이 논문에서는 16세기의 총부권 논의를 검토함으로써 조선 정부에서 현실과 관습을 어떠한 방식으로 수렴하여 유교적 친족질서를 정착시켜 나갔는지를 살펴보았다. 이를 통해 조선에 도입된 유교문화가 기존 질서와 상호작용하며 조선의 사회질서로 재탄생하는 과정을 파악하고자 하였다. 그리고 이 과정에서 사헌부, 사간원 관원들의 역할에 주목하였다. 총부는 적장자의 처이고, 총부권은 총부의 主祭權과 夫家 계승자 지명권이다. 총부권은 유교적 제사형태 하에서의 봉사자인 적장자가 아들 없이 사망했을 때 그의 처인 총부가 가지게 되었던 권한이었다. 그리고 당시에 여성이 이러한 권한을 가질 수 있었던 것은 소가족 단위의 생활 구조, 여성의 봉사와 입양이 가능했던 사회 풍토 등에 기인한다. 즉, 총부권은 유교적 제사형태와 종법이 정착되어 가는 과정에서 현실과 습합되어 나타난 것이었다. 다만 총부의 주제권이 종법과 조선의 관습이 습합되어 자연스럽게 나타난 현상이었던 반면 총부의 夫家 계승자 지명권은 嫡系 종통 계승을 지지하는 지식인층에 의해 고안되었던 것으로 판단된다. 조선 조정 내에서 총부권 존중을 주장하며 이를 관철시키는 역할을 했던 이들은 바로 사헌부, 사간원의 관원들이었다. 이들은 적계 종통 계승 체제를 정착시키기 위해 총부의 夫家 계승자 지명권 보장을 적극 주장하였다. 이를 통해 적장자가 아들 없이 사망한 경우 총부가 지명한 계후자가 차자나 차자의 장자보다 봉사의 우선권을 가지게 하고자 하였다. 또한 총부가 안정적으로 입후할 수 있도록 하기 위해 총부의 주제권을 보호하고자 하였다. 이들의 역할로 이 시기 조정의 논의는 대체적으로 총부권을 존중하는 방향으로 귀결되었다. 이는 입후의 필요성을 느끼는 여성들이 증가하는 가운데 조선에 적계 중심의 종법질서가 정착되는데 유용한 방안이 되었다. 이와 같이 사헌부, 사간원의 관원들은 안정적인 적계 종통 계승 체제의 정착을 위해 현실과 습합된 관행과 현실을 수렴한 방안을 적절히 이용하였다. 이렇게 현실을 수렴하여 정책을 고안하고, 조정의 논의를 주도해가며 이를 관철시켜 나갔던 이들의 모습을 통해 16세기 유교적 사회질서 정착 과정에서의 사헌부, 사간원의 비중있는 역할을 확인할 수 있다.

Examined in this article is the Joseon government`s and the society`s discussion of the so-called ``Chongbu rights``, in the 16th century. How the Joseon government surveyed the reality at hand, and selected customs that were deemed relevant, and then established a Confucian kinship order, will be assessed here through examination of the past people`s recognition of that particular topic. Also intended in this article is to determine what kind of an evolutionary process the Confucian culture imported from China actually went through in Joseon where it had to collide or interact with existing social orders, as well as to find out how the situations culminated and ended up creating a new Joseon-specific order, and define the roles played by the Saheon-bu(司憲府) and Sagan-weon(司諫院) officials. The term ``Chongbu`` refers to the wife of the successor-son of the house. And ``Chongbu Rights`` refer to a sort of authority which entitled the holder of that right to oversee preparations and conduct the ritual memorial services of the house, and also to appoint a person who should succeed her husband and then designate that person as the successor of her husband`s house. In other words, the ``Rights of the Chongbu`` meant the authority of the widow who had been married to a successor-son (who held the right to serve the ancestors in a way dictated by Confucian ritual service codes) yet lost that husband and was left without a son. The females of this time were able to wield this kind of power as small families became a social norm of living and the society and all its conventions allowed the females to assume the role of serving the ancestors or adopt children from outside. In that regard, the ``Rights of Chongbu`` was another product of reality which was witnessing the establishment of Confucian-style ritual memorial services and the settling down of certain kinship codes throughout the country. The Chongbu widow`s right to oversee all stages of the house`s ritual memorial services was formed rather smoothly with the kinship codes and Joseon customs merging with one another, while the Chongbu widow`s right to name the successor of her husband`s house seems to have been designed by the intellectual community, which supported and sponsored the idea of ``legitimate order of succession(the system that dictates the eldest and legitimate son to be the successor)``. Inside the Joseon government, the officials at the Saheon-bu and Sagan-weon offices strongly argued that the Rights of Chongbu should be respected and recognized. They were quite instrumental in establishing the Chongbu Rights as a normal practice of the society. In order to establish a ``legitimate order of succession`` system, they presented an argument which said that the Chongbu widow should be granted with the right to name the successor of her husband`s house, so that in case the successor-son dies without a son the Chongbu could name a successor who would have an ancestor-serving authority higher than any other one`s, including the authority of the second son(the younger brother of the deceased successor-son), or of the second son`s first offspring. Also, in order for the Chongbu to safely designate a successor, the officials of the said offices felt that the Chongbu`s authority in overseeing the ritual memorial services in the house should be respected and protected as well. Finally, with the efforts of these officials, it became the government`s general position to respect and recognize the rights and authority of the Chongbu widows. The females became increasingly concerned about the necessity of safe succession, and these offices` efforts ultimately contributed to the establishment of a successor-son-centered kinship code order throughout the Joseon society. As we can see, the governmental officials of the Saheon-bu and Sagan-weon offices employed customary conventions and methods based upon reality, in order to establish a stable ``legitimate order of succession`` system. By designing policies based upon real life situations and by leading the government`s overall discussions of relevant matters, the Saheon-bu and Sagan-weon offices played a pivotal role in the government`s overall efforts to install a Confucian social order in the 16th century.