What it was
In the sixth and seventh centuries, Silla organized aristocratic boys into bands of hwarang — “flower youths” — who trained in ethics, music, poetry, and war while roaming sacred mountains and rivers. Later sources, the Samguk Sagi and the Samguk Yusa, preserve the “Five Secular Injunctions” the monk Won’gwang gave two hwarang: loyalty to the king, filial piety, trust among friends, no retreat in battle, and discrimination in taking life.
Role
The order bound the young aristocracy to the throne and the battlefield, and it supplied the unification era’s leadership. Kim Yu-sin was a hwarang leader, and the boy warrior Gwanchang, who died charging the Baekje lines at Hwangsanbeol in 660, became its martyr-emblem.
Fate
The order faded after unification. It has been richly romanticized since — in nationalist historiography and in today’s dramas and games — and the sparse early sources should be distinguished from that modern image.