Some Chinese documents referred to the southern regions of the peninsula contemporaneous with
Nangnang as Samhan, or three Han states (a different character from that of Han China). However, multiple ‘states’ are named as part of each of the three Hans, suggesting that the term meant something like a walled and possibly self-governing city with an agricultural hinterland. To confuse posterity further, one Chinese document refers to the whole south of the peninsula as the Chin State. Archaeological discoveries demonstrate that the south was developing under the stimulus of Nangnang. For example, a burial in the first century CE in the coastal region where one of the Kaya states was founded contained a writing brush, suggesting that literacy was known in the south of the peninsula during the Chinese Han dynasty. Other archaeological discoveries include southern coastal sites containing Chinese Han dynasty coins and oracle bones without inscriptions.
Korean histories refer to the time period from 57 BCE to CE 668 as the Three Kingdoms Period. The three kingdoms are Koguryo, Paekche, and Silla. In addition six city-states were called Kaya, and coexisted with these warring kingdoms before being conquered or absorbed by Silla. Archaeological discoveries do not entirely confirm the early beginnings of the southern states of Paekche and Silla, although a large city has been unearthed in the southwest, and early rich burials were found in Silla territory. Whenever each crystallized into a state, polities of some sort were forming in the north, southwest, and southeast of the peninsula respectively.
Koguryo was probably the earliest of the Korean kingdoms to become a true state, as we would now employ the term. The kingdom of Koguryo arose first in valleys of northern tributaries to the Yalu (Amnok) River. In Chinese writings Koguryo is described as an offshoot of Puyo, a polity in northern Manchuria and the Russian Far East, described in Qin dynasty records as the result of an expedition to that region.
Archaeologically, Koguryo is characterized by large stone tombs. They are mostly in Ji’an, although many contemporaneous burial sites are also found across the river on the North Korean side. As Koguryo expanded by conquest, a large walled city defended by a hill fort was constructed in Ji’an, in present-day China (see Asia, East: China, Neolithic Cultures; China, Paleolithic Cultures) on the north bank of the Yalu River. Within Ji’an, the development of large burials begins with stone-mounded tombs, followed by one unique tomb with monolithic stones shaped like a stepped pyramid, to tombs made of stone slab-rooms covered with earthen mounds. These last are the famed painted tombs, providing a wealth of information about the lives of the elite. Several murals depict a couple, presumably the tomb occupants, sitting side by side on a raised and covered platform.
In one such painting, servants prepare a feast, and wrestlers and dancers perform. A scene of hunting tigers and deer from horseback using the ‘Parthian shot’, twisted in the saddle to shoot with a long bow, is well known.
An inscribed stele found in the vicinity of Ji’an boasts of the exploits of King Kwanggaeto. The stele details the conquest of many towns in the fourth and fifth centuries. Kwanggaeto extended his realm far into the Dongbei, including sites in the current Liaoning and Jilin provinces. It is thought that the stone pyramid tomb, noted above, was his funerary monument. Buddhism and literacy were well established within the reign of King Kwanggaeto.
Later Koguryo kings drove the Han dynastic overlords from the Korean peninsula, and moved the capital to present-day Pyongyang. Painted tombs are found in large cemeteries, with Chinese influence visible in the style of the tombs, as well as in the use of the four seasonal animals (blue dragon, red bird, white tiger, and black tortoise). Both Buddhist and shamanic images are found painted on the walls of tombs (Figure 5).
Korean histories relate that Paekche was founded by two brothers who were younger sons of a Koguryo king. The archaeology near Seoul seems to reflect this tale, as stone mounded graves in pyramidal style have
Figure 5
Ladies.
Tomb painting - ox cart, armored horse, and noble
Been excavated along the Han River. Unsuccessful battles with Koguryo forced Paekche farther and farther south, while Koguryo occupied the Han River from the current location of Seoul to its mouth at Inchon. The kingdom of Paekche is known archaeologically from early fortresses at Inchon on the Yellow Sea coast and along the Han River in central Korea, and from later tombs and Buddhist monuments farther south, at Kongju and Puyo.
Near the final Paekche capital at present-day Kongju, an enormous Buddhist temple is under excavation, as well as part of a large palace and its extensive grounds. Several pagodas still stand, as well as miruks, which are life-sized human stone figures with a flat hat made from a separate stone. Although the name indicates they represent the matreiya, the Buddha of the future, they are unlike other Buddhist sculpture and probably antedate the adoption of Buddhism in the region.
A group of earth-mounded royal tombs occupies an area outside Kyongju. Inside they resemble small late Koguryo tombs, sometimes with faded painting on the stone-slab walls. They were all looted in antiquity, but a brick tomb was concealed underneath, and was entirely intact when it was discovered in 1971. This was the tomb of King Munyong and his wife, complete with inscriptions giving their names and the years of their deaths. Each wore a gold headdress of cut-out floral design, and gilt-bronze burial shoes. It is interesting that although Buddhism was flourishing at the time in Paekche, the burial has little Buddhist iconography. However, the tomb was constructed of bricks impressed with lotus designs, with a barrel vault ceiling and flame-shaped wall niches, reflecting Chinese styles.
The Silla kingdom developed around the city of Kumsong (meaning Gold Fortress), which is presently known as Kyongju. The history/mythology of Silla describes six tribes in the valley joining forces for strength against ‘enemies nearby’. The main city arose within a plain surrounded on three sides by rivers, protected by a hillfort on the southern river and fortresses ringing the higher mountains on all sides. The archaeology of Silla can be divided into three periods. Remains of some hilltop fortresses may partly derive from the earliest era, and documents would include the hill fort known as Panwolsong, or Half Moon Fortress. During the early period the polity was known as Saro. It may not have been yet a monarchy, although the king lists, based on a lost history of Silla, contain names of kings and queens as well as their parents, continuously from 57 BCE to CE 9xx.
The era of huge mounded tombs (fourth to sixth centuries) is well published, for the mounds were not easy to rob, and when first excavated in the 1930s
Figure 6 Gold crown from Silla.
They were found to contain rich grave goods. Most spectacular were the royal tombs, each of which included a gold crown, gold belt, and other gold jewelry such as necklaces, earrings, bracelets, and in some cases finger and toe rings (Figure 6). On the south mound of Tomb 98 in Kyongju, the gold weighed almost five kilograms. Horse trappings are prominent in these burials, especially bronze saddlebows with cut-out and gilded decoration. The crowns are tall, with uprights in the shape of antlers and stylized trees. Many scholars have related these shapes to shamanism, and indeed one of the early titles applied to the ruler is thought to mean shaman. The crowns are covered with dangling birch-leaf-shaped gold pieces and jade and glass gogok attached with twisted gold wire. Burial goods include artifacts made of birch bark, having painted designs including white horses and the red bird of the south. Exotic goods, such as Mediterranean glass containers, Central Asian silver bowls and an inlaid dagger also came to Silla from afar. Trade must have been conducted both over sea routes from the south and across the silk road through Central Asia. Although Silla is mentioned in Chinese writings of the time, Chinese artifacts are rare, consisting of only one small glazed bottle. As the kingdom farthest removed from China within the Korean peninsula, Silla resisted Chinese influence longest. This is particularly evident in the burial style, for both Koguryo - and Paekche-built Chinese Style tombs with entry passages intended to be reentered for postmortem ceremonies, which made them inviting to loot, while Silla tombs were impossible to re-enter, covered having several meters of boulders topped by more meters of earth.
Silla society was divided into endogamous groups called bone ranks, and sumptuary rules applied to each group, with restrictions specified for men and women separately. Only members of the Holy Bone were eligible to rule, but women could be selected as rulers as well as men. The largest and most spectacular of the mounded burials belonged to a queen. The True Bone were high nobles, with three other ranks of lesser nobles below them. Interestingly, the common people, both men and women, were allowed to own and ride horses, but they were restricted in the amount and kind of saddles and horse trappings they could display.
Buddhism was accepted in Silla by the fifth century, and burials became less lavish, as cremation became more commonplace. Mounded tombs were often surrounded by the 12 zodiacal year-signs of China, and some even had spirit paths leading up to them, guarded by life-sized stone animals and warriors. As in Paekche, enormous Buddhist temples were endowed, and the hills around Kyongju became filled with Buddhist carvings on stone boulders, which are still objects of pilgrimage.
Kaya is the name given to a group of city-states that never coalesced into a larger polity, and they were gradually conquered by Silla. They are often seen as allied with Paekche because of the written history, but in terms of artifacts such as pottery and weaponry they are closer to Silla. Six Kaya polities were distributed along the Naktong River valley and along the southern coast. The Kaya region was extremely rich in iron. Almost all cemeteries contain iron armor and iron weapons, and the richest burials have iron ingots laid out for a floor. It is likely that the large iron ingots were an important export. One Kaya tombs is reminiscent of multiple interment tombs in Liaoning, with a central burial and others radiating around it, separated by stonewalls. One burial hill has overlapping double mounds, in which one person’s head points north and the other northeast, suggesting that the husband and wife came from groups with different burial orientations.
The stonewares from Kaya are closely related to those of Silla. Kaya stoneware vessels in the shape of everyday objects allow unusual insights into the material culture. They include houses, carts, sandals, boats, and drinking horns. Three of them depict men on horseback, showing their complete clothing and the rigging of the horses, including stirrups. Of two found together, one is thought to be the noble, and the other the servant, due to differences in clothing. The third one is a soldier and horse both in armor.
After Silla conquered the Kaya states and other unaffiliated towns in the southeast, inscribed boundary stones that are still extant were set up on the mountain ridge dividing Silla from Paekche, in the region of the Han River, and far to the north on the east coast. Silla was able to conquer first Paekche and then Koguryo with the aid of the Tang Dynasty. In CE 668, all but the northernmost part of the peninsula was ruled by United Silla, with its capital still at Kyongju.
World History
