We visited Samnagnseong Castle on the day we went to Ganghwa island with Mr Kim and his wife. Expecting to go vegetable picking at his wifes parents farm we were surprised when he pulled up a side road and told us he would be back in 45 minutes to pick us up.

Having no idea what lay ahead we walked up the massive hill from the car park and found ourselves at the entrance to Samnagnseong Castle. The plaque at the entrance to the castle read:

It is not obvious when this castle was built, but according to the records it is said that the founding father of Korea Dangun had his three sons make this castle and named it Samnangseong Castle. It is also called Jeongjok mountain fortress wall. At the start it was built with a sort of mud with broken stones laid on top. This style is followed in the fortification period of the tree kingdoms.

Facilities of this castle were the Mannum-ru (the south gate tower), the Dongmun (the east gate tower), the Seomum (the west gate tower) and the Bukmun (the north gate tower) and 13 wells in the castle. There is Jeondeungsa Temple in the castle. The government also built archives here for the preservation of royal chronicles, and established a tempory palace in this castle.

In the middle of the Joseon dynasty the Seonwonbogak was built. In 1866 general Yang Heon-su defeated the French naval invaders. The south gate Jonghae-ru was restored to its original condition in 1976.

Walking around it was clear that there isn’t much left to see of the castle. But the fortress wall and the temple have been restored. Some more information about the origins of the castle and the restoration work can be found here.

We arrived at the stunning temple which is in full working order. The temple is called Jeondeungsa Temple. According to a website called Korea Temple Jeondeungsa Temple was established by a monk called Monk Adohwasang of Goguryeo. After the temple was established Queen Jeonhwa, during the reign of King Chunryeol (reign 1274~1308), donated a jade lantern to the temple and it was renamed Jeondeungsa Temple.

As we entered the temple the first thing we saw was this tower style building.

The plaque beside this building read:

This is a tower style building at the entrance to the temple. Nobody exactly knows when this building was constructed. But it is estimated it has existed since the time of the Goryeo Dynasty because Daejoro is described in ‘Jeondeungsasi’ a poem written by Yi Saek, a great scholar of Goryeo Dynasty.

It was rebuilt in 1932 during the rebuilding of the other building of the temple.

Across from Daejoru was the main temple building called Daeungjeon. There is a bit of a legend behind this building. The plaque outside read:

Rebuilt in the 13th year (1621) The King of Gwanghaegun’s rule over the Joseon Dynasty, this wooden building is three kan (a traditional architectural measurement meaning the distance between two columns) at the front and back and three kan at the sides. The building has finely carved multi-tier wooden ornaments on the top of each column as well as between columns. All columns show entasis with slight convex curve in the middle, creating a stable look, at the four corner columns have carvings of naked women at the apex. Legend has it that the architect designed them to warn against the unfaithfulness of women, and purge her from the sin, after his lover ran away from him during the construction work. Three Buddhas are enshrined in the hall, which features a lavishly decorated ceiling with bright colours and sculptures of animals, flowers and dragons, phoenix and lotus blossoms. The altar and the canopy over it are exuberantly decorated.

And the inside of the building is beautiful.

The intricate carvings and paintwork must have taken a lot of hours and patience to do. It’s no wonder the architect got annoyed when his lover left him during the building work!

Next to the main temple building we came across piles of what appeared to be roof slates with writing on (picky below). Whilst discussing between ourselves what they could mean a very helpful Korean explained in broken English that they were in fact roof tiles. The writing on them was wishes and the tiles would eventually be placed on the roof of the temple.

The next building we came to was the Yaksajeon which housed the medicine Buddha. From the outside this building was not as spectacular and difficult to get a picture of. But the inside was elaborately decorated. It is unclear when the Yaksajeon was built. The Korea temple website gave this information:

It is not clear when this hall, which is dedicated to Yaksayeorae, the Buddha of Medicine, was constructed. The only available record notes only that the roof tiles of the hall were replaced in the 13th year of King Gojong (1876). The multi-bracketed eaves, the hipped-and-gabled roof, the rectangular, dressed stones of the platform-like foundation, and the tapering pillars are all typical of structures built during the middle of the Joseon period (1392-1910). However, the flat beams that usually accompany the tie beams in this kind of structure are missing.

The plaque outside the building estimated that it was probably built at a similar time to the Daeungjeon. The plaque read:

Yaksajeon is a temple hall where the medicine Buddha is enshrined. According to the historical record this building had new roof tiles in the 13th year (1876) of King Gojong’s rule of Joseon. While there is no record that mentions its exact date of construction, a similar architectural style to the temple’s main service hall suggests that it was built during the mid-Joseon era. It is of three kan at the front and back and two kan at the sides with a hipped-and-gabled roof. The cross-hatched ceiling is decorated with patterns of lotus blossoms and vines.

During our brief visit we also managed to get a look at Jeondeungsa Temple’s iron bell. This bell (picky below) is Chinese, according to the Korea Temple website it originally belonged to the belonged to Sungmyeongsa Temple, Mt. Baekam, Hanam Province of China. The bell is thought to date from the fourth year of the king Cheoljong (A.D 1097) of the North Sung Dynasty. It it thought to have come to Jeondeungsa after it was found in Japanese arms storage after the declaration of Korean independence and was carried into Jeondeungsa Temple. The bell is the only Chinese iron bell to be appointed as a treasure in Korea.

The plaque beside the bell read:

A Chinese bell originally made in 1097 for Sungmming Temple of Henan during the Chinese Sung Dynasty. This unique iron piece was moved to its current site from Bupeyong Armory just after the second world war. It is know that the bell was collected by the Japanese colonial authority during the war, as it desperately needed more materials to make arms.

The top loop of the bell is decorated with two dragons, and there are eight trigrams, or signs of divination , carved in relief at the upper part of the body; its lower part is decorated with squares, also carved in relief. The inscriptions on the squared tell us it was made in the fourth year (1097) of King Cheoljong’s rule over Northern Sung for Sungming temple at Henan Province, China.

There is not a huge amount more to say about Samnagnseong Castle and the formatting on this post keeps messing up. So I’ll leave it there for now. Look out for a futher post about our trip to Gangwha Island.

* Posted by j150vsc on 08/10/2006.