Chairman
"Koguryo was a mighty country with a large territory and a highly developed culture. Its people were very courageous and passionately patriotic. Its great strength and its high cultural standard are of great pride to our nation."
Among the precious cultural heritages showing the advanced cultural level of Koguryo is a group of Koguryo tombs in Taesong-dong.
They are at the foot of a mountain extending southwest from Kuksa Peak of Mt. Taesong in Taesong District, Pyongyang, with an area of about 1 km².
There are many historical relics including the site of the Anhak Palace, Fort on Mt. Taesong, Earthen Wall of Chongam-dong and Namgyong Relics around it.
They were excavated between 2004 and 2010.
Here you can find 30 odd earth-covered stone coffins and earth-covered stone graves.
The earth-covered stone coffins, which were made of rubble stones and then heaped up with soil, were common in the early days of Koguryo.
The earth-covered stone graves, which had a room for the dead with stones and heaped up with soil, came into being from about the 2nd century.
Among a group of Koguryo tombs in Taesong-dong are different kinds of tombs. One of them is the simple tomb which doesn't have a separate room for the dead and path; the other is the tomb that has the room for the dead on one side and the path on the other side; you can also see the different kind of tomb-it has path in the middle while the room for the dead is on both sides.
And the number of the coffins also varies: some of them have only one coffin, the other has two or three coffins inside the room for the dead.
This shows that they were used for a relatively long time.
Among the earth-covered stone graves Tomb No. 34 is a mural tomb built around the 4th century, in which the walls of the west, north and south of the inner room are severely damaged so that traces of mural paintings can hardly be found, and only part of the mural remains on the eastern wall.
The mural painting on the eastern wall is accepted as Blue Dragon, reminiscent of the painting of Blue Dragon in the tomb of four guardians in Honam-ri, Samsok District, Pyongyang, in form, composition and tone of color.
This mural shows the excellent painting skills of Koguryo.
Many relics such as gold earrings, gold strings and other precious metal relics, tripetalous ring-handled knife ornaments, iron mirrors, iron knives, tubular rings, tubular ornaments, tubular nails and staples were unearthed from the tombs.
The gold earrings were unearthed from the eastern chamber of Tomb No. 7.
Tomb No. 7 is a single burial mound with 3 corpse chambers in it.
The gold earring is 2.67 cm long and weighs 9.87 g, and consists of the main thick ring, hanging decoration, and the connecting ring that link.
Hanging decoration is made up of several mini decorations, they are a spherical middle decoration, an abacus ball decoration, and a conical decoration; the upper and lower sides of the spherical middle decoration are filigreed with tiny gold beads of 0.15-0.2 mm in diameter, and the sides are engraved with vine patterns.
Gold earrings are very elaborate and exquisite in filigree.
Gold strings were excavated at the northern end of the eastern bier of Tomb No. 3.
This gold string is believed to be a forging one, and even has patterns on the surface.
They managed to excavate 4 pieces of gold ornaments from Tomb No. 34.
Three of them are tubular with convex middle parts and narrow ends, whose holes measure 0.1 mm in diameter.
This is thought to be a part of a necklace.
The last is a cube-shaped decoration, which they put together six rings of 3.2 mm in diameter to make the shape of a cube. In fact, they made those six rings with the gold strings measured 1 mm across.
Such things are recorded to have been used in Koguryo, Silla and Kaya to make the middle part of the necklace more attractive.
From The tomb No. 34 you can also see two pieces of ring-handle knife ornaments of the same type but different in size.
You can still see the shape of the ring-handle knife ornaments as they are preserved in a comparatively good condition, with tripetalous carves on the oval ring at the end of the knife-handle.
And there are some flat, oval silver-shaped plate rings at the joint in the handle and the neck part.
It is now recognized as a scientific doctrine that the relics such as the ring-handle knife ornaments have so far been excavated from some of the tombs of Kaya and Silla, and that all those tombs are accepted to have existed after the early 5th century.
Therefore, the fact that relatively old relics such as ring-handle long swords accepted to have been from around the 4th century have been discovered at the Koguryo historic site tell us the possibilities of its introduction into Kaya and Silla along with Koguryo's southward advance for the unification of the Three Kingdoms.
Besides, a lot of earthenware such as dish, porcelain brass, steamer, bottle, cup and various pieces of tiles were known at Koguryo tombs in Taesong-dong area.
The historic sites and relics unearthed in a group of Koguryo tombs in Taesong-dong area are of great significance in scientifically illuminating the history and culture of Koguryo.
The excavation of various kinds and forms of graves in a group of Koguryo tombs in Taesong-dong proves that the Koguryo people advanced into Pyongyang from early days and created a developed culture and that Pyongyang was the center of cultural development in the Koguryo period just as in the Ancient Joson period.
And gold earrings and other metal crafts clearly show the high level of developed Koguryo culture and the central role Koguryo played in the development of dominant culture in the period of the Three Kingdoms.
As you can see, a group of Koguryo tombs in Taesong-dong are precious remains in studying the history and culture of Koguryo because of its diverse tomb structures, mural paintings, precious metal crafts and other relics.
