Chairman
"The developed culture of our country was known to the world from its early days, exerting a great influence on the cultural development of its neighbouring countries. In particular, its influence on the cultural development of ancient Japan was great."
Okchungjuja is one of the cultural relics which show the the high technical arts of Koguryo people to the full. It is preserved in the the main building of Popnyung Temple in Nara prefecture in Japan.
It is one of the typical relics of the Aska era(the mid-6th century – the late 7th century), which was known as the golden age of the culture of ancient burial mounds. It was made as a Bulgam(a kind of cabinet for keeping Buddhist images) of King Chugo(593-628), who loved it very much.
"juja" literally means a cabinet for keeping Buddhist images and "okchung" is the name of a beetle called Kiljongchung.
From old times, the beautiful wings of these beetles were widely used for decoration. And okchungjuja is one of such typical examples.
It is divided roughly into two parts.
The lower part is called Sumidan(a daise which shows a legendary mountain in Buddhism) and is to be used as the stand. The upper part is juja, which is also called the palace part because its architecture was modelled after a palace or a temple.
The upper part of the palace was raised with a gabled roof, and its details were fully artistically decorated, even to its ridge-end tiles, antefixes and beams.
In particular, the pictures and decorative techniques show well the characteristics of okchungjuja.
Its stand(the lower part), the mountains and trees, the house with a gabled roof, the Buddhist image as the main character and the maids on its both sides as well as Tabo Pagoda, fairies and phoenixes and so on depicted on the walls of the palace part, all these make it possible to understand its elaboration and grace at first sight.
For main ornamental purposes are the metal fixtures carved with okchung's wings and vine patterns with perforation technique on its stand and the edges of the stylobate of the palace part. The purplish red and green of the wings and the yellow gold of the fixtures are in brilliant harmony with each other.
According to the fact, more than a thousand and hundreds of okchung's wings in golden green were used to make this okchungjuja.
Okchungjuja vividly shows the advanced craftwork, fine arts and architecture of Koguryo in painting and processing techniques.
The mountains and trees, the house with a gabled roof, the crow with three feet, the toad which symbolizes the sun and the moon as well as Tabo Pagoda, the fairies, phoenixes and the vine patterns depicted on the walls of okchungjuja can be clearly seen in the murals of Koguryo tombs built in the first half of the 4th century.
The decoration of the ridge-end tiles on its roof are just the same as those at the site of Anhak Palace. Likewise the perforation technique applied here is not at all different from that of Koguryo tombs like tombs No. 7 and No. 16 in Jinpa Ri(today's Ryongsan Ri). This fact shows well the Koguryo-style characteristics of the okchungjuja.
As seen above, Okchungjuja is one of the excellent craftworks which show well the woodcraft and metal decoration techniques as well as the admirable pictorial art and architecture of Koguryo, and is an evident proof that the culture of Koguryo had a direct influence on Japan in the period of the Three Kingdoms.
