via yonhapnews.co.kr, February 20, 2008
Over 1,000 Proto Three Kingdoms Period Relics Excavated at Kyŏngsan
As a result of excavations performed at Amnyang-myŏn in Kyŏngsan, North Kyŏngsang Province , where urban development work has been planned since March 2006, some 1,359 artifacts have been discovered in wooden coffin tombs dated to the Proto Three Kingdoms period.
According to the Yŏngnam Institute of Cultural Properties ( 영남문화재연구원 ), numerous artifacts from various ages, including the Proto Three Kingdoms, the Unified Silla, and the Koryo periods, were excavated in a 104,000 square meter zone slated for urban development projects.
Many of the artifacts date from the Proto Three Kingdoms period, which lasted from the early first century A.D. to the early second century.
The bronze horse-shaped and tiger-shaped belt buckles, folding fans and bracelets excavated from wooden coffin tomb are believed to be prestige items indicating the status of the individuals interred in the tombs.
The site yielded 843 artifacts belonging to the Proto Three Kingdoms period, including ceramics, ironware, bronze ware, glass and jewels, found in 109 wooden coffin tombs and 45 earthenware urn burials. Another 21 artifacts of various types were recovered from one stone chamber tomb and five stone cist tombs belonging to the Unified Silla period of the seventh and eighth centuries.
Celadon plates and bowls, bronze spoons, and iron scissors were excavated from four stone cist tombs and 334 earth pit tombs of the Koryŏ period.
Yi Hŭi-jun, director of the institute, said that the Proto Three Kingdoms site is a large-scale cemetery distributed broadly over the top and sides of a low hill and provides valuable data for the research of tomb groups of this period. He also mentioned that this site was used continuously as a space for burials, in light of the fact that it yielded various tombs and artifacts of various ages ranging through the Unified Silla, Koryŏ and Chosŏn periods.
A newspaper article (in Korean) is HERE