Stone Chamber Tombs of the Unified Silla Period Excavated at Myŏngnyun-dong in Sungkyunkwan University

Stone chamber tombs of the Unified Silla Period (668-935) have been unearthed at Sungkyunkwan University in Myŏngnyun-dong, Chongno-gu, Seoul. This marks the first time that tombs of the Unified Silla Period have been found within the old walls of Seoul.

According to the Korea Institute of Heritage (Director, Kim Pyŏng-mo), which specializes in the investigation of buried cultural heritage, two stone chamber tombs of the Unified Silla Period, two building sites, remnants of a wall, one storage facility and four pit features have been found as a result excavations conducted since last August 30 at N0. 51, Myŏngnyun 3-ka-dong, the planned construction site of the Sungkyunkwan Global Educational facility.

At the time of their discovery, the two stone chamber tombs had only one to three tiers of their stone walls and a part of their stone chamber structure remaining. It is assumed that the tombs were first damaged by the construction of the wall discovered there, and again later by modern building construction.

Stone chamber tomb no.1 (picture above) measures 330cm (partial) by 260cm and was oriented in an east-west direction. It is assumed that there was one additional burial at the site.

One researcher explained that the full extent of the walls cannot be determined due to the poor state of preservation, but judging from the two tiers that remain of the west wall of the tomb, the walls were constructed using both vertical and horizontal piling of stones. Four mounted cups (高杯), one lid, and one bowl were recovered from this tomb.

Stone chamber tomb no. 2 was found 14 m to the north of from tomb no. 1. The size of chamber is 350cm (estimated) x 220cm (partial). The stones used in the construction of the walls were granite, which is easily obtained in the vicinity of the site. No artifacts were recovered from this tomb.

Kim A-gwan, director of the research office of the Korea Institute of Heritage, states that though the features found at this site are few in number, the site is worthy of note for the unprecedented discovery within the old walls of Seoul of stone chamber tombs dating to the Unified Silla Period. He also explained that detailed investigation should be conducted to verify the usage and time of construction of the storage facility feature, which predated building site no.1.

Original news story (Newsis) reported by Lee Jaehoon (realpaper7@newsis.com)
25 October 2010.  

A newspaper article (in Korean) is here.