Publications on Early Korea
Below are listed recent important publications on Early Korea.
Domesticating the Dharma, Buddhist Cults and the
Hwaŏm
Synthesis in Silla Korea
Richard D. McBride, II
Hawaii University Press
, 2007
Western scholarship has hitherto described the assimilation of Buddhism in Korea in terms of the importation of Sino-Indian and Chinese intellectual schools. This has led to an overemphasis on the scholastic understanding of Buddhism and overlooked evidence of the way Buddhism was practiced “on the ground.” Domesticating the Dharma provides a much-needed corrective to this view by presenting for the first time a descriptive analysis of the cultic practices that defined and shaped the way Buddhists in Silla Korea understood their religion from the sixth to tenth centuries. Critiquing the conventional two-tiered model of “elite” versus “popular” religion, Richard McBride demonstrates how the eminent monks, royalty, and hereditary aristocrats of Silla were the primary proponents of Buddhist cults and that rich and diverse practices spread to the common people because of their influence. Drawing on Buddhist hagiography, traditional narratives, historical anecdotes, and epigraphy, McBride describes the seminal role of the worship of Buddhist deities—in particular the Buddha
Śākyamuni, the future buddha Maitreya, and the bodhisattva Avalokiteśvara—in the domestication of the religion on the Korean peninsula and the use of imagery from the Maitreya cult to create a symbiosis between the native religious observances of Silla and those being imported from the Chinese cultural sphere. He shows how in turn Buddhist imagery transformed Silla intellectually, geographically, and spatially to represent a Buddha land and sacred locations detailed in the Avatamsaka
Sūtra
(Huayan jing/Hwaŏm kyŏng) . Emphasizing the importance of the interconnected vision of the universe described in the Avatamsaka
Sūtra, McBride depicts the synthesis of Buddhist cults and cultic practices that flourished in Silla Korea with the practice-oriented
Hwaŏm
tradition from the eight to tenth centuries and its subsequent rise to a uniquely Korean cult of the Divine Assembly described in scripture.
A History of the Early Korean Kingdom of Paekche, together with an annotated translation of The Paekche Annals of the Samguk sagi
Jonathan W. Best
Harvard University Asia Center, 2007
This volume presents two histories of the early Korean kingdom of Paekche (trad. 18 BCE-660 CE). The first, written by Jonathan Best, is based largely on primary sources, both written and archaeological. This initial history of Paekche serves, in part, to introduce the second, an extensively annotated translation of the oldest history of the kingdom, the Paekche Annals (Paekche pon'gi). Written in the chronicle format standard for the traditional official histories of East Asia, the Paekche Annals constitutes one section of the Histories of the Three Kingdoms (Samguk sagi), a comprehensive account of early Korean history compiled under the editorial direction of Kim Pusik (1075-1151). Although these two representations of Paekche history differ markedly, the underlying problem faced by both the twelfth-century and the twenty-first-century historian is essentially the same: fashioning a responsible, encompassing, and reasonably coherent history of the kingdom from meager, and often disparate and fragmentary, evidence.
Included in the volume are 22 appendixes on problems in Paekche history; a concordance of proper names, official titles, omens, and weights and measures; a glossary of geographical names; and six historical maps of the kingdom showing its changing boundaries.
Constructing "Korean" Origins:
A Critical Review of Archaeology, Historiography, and Racial Myth in Korean State-Formation Theories
Hyung Il Pai
Harvard University Asia Center, 2000
In this wide-ranging study, Hyung Il Pai examines how archaeological finds from throughout Northeast Asia have been used in Korea to construct a myth of state formation. This myth emphasizes the ancient development of a pure Korean race that created a civilization rivaling those of China and Japan and a unified state controlling a wide area in Asia. Through a new analysis of the archaeological data, Pai shows that the Korean state was in fact formed much later and that it reflected diverse influences from throughout Northern Asia, particularly the material culture of Han China. Her deconstruction of the uses of the archaeological finds by nationalistic historians reveals how they have been utilized to legitimate Korean nationalism and a particular form of national identity.
Reference Books on Early Korea
Dictionary of Korean Art and Archaeology
Roderick Whitfield (Editor in Chief)
Hollym, 2004
352 pp. 110mm X 182mm,
Softcover.
ISBN: 1-56591-201-2
See more information at Hollym's website