Stone Tablet with Inscription of Oath of the Imsin Year

The Imsin seogiseok is an elongated slate tablet, wider at the top and narrower at the bottom, with seventy-four characters inscribed in five lines on one face. At the head of the inscription is carved the sexagenary cyclical designation "Imsin", and because phrases pledging loyalty recur throughout the text, the stone is also known as the "Imsin seogimyeongseok" (Stone Inscribed with an Oath of the Imsin Year). The inscription reads as follows: "On the sixteenth day of the sixth month of the Imsin year, two men together swear an oath and record it. We swear before Heaven that from this day, for three years hence, we will keep to the Way of Loyalty and commit no fault. We swear that if we break this pledge we shall incur great guilt before Heaven. We swear that, should the state fall into disorder and the world into great turmoil, we will still carry out the Way of Loyalty. We also made a great oath earlier, on the twenty-second day of the seventh month of the Sinmi year, swearing to master, in turn, the Book of Odes, the Book of Documents, the Book of Rites and the Commentary on the Spring and Autumn Annals, within three years." It is the only epigraphic artefact to prove that, when Chinese characters and classical Chinese were adopted as a means of writing Korean, a "meaning-gloss" style of transcription existed in practice alongside the hyangchal style and the purely classical Chinese style. It stands as an emblem of the notion of sworn faith held by young men of Silla, embodying "befriending with trust", one of the Five Secular Commandments, and it also offers material suggesting something of the character of "Heaven" in the ancient beliefs of the Korean people. The Imsin year of the inscription is thought to be either 552, the thirteenth year of King Jinheung, or 612, the thirty-fourth year of King Jinpyeong, and in terms of calligraphic history, the shape of the characters, the brush technique and the method of carving all display the general characteristics of sixth-century Silla epigraphy.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Gyeongju, Gyeongbuk

Designation

Treasure · 보물