Five-story Stone Pagoda of Yongjusa Temple, Hwaseong

This pagoda originally stood near Yongjusa Temple, and was later moved, via the rear yard of Jijangjeon Hall, to its present location in front of the Hyohaeng Museum (Museum of Filial Conduct). It stands 4.5m tall overall and is made of granite. The five-story pagoda has a single-tier base surmounted by a five-story body and a finial. The base consists of a large rectangular lower stone set on the ground stone, joined to a middle stone and an upper stone. Each face of the lower stone bears three carved ansang (blind-arch) motifs, and one face of the body stone (myeonseok) carries a spirit-tablet-shaped motif. The base's cover stone has a gently sloping drip surface on top, with a single low tier serving as the pagoda body's support at the centre. The pagoda body is formed of body stones and roof stones (okgaeseok, the roof-like stone capping a pagoda or stone lantern), each a single piece, with corner pillars carved on every body stone. The first-story body stone has door-leaf motifs carved on its front and back, and the fifth-story body appears to be a later restoration. Among the roof stones, the supports beneath the first to third stories are worked in four tiers and the fourth in three, but the fifth is carved in relief imitating the joinery of rafters and hip-rafter brackets from timber architecture. The drip surfaces slope gently, the lines at the four corners are clearly rendered, and holes remain where wind chimes were once hung. The finial is formed as a single piece with the fifth-story roof stone, with an inverted-bowl ornament and a jewel finial carved in sequence above a round, flat roof-disk stone. Judging from the style of the body and roof stones, the stone-dressing technique, and the rate at which the stories diminish in size, the pagoda is presumed to have been built in the late Goryeo period.

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Where it is

Region

Hwaseong, Gyeonggi

Designation

Provincial Tangible Heritage · 시도유형문화유산