Jeolbuam Hermitage

This rock commemorates the fidelity of Lady Go. In the late Joseon period, a fisherman of this village named Gang Sa-cheol went out to sea to fish and met with disaster in a fierce storm. His wife, Lady Go, searched for her husband for several days, and when she finally could not find him, she considered it her duty to follow him in death; she put on white mourning clothes and hanged herself from a tree at this spot. Soon afterwards her husband's body suddenly floated up beneath this rock, and people all marvelled that it was just like the old story of Cao E of China — the daughter of Cao Gan, who drowned in a swift current while crossing a river; Cao E searched for her father for seventy days, and when his body could not be found she too threw herself into the river, floating back up five days later still holding her father's body. Regarding this as a wonder, the panggwan (local magistrate) of the time, Sin Jae-u, had the words "Jeolbuam" (節婦岩, "Rock of the Faithful Wife") carved into the rock where Lady Go had taken her life, so that later generations would remember her. The authorities also buried the couple together and, to console their spirits, had the villagers of this town hold a memorial rite every year on the fifteenth day of the third lunar month.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Jeju City, Jeju

Designation

Provincial Monument · 시도기념물