Munongjeong Pavilion, Cheongju

Munongjeong in Cheongju is a pavilion built in the early Goryeo period by Han Ran, founding ancestor of the Cheongju Han clan, to encourage farming among the people. Long after its founding the pavilion fell into ruin and only the old site remained, until descendants rebuilt it in 1949; it was destroyed again during the Korean War and restored once more in 1988. It stands on a hill to the left of Bangseo intersection, on the road running from central Cheongju towards Boeun. The area around the pavilion is now landscaped as a park with dense woods, and it commands fine views over the Musimcheon stream and the Yongpyeong plain below. Whereas pavilions were generally used as places for teaching the humanities to younger scholars, Munongjeong was unusual in that it was a place where ordinary farmers were taught methods of agriculture, putting it, in terms of intellectual lineage, closer to Silhak, the practical-learning school of thought. Munongjeong is a wooden, tile-roofed building three bays wide and two bays deep, with double eaves under a hipped-and-gabled roof. Its foundation stones are squared granite blocks, giving it none of the rustic charm of more roughly dressed stonework. The columns are round, thicker than the changbang tie beam and other members above them relative to their height, which is so low that the proportions of the building as a whole feel unbalanced. The bracket sets have no projecting arms on the inside but a single row on the outside, in the simple jusimpo style with brackets set only on the columns; the ox-tongue-shaped bracket arms project a long way out, and the basic joinery follows Goryeo-period timber construction methods, though the carving style of the brackets is of a late, somewhat decadent form that feels rather out of keeping with the traditional style. The roof frame is a five-purlin structure without a central king post, with a wave-patterned strut supporting the ridge purlin. Inside, the floor is laid with wooden boards in a well-frame pattern and surrounded by a balustrade with curved corner posts; at the centre of the building hangs a plaque written by a later descendant, Han Gi-geun. The building faces west, with a single-post gate at its front entrance, and is enclosed on all sides by a low wall of rough fieldstones capped with roof tiles. Munongjeong is a place of great historical value, embodying both Han Ran's passion for education and the turbulent times of the Later Three Kingdoms period.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Cheongju, Chungbuk

Designation

Provincial Monument · 시도기념물