Bumosanseong Fortress, Cheongju

Bumosanseong Fortress stands astride the summit of Bumosan Mountain (231.7 m above sea level), which rises on the boundary between Biha-dong and Jidong-dong in Cheongju. It consists of a pogok-style stone-walled mountain fortress — a type that encloses a valley within its walls, rather than encircling only a hilltop — together with three small outpost fortresses (boru) built along the ridges extending from it. The Sinjeung dongguk yeoji seungnam (Newly Augmented Survey of the Geography of Korea) records: "Bumoseong is 15 ri west of the town. It has stone walls with a circumference of 2,427 cheok, and inside the fortress there is a large pond, but it is now abandoned." Later geographical texts record almost the same content. Converting the main wall's circumference of 2,427 cheok using the pobaek-cheok junsu standard (1 cheok = 46.73 cm) gives 1,134.1371 m. The wall of the fortress's main enceinte was built making full use of the projecting ridgeline. Its overall circumference is about 1,135 m, its width is roughly 6.4–7 m, and its height is thought to have been built to roughly match its width. The wall was constructed from the outer face upward following the slope of the mountain, built as a double wall with inner and outer faces from a certain height, and shows the characteristic gidan-bochuk structure, in which additional stonework was added to the outer face at the base to reinforce it. There are four gate sites, one on each of the valleys on the fortress's east, west, south and north sides, allowing access. Excavation of the north and west gate sites confirmed a hyeonmun ("suspended gate") structure, in which a ladder-like ramp was lowered from outside to allow passage, and it is presumed that the remaining two gate sites were of the same type. There are also water outlets in the eastern and northern valleys. Academic investigation of Bumosanseong began with a general surface survey in 1987, and its full extent became clear through a detailed surface survey in 1999. The area around the north gate site was excavated in 2004, and the west gate site, the first outpost and a lotus pond were excavated in 2012. These excavations yielded artefacts of both Silla and Baekje origin. The Silla artefacts — stemmed cups (gobae), lids and bowls dating to the mid-to-late sixth century — can be understood in connection with Silla's advance into the Cheongju region, while the Baekje artefacts — pottery sherds dating to the late sixth to early seventh century, and roof-tile fragments stamped with characters such as buk (北, north), jeon (front) and hu (rear) — show that Baekje retook and continued to manage the fortress, bringing about structural changes to its walls and gates. Bumosanseong thus shows that Baekje and Silla fought fiercely over control of this region. Although Cheongju, where the fortress stands, originally belonged to Baekje, the stonework of Bumosanseong's walls displays the characteristic building style of Silla's northward-advance period (sixth to seventh centuries), dating to the mid-to-late sixth century. Meanwhile, excavation of the fortress's first outpost and of the nearby Hakcheonsanseong Fortress revealed a Baekje-style earth-core stone-faced wall (tosim seokchuk), built with an earthen core faced with stone, suggesting that before the stone wall was built there may originally have been a Baekje earth-core wall on the same site.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Cheongju, Chungbuk

Designation

Provincial Monument · 시도기념물