Pyeongtaek Yongseong-ri Fortress Site

This is a flat-land earthen fortress at Yongseong-ri, Anjung-eup, Pyeongtaek-si, built on a low hill 30–40 m above sea level. In plan it is roughly trapezoidal, with the north wall slightly shorter than the others; given that the east wall was damaged during the construction of an agricultural irrigation channel, the original shape is thought to have been rectangular. The fortress has a circumference of 449 m. Its walls contain three gate sites, five chi (projecting bastions), and drainage outlets. Five building sites have been identified within the walls, and there was a moat outside them. The walls were built by using the slope of a natural ridge and raising earth to fill in the lower ground. The wall surfaces were levelled and then built up by alternating and compacting layers of clay and weathered granite soil (masato). Each layer of soil is 10–50 cm thick, thicker and coarser than is typical of Goryeo-period earthen fortresses. No distinction can be identified between a foundation stone course and separate inner and outer layers of rammed earth. Traces of wooden posts were found at roughly 1.5 m intervals at the base of the wall, suggesting that the Yongseong-ri earthen fortress was not built using the panchuk (board-frame rammed-earth) method, but rather by setting up wooden posts and then piling and compacting earth around them. Given this construction technique, the Yongseong-ri earthen fortress was most likely built during the Joseon period. Since tradition holds that the hyanggyo (local Confucian school) of Yongseong-hyeon once stood here, it is possible that the fortress was built in the course of relocating the administrative seat of Yongseong-hyeon. Most of the artefacts excavated within the fortress — porcelain, earthenware, and roof-tile fragments — date to the Joseon period, suggesting that the site mainly functioned as the walled town (eupseong) or a granary fortress (changseong) of Yongseong-hyeon during the Joseon period.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Pyeongtaek, Gyeonggi

Designation

Provincial Monument · 시도기념물