Deongneungmaeul Village Mountain Spirit Shrine

A sansingak is a shrine enshrining the mountain spirit (sansin), a native Korean deity, and it functions to protect the village and nearby temples. As its name suggests, Deongneung Village formed around a royal tomb or the grave of a member of the royal family. Deongneung, meaning "Tomb of Virtue", is another name for the tomb of Deokheung Daewongun (1530–1559), the father of King Seonjo of Joseon. The shrine measures one kan across the front and one and a half kan along the side. Viewed from the side, its roofline takes the form of a gable roof (matbae) resembling the Chinese character for "person" (人), and wind boards (pungpan) have been fitted on both sides to block the wind. Inside hangs a painting of the mountain spirit in the style of a taenghwa, a Buddhist ceremonial painting: at the centre sits the mountain spirit holding a lotus-shaped fan; to the left is a tiger of the kind seen in folk paintings; and to the right are a maiden holding a peach, a monk brewing tea, and two child attendants. Villagers regard this mountain spirit as the spirit of Suraksan Mountain. The shrine was built in 1882 by the villagers to pray for the peace of the village, and a rite to the mountain spirit is still held there today. After a date is chosen in the first and tenth lunar months, the villagers select a single officiant — someone judged to have auspicious fortune that day and to be ritually pure — to perform a Confucian-style rite at night, using a cow's head as the offering. Taken together, the shrine, the painting, and the rite show a fusion of traditional belief in the mountain spirit, Buddhist faith, and Confucian ritual, forming important material illustrating one aspect of village religion as it developed during the Joseon period. The shrine was most recently repaired in 1998.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Namyangju, Gyeonggi

Designation

Provincial Folklore Heritage · 시도민속문화유산