Miryang Gyodongmilseong Son Clan Old House

This building is a modern-era hanok standing in the centre of Dongchon, the eastern part of Gyo-dong village. Other heritage-designated houses stand nearby: the Son Clan Old House, the Son Jeong-gyu House, and the Son Dae-sik Old House (Cultural Heritage Material No. 175). The Gyo-dong Son Clan Old House consists of four buildings — the gate house (daemunchae), the middle-gate house (jungmun-ganchae, which also serves as a secondary sarangchae, or men's quarters), the main house (anchae), and the lower house (araetchae). A sarangchae originally stood here too, but it is said to have been bought and dismantled about thirty years ago by another lineage for use as a jaesil (ancestral memorial hall). The anchae was built around 1910. It is seven kan (bays, the standard unit of spacing between columns) wide across the front and one-and-a-half kan deep, in a reversed 'ㄱ'-shaped plan, with a five-kan araetchae added on in front of the geonneonbang (the room across the hall). Its floor plan runs, from left to right, geonneonbang, daecheong (wooden-floored hall), anbang (main room), and kitchen, with well-developed toe (narrow verandas) at front and back. Between the geonneonbang and the araetchae is a raised, half-kan-wide toenmaru (veranda) built like an internal loft, beneath which sits the kitchen for the geonneonbang; a plank door to its left gives access to the jar terrace on the anchae's left side. The anchae has a single eave and plain, unadorned bracketing (mindori). Its roof differs from side to side, with a hip-and-gable roof on the left and a gable roof on the right. The upper frame is a simple three-purlin structure resting on square columns set on roughly dressed stone bases atop a 650 mm natural-stone platform. On the front, the square columns, main beam, and veranda beam are joined without bracket-cap blocks, the column tops, eaves purlin, and supporting lintel being fitted together crosswise, with angled braces inserted beneath the beams for reinforcement; above, a trapezoidal or round panel-shaped king-post set on the main beam supports the ridge purlin. Comparing the roof's pitch with that of the rafters suggests extra rafters were added beside the ridge purlin to steepen the slope, a technique commonly found in modern-era hanok of the Miryang region. In recent years the platforms and floors of most of the buildings have been finished with cement mortar, glass windows added in front of the anchae's floor and veranda, and the rear plan and elevation altered by extensions that replaced window and door frames and changed wall materials, so that the original form has been partly damaged; the joinery of the rear columns, purlins and lintels is very simply treated, and cracking and sagging appear where timbers meet. The jungmun-ganchae is a single-eave, three-purlin mindori-jip, its square columns set on roughly dressed stone bases on a natural-stone platform; above the middle gate the ceiling plaster was never applied, leaving the lath exposed. Its roof likewise differs from south to north, hip-and-gable on the south side and gable on the north. It is a small, low building three kan wide and one kan deep, with one kan of wooden-floored room on the south and two kan of heated (ondol) rooms on the north; a narrow attached veranda runs in front of these rooms but leans severely inward and needs urgent repair. The jungmun-ganchae is currently occupied by a tenant, and a cement-brick wall built out at the rear, facing the men's-quarters courtyard, has damaged the elevation's original form. The daemunchae (three by one kan) was originally thatched but is said to have been re-roofed with Japanese-style tiles about thirty years ago; it now leaks and has been covered with tarpaulin. Its plan runs, from the left of the front, one kan for the gate passage and two kan of ondol rooms, with a men's lavatory attached at the rear, facing the road; extensions to enlarge the ondol rooms and cement-mortar finishing of the exterior walls have damaged its original form. The sarangchae that once stood east of the anchae was a straight, five-kan building; it was bought and dismantled by another lineage about thirty years ago for use as a jaesil, and only an empty plot now remains.

AI Translation

Where it is

Region

Miryang, Gyeongnam

Designation

Cultural Heritage Material · 문화유산자료