Rise of Goguryeo: Museum highlight ancient Korean heritage in creative new ways

The National Museum of Korea features a massive new LED replica of a Goguryeo stone monument. Digital recreations are one way in which the museum aims to compensate for the unavailability of the artifacts.

The digital reconstruction of “Stele of King Gwanggaeto” greets visitors to the National Museum of Korea. Measuring 8 meters (26 feet) tall and 2.6 meters wide, it has 1,775 characters or syllables inscribed onto it, which experts copied using the copy made by scholar Lim Chang-sun (1914-1999). Installed at the Path to History section on Jan. 24, it recreates the stone monument from the Goguryeo Dynasty (37 B.C. to A.D. 668). [NEWS 1]

Korea’s ancient Goguryeo Dynasty, which lasted from 37 B.C. to A.D. 668, likely has never enjoyed the limelight as much as it is now at the National Museum of Korea.

At the museum's Path to History section that leads to its permanent exhibitions, there now stands a massive LED media tower replica of a Goguryeo stone monument believed to be around 1,600 years old.

The National Museum of Korea is visited by 4 million people every year, and the Path to History is located at the entrance. Of the different kingdoms in Korea’s vibrant Three Kingdoms Period (57 B.C.-A.D. 668), Goguryeo oftentimes doesn't receive as much attention as Silla or Baekje.

Known as the Stele of King Gwanggaeto, the monument was discovered in the 19th century in Jian, China. A stele is a stone slab with an inscribed surface.

The media tower is 7.5 meters high (8 meters, or 26 feet, including the pedestal) and has four sides that display the inscriptions of the Stele of King Gwanggaeto, with 1,775 characters or syllables in total, that describe the myth of how Goguryeo was established and the achievements of King Gwanggaeto (374-412), who is touted as one of the greatest conquerors in Korean history for expanding the territory of Goguryeo into northeastern China.

Officials made sure that visitors don’t miss the important bits, with the digital display zoomed in on certain parts and the text available both in Korean and English. On the walls of the room holding the tower, four life size scrolls with the inscriptions are installed, with supplemental explanations again in Korean and English on the bottom.

Better than real life The epitaph on this media tower is much easier to read than that of the real stele.

The Stele of King Gwanggaeto is known to have been erected by King Jangsu (394-491) during his reign to honor his late father, King Gwanggaeto. Historians believe the Stele of King Gwanggaeto was erected in 414.

But with the fall of Goguryeo, the stone monument was also long forgotten.

It was only in the early 1880s, the years leading up to Japanese colonization of Korea that began in 1910, that the Stele of King Gwanggaeto was rediscovered, covered with moss, by a Japanese historian.

Researchers at the time were greatly impressed by the unique calligraphy styles on the stele, but the epitaph was significantly damaged in the process of removing the moss and making rubbings of the inscriptions, likely due to their hastiness coupled with a lack of expertise.

For the media tower, officials mainly used the Cheongmyeongbon version of the many prints that were made of the stele but also referred to many other prints.

“We were able to supplement 362 letters with help from a version in Kyujanggak Institute for Korean Studies and National Museum of Japanese History," Ryu Jeong-hwan, a researcher at the National Museum of Korea, said.

At the Goguryeo exhibit in the museum, the three Goguryeo tomb murals (Anak No. 3 Tomb, Deokheungri Tomb, and Gangseodaemyo) are also digitally reenacted. In fact, they are more vibrant than the reality thanks to the images created based on photo materials and replicas and projected to fill up the entire space. [NATIONAL MUSEUM OF KOREA]

At the Goguryeo exhibit in the museum, the three Goguryeo tomb murals (Anak No. 3 Tomb, Deokheungri Tomb, and Gangseodaemyo) are also digitally reenacted. In fact, they are more vibrant than the reality thanks to the images created based on photo materials and replicas and projected to fill up the entire space. [NATIONAL MUSEUM OF KOREA]

Digital Goguryeo There are other instances in which digital reconstructions can be more helpful for the general public than the real-life artifacts. Take for instance the Goguryeo tomb murals that are in today’s North Korea.

Three tombs currently in North Korea — Anak No. 3 Tomb, Deokheungri Tomb and Gangseodaemyo — are recreated at the prehistoric and ancient history exhibition halls at the National Museum of Korea, by projecting images onto the walls and ceilings. Entering the spaces with the images projected all around gives a sense of visiting the actual tombs.

The “Complex of Koguryo Tombs,” which contains exquisite mural paintings of people and animals that provide a glimpse into what life was like back then, was successfully inscribed as North Korea’s first Unesco World Heritage site in 2004.

“We recreated the images based on photographs of the inside of the tombs and also referred to replica drawings that date back to the Japanese colonial period,” Jang Eun-jeong, the researcher who led the project back in 2020, told reporters at the time.

The photographs, Jang said, were taken by historians from South and North Korea in 2006 when they jointly explored around 10 Goguryeo tombs.

Officials also worked to recreate the textures of the stone room within the tomb by replicating the same stone feel and colors of granite and marble. When depicting the four guardian deities — the blue dragon, white tiger, black tortoise-serpent and red phoenix — they opted for animations.

The archaeological site of Goguryeo military facilities at Mount Acha was revealed to journalists in 2013. [JOONGANG PHOTO]

Why not real artifacts? Museum officials have their reasons for resorting to digital recreations when it comes to Goguryeo era exhibits in particular.

Out of the numerous kingdoms throughout Korean history, Goguryeo especially was valued for its military prowess and brave spirit. The territory it covered was massive, including southern Manchuria which is today’s North Korea, northeast China and southeastern Russia.

All of its former capitals, however, are now outside South Korea. So unlike for Silla and Baekje — the capitals of which were in the South — Korean archaeologists are unable to unearth what could possibly be Goguryeo’s most precious, royal artifacts, and are left with only rooftiles, pottery and weaponry.

As a result, of the approximately 400,000 artifacts in the National Museum of Korea’s collection, only about 2 percent are categorized as belonging to the Goguryeo Kingdom.

Double-edged sword Also factoring into this barrier is the highly controversial Northeast Project of China, strongly denounced by Koreans. In 2002, China launched its Northeast Project to document the history of its territory, but the initiative has been criticized for assuming that all artifacts from any historic event that once occurred in present-day China now belongs to the Beijing government.

Koreans have been particularly sensitive about the treasures from the Goguryeo Dynasty. Since the project began, China has alleged that Goguryeo and Balhae were China's own minority tribes. To counter such claims, South and North Korea held joint explorations of the Goguryeo tomb murals, and researchers were thrilled to find old Goguryeo military unit remains in Mount Acha in Gyeonggi, South Korea, in the 1990s.

More than 1,500 years ago, the powerful Goguryeo Kingdom kept as many as 2,000 Goguryeo soldiers stationed at Mount Acha where they stayed in at least 21 fortification complexes now identified at the site.

China’s attempt to merge the Goguryeo history into their own further spurred Korean academics’ studies into the Goguryeo era. The resulting 2014 report “Goguryeo Capital through Photograph Collections From Dry Glass Plates” is based on photograph and artifact collections of the Japanese authorities during the Japanese colonization of Korea. “Goguryeo Rooftiles in National Museum of Korea Collection” from 2023 is another resulting report.

The Seoul Baekje Museum, which opened in 2012, also has an exhibition hall dedicated to Goguryeo relics and includes a copy of the Goguryeo tomb mural.

Goguryeo expert and history professor Yeo Ho-gyu from Hankuk University of Foreign Studies said, “China cannot overlook the academic progress that Korea has achieved on Goguryeo any more. […] Even though we cannot access Goguryeo’s historic sites, we should continue to resort to digital recreation to increase Goguryeo’s presence domestically.”

Given that there are enough materials from Goguryeo capitals in North Korea and China, the next digital reconstruction can be on the capitals, Yeo said.

“Visitors are responding well to the Goguryeo exhibitions,” Yun Sang-deok, the head of the archaeological history department at the National Museum of Korea, said. “We plan on doubling the size of the Goguryeo exhibit and will continue to use recent archaeological findings and the latest digital technology to bring Goguryeo up close and personal to visitors.”

BY KANG HYE-RAN [kjdculture@joongang.co.kr]