Samguk Yusa

Samguk Sagi (三国史记, History of the Three Kingdoms) was compiled by Kim Pu-sik (1075-1151), a high official of the Koryo court, as the officially sanctioned history of Korea.

According to Tae-Hung Ha, it has the faults of most official chronicles, "forcing events into a framework pleasing to the government and omitting all matters thought to be embarrassing or indecorous."

Following Samguk Sagi was Samguk Yusa (三国遗事), which was compiled by Ilyon (1206-1289), a national priest from the Koryo period. Born in Kyongju, the capital of Silla, in 1206, he entered the order of Buddhist monks when he was still a child, and was given the religious name Ilyon. He passed the national examinations for monks with the highest distinction at the age of 22, and thereafter devoted himself to teaching and studying while residing at various temples at different times. As a diligent author, he had a stone monument erected in his honor after his death. The monument listed his works, but Samguk Yusa was not on the list. This gave rise to the view that the book was printed only after his death.

As Ha pointed out, one of the chief values of this book is that it includes a great deal of material omitted by the official history, "so that through it we can gain an understanding of the beliefs and practices of the people of ancient times, if somewhat distorted by the author's Buddhist point of view."

The value of the book was not so much historical in the strict sense of a chronicle of events as it is an account of the beliefs and folklore of medieval Korea. Though containing a mixture of factual history and legendary material, the book also captured "the wonderful laughter, and the solid, earthy humor of Korea."

Ha added: "Ilyon was no doubt a pious Buddhist, but he was no prude for all that, and he sets down the old tales as he heard them."

The title of the book is described as somewhat of a misnomer, for it is not really an account of the histories of the three ancient kingdoms of Korea. Rather, it is concerned primarily with only one of them, Silla, which at times conquered the other two with the help of China. Moreover, it covers the period during which Silla ruled the peninsula till its fall to the Koryo dynasty in 935.

The book was written at a time when Korea was dominated by Mongols, who at that time ruled all China and central Asia. Like all such books of its time, Samguk Yusa was written in literary Chinese.

Interestingly, when China was unified under the Sui dynasty in 589, its rulers began to subdue what they saw as "barbarians" on China's borders. This led to a series of attacks on Koguryo, which were successfully resisted, and was said to be one of the causes of the fall of the Sui dynasty in 618.