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Lines of Uneven Length Written on the Map of China and the Barbarians (華夷圖)題華夷圖長短句

Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) 東國李相國集 · Yi Gyubo · Compiled 1241 (Goryeo, 28th year of King Gojong); revised and enlarged 1251 · 1 passages · 67 Chinese characters · reading time 0.7 min

Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Former Collection, Book 17 The collected writings of Yi Gyubo of Goryeo, gathered and cut in woodblock by his son Yi Ham in 1241 and revised and enlarged by his grandson Yi Ikbae in 1251. It holds poems and rhapsodies, memorials and reports sent up to the king, records written for temples and pagodas, stele and tomb inscriptions, letters and prefaces, and the state letters that passed to and from the Mongols during the invasions. The Lay of King Dongmyeong, which sings the founder of Goguryeo, stands in volume 3 of the first collection, and the daily life of a man who called himself the White Cloud Layman — with his wine, his zither and his verse — fills the later collection. The book closes with the last poem he wrote as his eyes failed and he laid down the brush, and with the dirge and tomb inscription others made for him after his death.

萬國森羅數幅牋。三韓隈若一微塊。觀者莫小之。我眼謂差大。今古才賢衮衮生。較之中夏毋多愧。有人曰國無則非。胡戎雖大猶如芥。君不見華人謂我小中華。此語眞堪採。

All the countries are set out thick on a few sheets of paper, and Samhan (三韓) in one corner is like a small clod of earth. You who look, do not call it small; to my eyes I should call it fairly large. In old times and now, the talented and the worthy have come forth without cease, and set beside China there is not much to be ashamed of. Some say, 「A country, if it is not there, is simply not there」; but the barbarians, big as they are, are still like mustard seeds. Have you not seen how the people of China call Samhan the Lesser China (小中華)? This saying is truly worth taking.