Yetgeul › Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) › Former Collection, Book 32

Letter of Congratulation Presented to the Marquis of Gwangneung at the New Year正旦賀狀 廣陵侯

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 · 86 Chinese characters · reading time 1 min

Dongguk Isangguk Jip (Collected Works of Minister Yi of the Eastern Country) Former Collection, Book 32 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.

玉管灰飛。勻動縠羅之覆。金觴酒溢。細斟椒柏之香。恭惟令公殿下。瓜瓞聯榮。梓材播美。雅性嗜縑緗之學。千金購書。餘事精服餌之方。百藥濟衆。有德不飮。受福何涯。况臨五始之辰。宜享萬齡之壽。某等。官箴有繫。造賀靡由。

The ash of the jade pitch-pipe flies up and moves evenly the thin silk laid over it, and wine brims in the golden cup, pouring sweetly the fragrance of pepper and cypress.

In reverence I consider that Your Highness, my Lord (令公), carries on glory like a melon vine and spreads abroad excellence like walnut timber. With an upright nature You delight in the learning that comes of reading, and buy up books with a thousand pieces of gold; in Your leisure You are versed in the way of medicines, and with drugs of every kind You relieve the many. You bestow Your virtue and yet drink none of it Yourself; how then should the blessing You are to receive have any end? Still more, You have met the day of the five beginnings, and so ought surely to enjoy a span of ten thousand years.

We, bound to the business of our offices, have no way to come forward and offer our congratulations.

Interlinear notes 1

公嘗自造藥施人。

His Lordship once compounded medicines himself and shared them out among the people.