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

Report in reply to provincial officials on New Year's Day, as above同前答外官狀

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 · 34 Chinese characters · reading time 0.4 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.

日躔靑陸。甫迎鱗序之首時。書墮黃堂。遽辱繭牋之手蹟。備認謙勤之旨。第深銘刻之情。

The sun treads the blue path, and we meet at last the head of the ordered seasons. Your letter fell upon my office, and of a sudden, in awe, I received the traces of your own hand set down on cocoon paper. I have learned in full your humble and diligent intent, and the feeling with which I grave it and keep it is deep indeed.