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Preface — why the deeds of King Dongmyeong are set down in verse東明王篇 序

Dongmyeongwang Pyeon (The Lay of King Dongmyeong) 東明王篇 · Yi Gyubo · 1193 · 1 passages · 335 Chinese characters · reading time 1.3 min

Dongmyeongwang Pyeon (The Lay of King Dongmyeong) Complete in one volume An old-style poem in 280 five-character lines, with its preface, made by Yi Gyubo in 1193, when he was twenty-six. It sings of Haemosu, who came down from heaven and won Yuhwa, daughter of Habaek; of Yuhwa, who took in the light of the sun and bore an egg; and of Jumong, born from that egg, who left Buyeo, crossed the river on a bridge of fish and turtles, and founded a kingdom. Longer than the poem are the inline notes set between its lines — Yi Gyubo copied out, just as they stood, the passages that Kim Busik "cut down a great deal" in making the Samguk Sagi, taking them from the Basic Annals of King Dongmyeong in the Gu Samguksa, a book no longer handed down. The contest of shapes in which Haemosu and Habaek turn into carp and otter, pheasant and hawk, and the passage where Yuhwa's lips are drawn out three cheok long, survive in these notes alone.

1Obtaining the Gu Samguksa and reading the Basic Annals of King Dongmyeong

世多說東明王神異之事。雖愚夫騃婦。亦頗能說其事。僕嘗聞之。笑曰。先師仲尼。不語怪力亂神。此實荒唐奇詭之事。非吾曹所說。及讀魏書通典。亦載其事。然略而未詳。豈詳內略外之意耶。越癸丑四月。得舊三國史。見東明王本紀。其神異之迹。踰世之所說者。然亦初不能信之。意以爲鬼幻。及三復耽味。漸涉其源。非幻也。乃聖也。非鬼也。乃神也。況國史直筆之書。豈妄傳之哉。金公富軾重撰國史。頗略其事。意者公以爲國史矯世之書。不可以大異之事爲示於後世而略之耶。按唐玄宗本紀。楊貴妃傳。並無方士升天入地之事。唯詩人白樂天恐其事淪沒。作歌以志之。彼實荒淫奇誕之事。猶且詠之。以示于後。矧東明之事。非以變化神異眩惑衆目。乃實創國之神迹。則此而不述。後將何觀。是用作詩以▣▣記之。欲使夫天下知我國本聖人之都耳。

Many in the world speak of the wondrous deeds of King Dongmyeong, and even simple men and women can tell the story well enough. Once I heard it and laughed, and said, "Confucius, our teacher of old, did not speak of the strange, the forceful, the disorderly, or the spirits. This is truly a wild and bizarre affair, and not a thing for us to talk about." Later I read the Book of Wei and the Tongdian, and the matter was recorded there as well. But it was brief and not detailed. Was that the intent of writing what is within in full and what is without in brief?

In the fourth month of the past gyechuk year (1193) I obtained the Gu Samguksa and looked at the Basic Annals of King Dongmyeong. The wondrous traces in it went beyond what the world tells. Yet at first I still could not believe them, and took them for the illusions of ghosts. But after I had read the book three times over and come to savor it, and had made my way little by little to its source, I saw that it was not illusion but holiness, not ghosts but spirits. How much more so, since the history of a state is a record written straight. How could it have handed down anything false? When Lord Kim Busik compiled the history of the state anew, he cut this matter down a great deal. I think it may be that he held the history of a state to be a book that sets the age right, and so could not show a greatly strange affair to later ages, and cut it down.

If we look at the Basic Annals of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang and the Biography of Yang Guifei, there is nothing at all in them about the adept who rose to heaven and entered the earth. Only the poet Bai Letian, fearing that the matter would sink away and be lost, made a song and set it down. That was truly a wanton and strange affair, and even so he sang it and showed it to those who came after. How much more the deeds of Dongmyeong, which are not changes and wonders meant to dazzle the eyes of the crowd, but truly the divine traces of the founding of a state. If these are not written down, what will later ages have to look upon? For this reason I have made a poem and 〔two characters are missing〕 set them down, wishing to let all under heaven know that our country was from the beginning the capital of a sage.

‹ Haemosu — the son of the Heavenly Emperor who came down from heavenContentsListen to this piece