An ancient and distinctive culture

Abstract

The history of Korea spans over 4,000 years and the heritage of so ancient a culture is a very rich one, which must be rediscovered and conserved for future generations. Korea has been active in these tasks since 1902, through the promotion of research on traditional architecture, and the building up of collections of paintings as well as other cultural artefacts throughout the country. In 1945 the Cultural Property Preservation Bureau was set up in order to ensure the adequate protection of this heritage and in 1961 a law was passed on the subject according to which ancient art objects and old buildings, together with ‘non-physical’ elements such as folk dances, music, theatre, etc. could be declared national cultural treasures. In 1973, this law was revised so as to prevent clandestine archaeological excavations and illicit traffic in works of art. The list of the Republic of Korea's national treasures, of wich the most remarkable are described in the pages that follow, lengthens each year, thanks to concerted efforts in research and conservation. As this issue goes to press the former capitol building in Seoul is being renovated to house a new National Museum of Korea. The transplanted collections will be opened to the public in their new setting in late 1986. The Central Asia collection, never displayed before, is among those which will be on show for the first time. The collection was put together by a Japanese collector, deposited at the colonial administration headquarters in the capitol and kept there since that time. We hope that these and other new offerings for the Republic of Korea's museum visitors will be fully described in a future issue of the magazine.