Resilience Thinking in Traditional Knowledge about Urban and Rural Landscape of Korea

Abstract

The Korean people regarded the land they lived on as a variable and living system, and this is deeply related to resilience thinking. This study explored the development history of traditional knowledge about urban and rural landscape of the Korean peninsula by examining historical records, old maps, and visiting sites; identified how such traditional knowledge was manifested as a system in the Korean people’s resilience thinking; and searched for our responses in this era of environmental crisis. Until the Silla Period (BC 57~AD 935) which was the ancient kingdom of the Korean people, there was no unique model of their own about how to perceive the urban landscape. However, the sufferers of a frequent deluge had a traditional religious belief about protecting forests and early Buddhist monks widely disseminated the idea that Silla was originally the land of Buddha. Temples began to be constructed in a way that it is enclosed by mountains to express the Buddha’s grandeur in mountains rather than in architectures; architectures were created so that they existed in harmony with the mountain rather than being magnificent in and of themselves. There was an prophecy that they would produce a king if they planted trees. The prophecy seems to have been based on the experience of seeing the royal palace of Silla always at risk of water disasters, which could be prevented by planting trees. This experience probably resulted in a tradition that the King placed heavy emphasis on forest preservation in the later days. They also believed that mountains were Buddha and thus locate their capital near a harmonious mountain landscape and planted trees on bare mountains, believing that such service to Buddha would help perpetuate the dynasty. With this mindset, instead of building a big and overwhelming royal palace on a flatland, they preferred to locate the palace near mountains and build it in a size that would look harmonious with the mountains. A high mountain stood firm on the north with ridges embracing the city on both sides and a lower mountain lying gently on the south. The landscape configuration blocked the cold and dry northwesterly wind in the wintertime while letting in sunlight, providing a sense of psychological security as well as helping save energy. If the ridges are too low or mountain on the south is too distant, they planted trees to complement the landscape, and this tradition then spread to provincial areas. It would be vital to build forests in order to resolve today’s urban environmental problems, but this must be accompanied by the creation of waterways.