ABSTRACT
Discourses about the past on the Korean peninsula have rarely been free of foreign influences. Yi (2001), for instance, shows that people during the Chosun (or Joseon) period (1392–1910) made sense of prehistoric remains by relating them directly to ideologies adopted from mainland China that were widely followed by the ruling class of the Chosun dynasty. For example, stone tools were called "thunder axes," and this term was directly adopted from China (Yi 2001, 60). Furthermore, the existence of stone tools was explained with reference to the Principle of Yin/Yang and the Five Primary Substances (metal, wood, water, fire, and earth) (Yi 2001, 185). The origin of thunder axes was explained according to the circulation of gi, a form of energy that is present in the five primary substances. According to the Principle of Yin/Yang and the Five Primary Substances, the gi of fire, at its extremity, becomes the gi of earth. A stone is simply a solidified form of earth. This framework explained why it might be "natural" to find strange stones where lightning, an extreme and peculiar form of fire, was present. This kind of explanation was considered rational and logical throughout the Chosun period and overshadowed other folk narratives by criticizing them as irrational, mystical, or subjective.
