Supernatural Creatures of Korean Mythology. A while ago, I was riding around Sowol-gil on the slope of Namsan when I stumbled across what appeared to be a museum on mythical Korean monsters. It made me curious about what other kinds of mythical creatures lie buried in Korea’s past. For instance, the ancient Greeks had their minotaurs and cyclopes, the middle ages had elves and dwarves, every culture had dragons, and even the relatively young culture of North America has Bigfoot and Chupacabra.
The more I looked into it, the more I discovered that many of Korea’s legendary beings are still with us. Of course not in real life, but their legends live on in various forms. Korean legends characterise a variety of mythical creatures, ghosts, monsters, and dragons. Many are derived from Chinese legends, but with their own unique Korean spin. Dokkaebi The dokkaebi is a good place to start, as it was the focus of the museum I found up on Namsan. They look like they want to challenge you to a wrestling match.
Haechi Gumiho Chollima Gwishin. Korean mythology. Korean mythology consists of national legends and folk-tales which come from all over the Korean Peninsula. The origin may be a blend of Korean Shaministic religion, Buddhist, Chinese and Japanese myths, Confucian and Taoist legends and myths. The legends may also vary greatly by region, even within the country. For example, the people of Jeju Island have a very different lifestyle from that of the mainland and so can generate different forms of the same myths.[1] In Muism, the shamanistic religion, animism was dominant as the prime source for religious life for the Korean people. Particular worship of mountains, animals, plants stem from the belief that they had souls and often show up in the folktales as well as talk about tributes and sacrifices, whether literal, or figurative. [2] The so-called Anti-Superstition Movement under the Syngman Rhee administration and during the 1970s suppressed Korean shamanism and mythology as "superstition".
Korean shamanism[edit] Cosmology[edit] Four Symbols (Chinese constellation) The Four Symbols were given human names after Daoism became popular. The Azure Dragon has the name Meng Zhang (孟章), the Vermilion Bird was called Ling Guang (陵光), the White Tiger Jian Bing (監兵), and the Black Turtle Zhi Ming (執明). The Rongcheng Shi manuscript recovered in 1994 gives five directions rather than four and places the animals quite differently: Yu the Great gave banners to his people marking the north with a bird, the south with a snake, the east with the sun, the west with the moon, and the center with a bear.[2] A Han-dynasty pottery tile emblematically representing the five cardinal directions The four beasts represent a season each. The Azure Dragon of the East represents Spring, the Vermilion Bird of the South represents Summer, the White Tiger of the West represents Autumn, and the Black Turtle of the North represents Winter. 28 Chinese Constellations.
Korean folk tales: imps, ghosts and fairies : Im, Pang, 1640-1724. Korean Mythology. Korean Cryptids: Cheonji Monsters and Others. With news of the fighting in Korea, a bit of focus on the reported cryptids of Korea (North and South) might be in order. Some confusion does exist about whether cryptids reported from Japan have been seen in Korea. Do Koreans report Kappas, for example? Are there Sea Serpents seen off the coast? Were short hairy hominoids reported by American and Korean soldiers during the Korean War in the 1950s? Does the island where the center of the battle is now raging have cryptids on it? Perhaps it will be days before the last question is answered, but let us look at the record of cryptozoology in Korea.
Kappa (河童? The Tzuchinoko, the unknown species of snake has allegedly been sighted in the upper elevations of Korea and Japan. But the one cryptid that has traditionally been associated with Korean cryptozoology are the Cheonji Monsters. The first reported sighting was in 1903. During August 21-23, 1962, a person using a telescope reportedly saw two of the monsters chasing each other in water. Korean mythology. To understand more about the character and scope of Korean mythology and folklore, it is necessary to have at least a brief background in the history and geography of the country. Geography The Korean peninsula juts out from the mainland in Northeast Asia between China and Japan. This key location has made Korea the target of aggression by neighboring nations throughout history. To the east, Japan viewed Korea as a first and vital step to a conquest of the Asian mainland. To the west, China viewed Korea as a rightful part of its territory as the supreme power of Asia.
For thousands of years, Korea managed to fend off advances and maintain cultural and political independence. It was not until 1910, when Korea became a colony of Japan, that a foreign power ruled over the Korean peninsula. For thousands of years Korea was beset on all sides, yet still managed to maintain its own unique cultural identity. Its unique position also made it a natural conduit of culture in Asia. Monster Manual 3.5. Quetzalcoatl. Quetzalcoatl /ˌkɛtsɑːlˈkoʊɑːtəl/ (Classical Nahuatl: Quetzalcohuātl [ketsaɬˈko.aːtɬ]) is a Mesoamerican deity whose name comes from the Nahuatl language and means "feathered serpent".[1] The worship of a feathered serpent deity is first documented in Teotihuacan in the first century BCE or first century CE.[2] That period lies within the Late Preclassic to Early Classic period (400 BCE – 600 CE) of Mesoamerican chronology, and veneration of the figure appears to have spread throughout Mesoamerica by the Late Classic (600–900 AD).[3] In the era following the 16th-century Spanish Conquest, a number of sources were written that conflate Quetzalcoatl with Ce Acatl Topiltzin, a ruler of the mythico-historic city of Tollan.
Feathered Serpent deity in Mesoamerica[edit] A feathered serpent deity has been worshiped by many different ethno-political groups in Mesoamerican history. Iconographic depictions[edit] Vision Serpent depicted on lintel 15 from Yaxchilan. Interpretations[edit] Myths[edit] Basilisk. Accounts[edit] The basilisk is called "king" because it is reputed to have on its head a mitre- or crown-shaped crest. Stories of the basilisk show that it is not completely distinguished from the cockatrice. The basilisk is alleged to be hatched by a cockerel from the egg of a serpent or toad (the reverse of the cockatrice, which was hatched from a cockerel's "egg" incubated by a serpent or toad). In Medieval Europe, the description of the creature began taking on features from cockerels. "There is the same power also in the serpent called the basilisk.
Isidore of Seville defined the basilisk as the king of snakes, due to its killing glare and its poisonous breath. Theophilus Presbyter gives a long recipe in his book for creating a basilisk to convert copper into "Spanish gold" (De auro hyspanico). Albertus Magnus in the De animalibus wrote about the killing gaze of the basilisk, but he denied other legends, such as the rooster hatching the egg. Origin[edit] Literary references[edit] List of legendary creatures (B) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Buraq from a 17th-century Mughal miniature. List of legendary creatures. This is a list of legendary creatures from various historical mythologies.
Entries include species of legendary creature and unique creatures, but not individuals of a particular species. A[edit] B[edit] C[edit] D[edit] E[edit] F[edit] G[edit] H[edit] I[edit] J[edit] K[edit] L[edit] M[edit] N[edit] O[edit] P[edit] Q[edit] R[edit] S[edit] T[edit] U[edit] V[edit] W[edit] X[edit] Y[edit] Z[edit] See also[edit]