開港後 史庫保存狀況

Maintenance of Store Houses of Historical Materials After Opening of ports

The Koreans were careful of recording history and maintenance of historical records from olden times. This carefulness continued despite the penetration of foreign influence into Korea in the latter half of the 19th century. Even after the advances of Japanese imperialism became apparent and the fate of the nation was felt critical, good care of historical records was rather strengthened than slackened. In the Yi dynasty, Sa-go(史庫)-store houses of historical records and Sunwon-gak(璿源閣) were established in Seoul and in the mountains of four provinces to keep a copy each of annals of successive monarchs and other important historical documents in good care and to prevent them from destruction or damage in riots or invasion of foreign forces. Moreover, to finance the safeguard of these documents from all sorts of contingency, a system of special appropriation of expenses had been instituted. These historical records were regularly aired, this act of airing to guard them from moisture being called ‘po-swae’(曝曬). Po-swae was performed regularly, once in three, five, or ten years in the latter half of the 19th century, but from 1898 it was done at an interval of three years again, to inspect the preservation, prevention from decay, and protection against damage from insects. The maintenance of these store houses of historical records and documents subsequently had to be performed by a modern method as modern laws were enacted. One of the five copies of the annals of Yi dynastry which the state and nation had safeguarded with such care and attention was later transported to Japan and burned out after the Korean annexation by Japan. Of the other copies, either, the Korears who had tried so hard to keep them meticulously recorded and well preserved were not easy to look into. Some other records and remains well deserving national treasures were taken to Japan by Japanese. For instance, one of the rain gauges was taken to Japan and later was donated to British Scientific Museum by the Japanese. Thus, well preserved historical records and documents were taken intact by invaders, thanks to the good care by the people, and returned home only recently after the natisn recovered its independence in 1945. Yet, it still remains almost an impossibility to recover those other historical remains of national treasure class that were taken out of the territory by foreign invaders.