雁鴨池 木簡과 新羅 宮廷의 日常

Abstract

In Comparison with any other materials or references, the wooden tablets which were excavated in 1975 from Anapji of Kyoungju province illustrate abundant appearance of the Kingdom of Silla’s ancient palace. At the beginning of the research, scholars focused on estimating the age of the wooden tablets and debating about Setaek(洗宅). However, they could not make rapid progress on their research due to the difficulty of decoding the ink on the tablets and the lack of people’s interest on these wooden tablets. Since the late 1990s, more wooden tablets have been excavated, which has freshened and revived the study of the wooden tablets from Anapji. Based on the study of Japanese wooden tablets, the publications of wooden tablets of Anapji, studied by Lee, Sung-si, who mentioned the possibility of more wooden tablets of Anapji, also supported by Yoon, Seon-tae and Lee, Yong-hyeon shed new light on the wooden tablets of Anapji. Nevertheless, there was a limit as to how much scholars could decipher ink letters on the tablets, since their interpretation was made through the direct reading of the tablets. The book Ancient Wooden Strip with Inscription in Korea, published in 2004, introduced infrared photographs and influenced the former study on the wooden tablets. This allowed them to correct their research methods and re-examine the tablets of Anapji. The new method of research produced several breakthroughs in understanding the usages of the Anapji tablets, such as the following: (i) wooden tablets for receipts of goods, such as foods or keys; (ii) wooden tablets for receipts of tributary payments or taxes, which were collected and moved to Naesung(內省) (iii) wooden tablets in which the names of palace gates and guards, for palace security matters, were written (iv) wooden tablets for prescriptions; and (v) wooden tablets related to the information exchange between administrative offices. This outcome of the research offers evidence that in the late 7th century and its aftermath, there were diverse daily works in the palace of Silla, and the Anapji wooden tablets were used for daily life at that time. However, it is difficult to ascertain whether the wooden tablets were used for document-related administration in the time of wooden tablet culture, since during the so-called Anapji era, people started using papers for administrative works after Silla’s unification of three kingdoms. Nonetheless, the wooden tablets were widely used for various purposes beyond document-related administration because of their well-preserved, characteristic material, wood.