조선 후기의 좋은 집터, 이상적 거주공간의 이론과 실제―『임원경제지』 「상택지」를 중심으로―

Abstract

This paper focused on the discussions between scholars since the eighteenth century on how to choose good building sites, with focus on the “Sangtaekji” portion of the Limwonsibyukji written by Seo Yu-gu (徐有榘), which expertly focused on houses and dwellings. Taegniji, by Lee Jung-hwan (李重煥) and Myeongoji (名塢志) by Seong Hae-eung were works which discussed building sites in earnest and Seo Yu-gu wrote “Sangtaekji” by adding his opinions on the two books. The three scholars defined a good building site by using the notions of “a livable place” (可居處), “myeongo” (名塢), and “myeonggi” (名基). Lee Jung-hwan presented four criteria for choosing a good site for building a house ―the geography, resources available in the region, the generosity of people and the mountain and water. Seo Yu-gu added “water and soil” (水土) and “things to avoid” (避 忌) to the list. The three scholars disposed of the strong influence of the traditional feng shui concepts of good building sites and put effort on following the rational and scientific logic and succeeded in making a huge progress in the history of choosing good building sites. In the chapter on “Myeonggijogae” (名基條開, a categorized list of good building sites), Seo Yu-gu, in fact, presented 243 actual building sites as examples. There was a huge discrepancy in the number of sites per province; Seo mostly introduced sites in the Gyeonggi (88), Hoseo (58) and Gwandong (43) regions while he introduced only a handful of sites in the Yeongnam (25) and Honam (18) regions and almost ignored the Haeseo (5), Gwanseo (3) and Gwanbuk (3) regions. Such gap reflected the perspectives of the government officials who aspired to be stationed in Seoul as well as the theories on good building sites of the era. The presented sites well portrayed which building sites in which region were preferred in the eighteenth century and afterward. The discussions made by the three scholars were noteworthy in that the scholars attempted to systemize a formerly untouched topic into a new branch of study.