환동해 문화전파망과 봉의산동굴 - 동로의 관점에서 본 봉의산동굴 -

Abstract

The East Road , the coastal route in the east of the ‘Paekdudaegan’ (Paekdu Mountains) in Korean peninsula has profound archaeological ramifications in terms of cultural formation of prehistoric Korea. It geographically ranges from Chinese far northeastern and Russian eastern maritime regions down to the end of southeastern Korean peninsula. A number of major cultural traditions in Korean prehistory had been spread through the diffusionary network of East Road from Neolithic up to Iron times. They are termed as the ‘Flat Bottom Pottery Culture’, ‘Korean Petroglyphs Culture’, ‘Northeastern Plain Pottery Culture’ and the ‘Hard Type Plain Pottery Culture’. In this broad background, especially the expansive procedure of the ‘Flat Bottom Pottery Culture’ has been traced in this paper, focused on the cultural traits observed from the Bongyui Mountain Cave in Chunchon, Western Kangwon Province. Among those artifacts discovered from the cave which has been claimed to have been used as both residence and burial, a shaft of the composite fishhook which is known as unique marine fishing tool of the East Coast Flat Bottom Culture as well as a number of flat bottomed potteries with some typical impressed rim designs prove that the Bongyui Mountain Cave people had crossed the Taebaek Mountains, and the ‘Jinburyong’(the Jinbu Ridge in Taebaek Mountains) is proposed as most presumable crossing route. Those immigrated people seem to have failed in settleing up in Chunchon region because of their maritime lifestyle that was unadaptable to riverine and mountainous environment, where the Pointed Bottom Pottery Culture prevailed. Whereas, the Pointed Bottom Pottery Culture had succeeded in spreading throughout most of eastern maritime regions, which is testified by its widespread settlement and disappearance of indigenous Flat Bottom Culture in that region.