Buan Dongmunan Dangsan (Village Guardian)

About this place

The Buan Dongmunan Dangsan village guardian complex consists of a stone pillar (dangsan), a pair of stone jangseung (a grandfather and grandmother guardian), and forms a unified ritual site. Centered on a stone pillar erected to ward off impure influences from outside the village and pray for peace within it, a dangsan tree stands some 50 meters to the east, and a pair of stone jangseung stand facing each other along the path between the tree and the pillar. The stone pillar is carved from granite, and atop it sits a stone-carved duck. The pillar is usually tightly wrapped in a rope of rice straw used in dangsan rites, so that normally only the top portion (the duck and a little of the pillar below it) can be seen. West of the dangsan tree stands a male jangseung inscribed 「上元周將軍」 with a bonggeoji-shaped hat, round bulging eyes, a blunt nose, and protruding fangs. To the east stands a female jangseung inscribed 「下元堂將軍」; the female is taller than the male jangseung but does not wear a hat. A dangsan rite is held once every two years on the 15th day of the first lunar month (Daeboreum). After tug-of-war with a rope braided from rice straw, the rope is wrapped around the stone pillar — a practice called 'clothing the pillar' — expressing the wish for the entire village's fortune and agricultural abundance, and showing that the stone pillar is revered as the principal deity of the community rite. Both the stone pillar and stone jangseung preserve their old forms well and are valuable as folk cultural heritage illustrating village religious practices.