Samguk Yusa: Legends and History of the Three Kingdoms of Ancient Korea

"This work is attributed to a Buddhist priest by the name of Iryon. In the late 13th century, he felt compelled to collect a whole bunch of stories, many of them fantastic in nature, dealing with great kings and Buddhist priests. There are also accounts of miracles and strange occurrences and so on. It’s the first real collection of stories that we have in the Korean tradition. In the earlier part of the century, the Korean Peninsula had been invaded by the Mongols. After a long, long fight against them, the Korean kingdom of Goryeo surrendered to them. The Mongolians didn’t get rid of the kingdom completely, but made a lot of adjustments, and they kept a tight watch on what the Korean kings were doing. A lot of intellectuals at the time felt that they were in a serious crisis, which could lead to the complete extinction of Korean tradition. So that’s one of the reasons why this guy Iryon – and I’m thinking probably a bunch of other co-writers and co-collectors – wrote this book: preserving native stories to remind Koreans, even during those dark times, that we are different. We’re not Mongolians. We have our own traditions. These are stories that come from the people and from our land."