Samguk Sagi
Also known as: 삼국사기, History of the Three Kingdoms, Three Kingdoms History, Samguk-Sagi
A Confucian-style history of Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla compiled in 1145 by Kim Busik, organizing annals, monographs, tables, and biographies to narrate Korea’s early states through Unified Silla.
Description
The Samguk Sagi is the earliest extant comprehensive history of Korea’s Three Kingdoms, compiled in Classical Chinese by Kim Busik and colleagues during the Goryeo dynasty. Modeled on Chinese standard histories, it presents the annals of Silla, Goguryeo, and Baekje alongside monographs on rites, music, astronomy, geography, and institutional matters, plus chronological tables and biographical fascicles. While privileging Silla’s unification narrative, it preserves crucial accounts of foundations, royal successions, campaigns, envoys, and notable monks and ministers. The work often cites now-lost Korean records and Chinese sources, and includes astronomical portents and ritual detail that anchor events in a moral and cosmological framework.
Historiography
Commissioned by King Injong, the Samguk Sagi was compiled by Kim Busik with a team of scholar-officials and patterned after Chinese dynastic histories (shiji/zhengshi). It systematized earlier Korean materials, many of which have not survived independently, and incorporated notices from Chinese texts. The transmission relies on Goryeo and Joseon woodblock print traditions, with later editorial attention but no wholesale redaction. Reception has long noted its Confucian moralizing and Silla-centric lean, balanced in modern study by comparison with epigraphy, Chinese histories, and the more mythic Samguk Yusa.
Date Notes
Compiled under King Injong of Goryeo in 1145 CE; draws on earlier chronicles, inscriptions, and oral materials from the Three Kingdoms and Unified Silla periods.
Archetypes
Major Characters
- Kim Bu-sik
- Jumong
- Bak Hyeokgeose
- Onjo
- Gwanggaeto the Great
- King Jangsu
Myths
- Founding Myths of Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla
- Jumong the Archer-King
- Sacral Kingship and Portents
Facts
- Compiled in 1145 CE by Kim Busik under King Injong of Goryeo.
- Written in Classical Chinese and modeled on Chinese standard histories.
- Consists of 50 books: annals, chronological tables, monographs, and biographies.
- Earliest extant comprehensive Korean historical chronicle.
- Emphasizes Silla’s role in the unification of the peninsula.
- Preserves foundational legends of Silla, Goguryeo, and Baekje alongside political history.
- Includes monographs on rites, music, astronomy, geography, and officialdom.
- Frequently cites earlier Korean records now lost and Chinese historical works.
- Records celestial events and omens used to moralize political outcomes.
- Key figures include Kim Yu-sin, Queen Seondeok, Gwanggaeto, and Yeon Gaesomun.