From olden times the Taedong River basin has been well known as a good place to live in as the area has a clear river, vast stretches of fertile plain, abundant products and warm weather. This made the place one of the birthplaces of mankind and human civilization.

Unearthed in Hugu-ri, Sangwon County, North Hwanghae Province were the Komunmoru remains where pithecanthrope lived over one million years ago, and fossils of paleolithic men and neolithic men were found in the Taedong River basin. These facts prove that this basin was a cradle where the Korean ancestors had settled from time immemorial undergoing the successive stages of human evolution, namely, the pithecanthropic, paleolithic and neolithic stages, and that it was a birthplace of the earliest human civilization.

Approvingly, dolmens and stone coffins representative of the culture in the period of Tangun’s Joson are distributed most densely in the river basin. More than 14 000 dolmens were surveyed in the basin as of the mid-1990s, and of them those with a lid stone carved with a constellation numbered several hundred. This clearly tells that the basin was a cradle of ancient culture and origin of ancient astronomy.

In addition, many large village sites suggestive of towns, including the earthen wall in Chongam-dong, Taesong District, Pyongyang and the fort in Kumthan-ri, Sadong District, Pyongyang, both built for defending the country, have been uncovered in the basin, which can be seen only in the cradles of ancient civilization.

Besides, the fact that the pipha -shaped daggers and spearheads were unearthed in the historical sites in the early period of Tangun’s Joson proves that the basin was one of the places where bronze tool production started for the first time in the world and ancient civilization began.

The basin centring on Pyongyang also produced material data showing that five kinds of grains, including rice, foxtail millet, soybean and millet, were grown around it in the earliest time worldwide and three molt silkworms were raised there, a different way of silkworm raising from that of a neighbouring country. This indicates that agriculture was much developed there at that time.

A bronze ornament depicting two-person acrobatics and bronze bells unearthed from the tombs in the basin offer a glimpse of the high level of development of music, dance and acrobatics in the area. The Sinji characters used in ancient times highlights the brilliance of the ancient Korean civilization.

In the 1990s, on the basis of scientific and extensive research data, the History Society of the DPRK named the ancient culture in this area centring on Pyongyang the Taedonggang Culture.

Pak Ryong Un