• Economic and Environmental Geology
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• v.56 no.6
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• pp.661-674
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• 2023

From the seafloor of Taean, Chungcheongnamdo Province, a ship of the Joseon Dynasty was discovered for the first time in the history of underwater excavations in Korea in 2014 and was named Mado Shipwreck No. 4. A total of 27 unused whetstones loaded as tribute were discovered on the hull of Mado No. 4, which revealed that Mado Shipwreck No. 4 was a Grain transport ship that sank while carrying tribute from Naju to Hanyang between 1417 and 1425 (King Taejong to King Sejong). All of the 27 whetstones are in the shape of narrow and long sticks. The average values of length, width, thickness, and weight are 161.5 mm, 36.1 mm, 22.7 mm, and 253.2 g, respectively. The result of X-ray diffraction analysis shows that the constituent minerals are quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase, which is similar to that of the high-resolution digital stereomicroscope analysis. The average porosity of Mado-2672 and 2673 is 2.69% and 1.78%, respectively, and the average surface hardness is 807.2HLD and 834.5HLD, respectively. It is interpreted that if the porosity increases beyond a certain level, it affects the decrease in surface hardness. All of these are made of feldspathic sandstones with an average SiO₂ content of 74.51% and were confirmed to be suitable as grindstones. They are all medium whetstones when classified based on the SiO₂ content. These whetstones are small in size and weight and are convenient to carry, so they are presumed to be a type of non-stationary whetstone, and are estimated to have been mainly used in the fields such as weapon polishing and craft production during the Joseon Dynasty.

• Korean Journal of Heritage: History & Science
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• v.56 no.3
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• pp.138-156
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• 2023

Some of the metal cultural heritage that make up a considerable proportion of Korea's cultural heritage have been installed and displayed outdoors due to their own functions, roles, and scale. Therefore, more diverse and complex damages can occur outdoors than they are in a stable environment. Therefore, it is necessary to combine accurate diagnosis and systematic survey methods in order to utilize basic data obtained from research results as data for the long-term and continuous conservation management as well as to do the research to diagnose the conservation status of outdoor cultural heritage. The clepsydra(hereinafter referred to as Jagyeongnu) of Changgyeonggung Palace, the National Treasure has been installed and displayed outdoors since it was manufactured. Though regular conservation and maintenance of the Jagyeongnu have been carried out, damage still occurred. Therefore, the scientific research on Jagyeongnu to diagnose the state of conservation was conducted prior to the full-scale conservation treatment. First, the state of conservation was investigated with an examination of basic data, macroscopic inspections and past records of repair history according to the purpose of the research. More detailed examinations were also conducted through the 3D scan, surface pattern investigation, and color difference analysis, and the analysis on materials and contaminants were conducted through P-XRF, FT-IR, and Py-GC/MS. The scientific research reveals that squalane and silicone oil have been applied in the past for conservation treatment and directly exposed to outdoor environmental factors, which caused damage to Jagyeongnu and contaminants such as dust adhered thickly to its surface, accelerating severe damage. A greater incidence of damage was found around the part with relatively high exposure effect, which corresponded with the tendency identified by grouping color difference data. As a result of integrating various research methodologies to diagnose the state of conservation and secure basic data, the causes and types of damage were identified. Furthermore, the process of obtaining digital data to be utilized in various ways, and the color difference analysis presenting visible damage as scientific data and identifying the tendency of damage patterns were confirmed to have been effective.

• Korean Journal of Heritage: History & Science
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• v.57 no.2
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• pp.144-166
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• 2024

The Cultural Heritage Committee is an important organization that has been deliberating on important matters related to the preservation of cultural properties in the Republic of Korea for more than 60 years since 1962. The Cultural Heritage Preservation Committee was active in 1961, which was a short period of about a year, but the minutes prepared at the time confirmed that it had the following meanings. First of all, legally, it was meaningful in that the concept of cultural property or intangible cultural property was used for the first time in Korea in laws and regulations on the term of office of professional members. These matters became the basis for the operation of the current Cultural Heritage Protection Act and the Cultural Heritage Committee. The following confirms that, unlike previously known activities, they were active despite political upheaval at the time. In spite of rapid regime change at the time, the committee had no change in its members, and the meetings continued without interruption. At that time, there was an exclusive relationship between different groups in relation to the preservation of cultural heritage, and this relationship was confirmed by the minutes that disappeared with the establishment of the Cultural Heritage Management Bureau, which integrated these groups. Finally, the form of the minutes prepared then shows the form of documentation at the time, where it is confirmed that the traditional documentation format is changing into a new form. It can be good research material in terms of modern and contemporary bibliography. As discussed earlier, the Cultural Heritage Conservation Committee of 1961 has historical significance in terms of legal and actual activities. The reason why the committee's activities were low valued is presumed to be that the minutes and related documents prepared at the time were not organized well due to the lack of a related administrative system. The minutes of the Cultural Heritage Conservation Committee record various facts about cultural heritage policies and decisions at that time. Therefore, analysis and research on these contents can reveal more facts about the cultural heritage policies and perceptions of that time.

• Korean Journal of Heritage: History & Science
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• v.57 no.3
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• pp.24-35
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• 2024

Recently, research using deep learning technologies such as artificial intelligence, convolutional neural networks, etc. has been actively conducted in various fields including healthcare, manufacturing, autonomous driving, and security, and is having a significant influence on society. In line with this trend, the present study attempted to apply deep learning to the classification of archaeological artifacts, specifically ancient Korean roof-end tiles. Using 100 images of roof-end tiles from each of the Goguryeo, Baekje, and Silla dynasties, for a total of 300 base images, a dataset was formed and expanded to 1,200 images using data augmentation techniques. After building a model using transfer learning from the pre-trained EfficientNetB0 model and conducting five-fold cross-validation, an average training accuracy of 98.06% and validation accuracy of 97.08% were achieved. Furthermore, when model performance was evaluated with a test dataset of 240 images, it could classify the roof-end tile images from the three dynasties with a minimum accuracy of 91%. In particular, with a learning rate of 0.0001, the model exhibited the highest performance, with accuracy of 92.92%, precision of 92.96%, recall of 92.92%, and F1 score of 92.93%. This optimal result was obtained by preventing overfitting and underfitting issues using various learning rate settings and finding the optimal hyperparameters. The study's findings confirm the potential for applying deep learning technologies to the classification of Korean archaeological materials, which is significant. Additionally, it was confirmed that the existing ImageNet dataset and parameters could be positively applied to the analysis of archaeological data. This approach could lead to the creation of various models for future archaeological database accumulation, the use of artifacts in museums, and classification and organization of artifacts.