Bak Hyeokgeose
Also known as: Hyeokgeose Geoseogan, Bulgunae (Brightness)
Mythological Narrative
The egg-born founder of Silla, found by the six village chiefs beside the Najeong well where a white horse knelt and then rose into heaven; crowned at thirteen with his queen Aryeong, born from a dragon at another well.
Scholarly Commentary & Evolution
## The egg at Najeong
In Iryeon's *Samguk Yusa*, the chiefs of six villages of the Gyeongju plain gather on the bank of the Al River and agree that they need a ruler. Looking south, they see a strange light like lightning at the Najeong well at the foot of Mount Yang, and a white horse kneeling there as if bowing. They find a purple egg; the horse, seeing them, neighs and rises into the sky. From the egg comes a boy of great beauty. When they bathe him in the Eastern Spring, his body gives off light, birds and beasts dance, heaven and earth shake, and the sun and moon shine clear. They name him Hyeokgeose, 'brightening the world', and give him the surname Bak because the egg was like a gourd (*bak*).
## Aryeong
On the same day a chicken-dragon appears at the Aryeong well and a girl is born from its side, with lips like a chicken's beak until she is bathed in the northern stream. The two are raised together, and when Hyeokgeose is thirteen (traditionally 57 BCE), he becomes king with Aryeong as queen, and the state is called Seorabeol.
## Death
After sixty-one years of rule, the *Samguk Yusa* says, he ascended to heaven, and seven days later his body fell to the earth in five parts. When the people tried to bury them together, a great serpent prevented them, so they buried the five parts in five tombs, the Oreung ('Five Tombs'), also called the Serpent Tombs. The traditional dates are not historical; Silla emerged as a state in the following centuries.
Academic Discussion & Critique
Exchange peer-reviewed hypotheses, comparative Indo-European etymologies, and archaeological field interpretations regarding Bak Hyeokgeose.
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