Comments on: When Tigers Stalked Korea

By: lirelou

lirelou — Wed, 09 May 2007 00:15:55 +0000

dogbertt. Good point, depictions of tigers in traditional Korean paintings look more like oversized housecats, as opposed to their more realistic depiction in, say, Chinese art of a similar period. Perhaps rodents (apologies to Marmot) were not the problem in Korea that they are in Southeast Asia, where housecats are fairly common, and country people my age still loath tigers.

By: sewing

sewing — Tue, 08 May 2007 16:19:31 +0000

Makes sense.

By: dogbertt

dogbertt — Tue, 08 May 2007 07:52:35 +0000

A fair number of Koreans indeed seem to have a visceral fear/hatred of cats.

Perhaps a vestige of the time when man-eaters roamed the land?

By: kpmsprtd

kpmsprtd — Tue, 08 May 2007 07:47:23 +0000

Thanks, Robert. Korean (Manchurian, Amur) Leopards, and I never would have known a thing about it. One can learn a lot poking one’s head into a marmot’s hole.

By: sewing

sewing — Mon, 07 May 2007 17:33:51 +0000

I hadn’t heard of leopards existing in Korea, but what do I know?

Tigers must have been common enough at one time that they figure so prominently in folktales (even in the line, “Once upon a time, a long time ago, when tigers smoked pipes…”) and iconography (like Hodori, the ‘88 Olympic mascot).

I recall reading a book by a couple of Swedes who travelled to Korea in the ’30s. The coolest part is that they got there by train, via the Trans-Siberian Railway, then down through Manchuria into Korea. Anyhow, I recall reading about either their tiger-hunting or meeting tiger hunters…or perhaps it was wild boars, now that I think of it….

By: bulgasari

bulgasari — Mon, 07 May 2007 11:50:32 +0000

Interesting article (as always).

A friend of mine told me that when his father was growing up near Daejeon (early 1940s, I think), their dog woke them up when it ran into the house one night shivering and wetting itself. Then they heard a deep, rumbling growl from something large beyond the compound, but it left and never returned. They assumed it was a tiger (though perhaps it was a leopard).

In “Corea or Cho-sen: The Land of the Morning Calm” (it can be read over at project gutenberg) the author describes the close encounter with the leopard in the abandoned palace mentioned in the article.

‘Korea’s Fight for Freedom’ (also at gutenberg) mentions the tiger hunters as being members of the righteous armies.

By: sanshinseon

sanshinseon — Mon, 07 May 2007 09:15:19 +0000

Anyway, that was a fine article, Robert, like the rest of that series — thanks for bringing it to our attention.

By: lirelou

lirelou — Mon, 07 May 2007 07:13:14 +0000

I recall a report some time last year that the DPRK had received a grant from some U.N. agency to study the Snow Leopard, however I have not been able to google it back up. It may have been misinformation. If snow leopards could survive, perhaps there is hope for tigers. For some reason, the link to the rest of the article keeps timing out.

Certainly in early 20th Century Korea, there was a guild of tiger hunters which according to one observer, also functioned as a military force.

By: R. Elgin

R. Elgin — Mon, 07 May 2007 06:09:33 +0000

I loved this report. I had just read about a performance of one Jazz/Samulnori work called “TIGER!” by the Ronn Branton Group that is supposed to be performed this July as well as part of his Summer Night Jazz program. I guess this is the season for tigers but this goes well with the earlier post about Sanshin since he always had tiger with him.

By: railwaycharm

railwaycharm — Mon, 07 May 2007 05:11:21 +0000

# 7 LO F’ing L!!!!!