Secrets of Danyusemungyeong: How one man cracked a 2,500-year-old bronze mystery

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Secrets of Danyusemungyeong: How one man cracked a 2,500-year-old bronze mystery

Published: 06 May. 2025, 07:30

PARK SANG-MOON
[email protected]

Audio report: written by reporters, read by AI

Lee Wan-kyu demonstrates reproducing Danyusemungyeong, a bronze mirror with geometric patterns, at his studio in Yongin, Gyeonggi. [PARK SANG-MOON]

[ZOOM KOREA]

Danyusemungyeong, a bronze mirror with geometric patterns, was created about 2,500 years ago during the Middle Bronze Age.

Due to its elaborate patterns, it is also called Jeongmungyeong.

The artifact was found across regions of eastern Asia including the Korea Peninsula as well as in China and Japan, but the one found in Nonsan, South Chungcheong in Korea during the 1960s is known for having the most precision and detail among others.

One Danyusemungyeong, a national treasure, designated at Soongsil University measures 21.1 centimeters (8 inches) in diameter with its reverse side adorned with over 13,000 meticulously drawn lines forming triangles, rectangles and concentric circles at 0.3 millimeters intervals. Due to its extremely intricate details, they are said to be impossible to replicate even with a supercomputer.

But there was one person who succeeded in replicating the complicated artifact: Lee Wan-kyu, a Gyeonggi Province Intangible Cultural Heritage No. 47 recognized for his craftsmanship in casting.

Danyusemungyeong [PARK SANG-MOON]

In 2007, Lee successfully reproduced it.

Born in Cheongyang, South Chungcheong, Lee was always that one kid in the class who had remarkable dexterity.

After graduating high school, Lee immediately moved to Seoul to find work. There, he started working for Oh Hae-ik’s studio in the 1970s. Oh, at the time, was an esteemed master of metalcraft sculpture whom every trainee wanted to work with.

Paljuryeong, a bronze bell [PARK SANG-MOON]

After that, Lee also worked for a metal craft casting factory where he learned both sculpting and casting techniques.

In a short period of time, Lee was able to pick up various techniques that are needed in the artifact realm.

His remuneration was also above average, receiving three to four times more than an average salary of a public servant at the time.

But it wasn't like Lee always held an interest in the culture of the Bronze Age. It was by chance when he appeared on a KBS historical documentary in 1982 that Lee really started developing interest in the subject. The documentary shed light on the history of Korea and Lee participated to demonstrate how to cast a bronze sword.

When the reproduction procedure didn't come off as he had expected, Lee visited the Christian Museum at Soongsil University to closely examine not only the bronze swords, but also Danyusemungyeong and casting molds.

Lee then set up his own studio to focus on reproducing historical relics, before being invited by China’s Shenyang Museum in 1992 where he stayed for some time to conduct in-depth research on various relics of the Bronze Age.

Gilt-bronze Pensive Maitreya Bodhisattva [PARK SANG-MOON]

For the next 10 years, Lee accumulated diverse experiences related to the Bronze Age artifacts.

Out of aspiration to obtain more expertise in it, Lee in 2002 entered the cultural heritage program at Dongguk University Graduate School of Arts and Culture.

A professor teaching Bronze Age culture at the university said that the casting technique of the Danyusemungyeong was one of Korea’s seven great mysteries of which artifacts are nearly impossible to restore perfectly.

Although his initial reproductions of bronze swords and Danyusemungyeong were not perfect, Lee believed and asserted that he would be able to achieve it at one point, although the academic community had no faith in him.

Driven by determination, Lee told himself that he would achieve success no matter what.

From the start, however, there were difficulties such as the mold.

Most scholars had claimed that clay molds were used to make the ancient mirror because they believed that stone-made molds would be too dense for air to circulate and molten metal to flow.

Lee, however, discovered that the best method to reproduce the artifact was to use stone mold casting instead of the traditional method, engraving patterns directly onto talc before pouring in the metal.

Such new findings mesmerized Lee to delve deeper into the Bronze Age artifacts and how to reproduce them including the Danyusemungyeong.

Great Gilt-bronze Incense Burner of Baekje [PARK SANG-MOON]

As he engraved more than 13,000 intricate geometric patterns -— triangles, rectangles, concentric circles -— on the 21.2 centimeter surface, his health deteriorated severely including his eyesight.

After countless number of failures, Lee concluded that the key to successfully reproducing it lied in engraving the patterns directly onto talc and using a tool called chigu that could draw multiple concentric circles at once.

But each time he solved one problem, another would arise.

As he carved patterns and lines using the intaglio techniques, it led him to develop work-related palsy. He was unable to move his hand at one point that he had to splint it and wrap it with bandages.

He often encountered the urge to quit, asking himself: “Why am I doing this when no one even takes notices of my efforts?”

After long and deliberate research, Lee also found that a coating process called “songyeon” where one covers the talc mold with soot by burning pine wood was one of the quintessential parts of the reproduction process.

The soot would protect the surface of the Danyusemungyeong and ensure that it separates cleanly from the mold.

When he was fully prepared and confident in terms of the process, he poured molten metal into the mold of the mirror.

The result was perfect. The Danyusemungyeong patterns came out flawlessly.

Lee was overwhelmed.

He went on to reproduce additional bronze artifacts using the methods he developed through his own research.

His additional works include a violin-shaped bronze sword, paljuryeong (a bronze eight-belled rattle), bronze axes as well as national treasures like the Gilt-bronze Pensive Maitreya Bodhisattva and Great Gilt-bronze Incense Burner of Baekje (18 B.C. to A.D. 660).

He also created the Miller sculpture at the Hoam Art Museum and also took charge of crafting the Korean War Allies monument at the War Memorial of Korea and the 162-kilogram pure golden bat statue in Hampyeong, South Jeolla as well as the presidential busts installed at Cheongnamdae.

Bronze Kundika with Silverinlaid Willow and Waterfowl Design [PARK SANG-MOON[]

His 50 years of experience in craftsmanship, committing his passion into glowing molten metal wasn’t an easy journey. He endured years of hardships with patience, following only faint clues to succeed in reproducing ancient artifacts.

These ancient relics, the foundation of modern civilization, were only made possible by the perseverance and sacrifice of unnamed artisans back at the time.

Lee said that the people he admires the most are those unnamed masters who crafted these artifacts in the past.

BY PARK SANG-MOON [[email protected]]