Haeundae Carved Stone

Three Chinese characters are carved into a coastal rock and read as “Haeundae.” The name preserves the literary name of a man whose birth had already determined the limit of his career.

Choe Chiwon was a court scholar of the Korean state of Silla and sought state reforms. He belonged to the hereditary “sixth head-rank” estate: its members could serve as officials, but the highest posts were held by the hereditary aristocracy. In eight hundred ninety-four, Choe submitted to Queen Jinseong a plan of reforms with more than ten points. As a reward, he received the rank of achan—the sixth of seventeen ranks, precisely the ceiling assigned to him by birth. The proposals went no further. Choe left government service and eventually settled near Haeinsa Temple in the Gayasan Mountains.

Local legend places him on Dongbaekseom Island during this very departure. On his way to Gayasan Mountain, the scholar is said to have lingered on the rocky shore, created an elevated platform here, and carved the word “Haeundae” into the stone. “Haeun,” meaning “sea and cloud,” was his literary name; “dae” meant a platform from which one looks into the distance. The literary name of the retired official became attached to the coast, then passed to the beach and an entire district of Busan.

The chisel in Choe's hand is part of the legend. There are no records from his time confirming his authorship. Yet in the first half of the fourteenth century, the poet Jeong Po already wrote that the platform itself had disappeared, while Haeun's name remained. So the story was associated with this coast long before modern resort development appeared.

The state register dates the surviving carving to the Joseon Dynasty, which began several centuries after Choe; who carved these particular lines is unknown. Of the three characters, the middle one—“un,” cloud—has worn away the most. Even it is disappearing from the stone, yet the whole word is still spoken as the name Haeundae.