Bangudae Petroglyphs

The Bangudae (Daegok-ri) Petroglyphs are pre-historic engravings on flat vertical rock faces on the riverside of the Daegokcheon (Bangucheon) stream, a branch of the Taehwa River, which runs eastward and joins the East Sea at Ulsan. They are the National Treasure of South Korea No. 285 and were registered on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2025. This site presents a vivid and intricate portrayal of whaling, unmatched by any rock art found globally. The carvings, featuring animals, human figures, hunting scenes, concentric circles, diamond patterns, and inscriptions, exhibit remarkable realism and energy, arranged in a distinctive blend of figurative imagery and written symbols. Notably, the petroglyphs of animals — both marine and terrestrial — display such fine detail that the species of each creature can be identified. They span a long period from ca. 5000 BC to the 9th century AD. The Bangudae rocks are around 8m wide and around 5m high. The surrounding ten rock faces have a small number of engravings as well. The name Bangudae comes from the Korean ban, the word for a shell, gu, meaning a turtle, and dae, a structure or a site since the carving site forms itself like the back of turtle. The rocks consist of shale and hornfels oriented toward the north and they shine for a while at sunset. As an overhanging cliff they are in the structure of a rock shelter. I

Archaeological site data from Wikidata (CC0). Summary from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA).