Formation and Transformation of the Buyeo Gwanbuk-ri Site

Buyeo is known as the central area of Sabi Capital City, the last capital of Baekje, and since investigations began in the 1980s, annual excavations have uncovered a variety of remains from different periods. The Gwanbuk-ri site plays a key role in hypothesizing the location of the royal palace within Sabi Capital City, where large timber-frame building foundations, ornamental ponds, and roadways have been investigated. These remains provide crucial clues to the urban planning of Sabi Capital City and the arrangement of its palace complex; in particular, recent excavation results—such as large-scale platform construction, square pond remains, road remains—have further enhanced the resolution of our understanding of the palace precinct’s layout. Compared to other areas within Sabi Capital City, the Buyeo Gwanbuk-ri site is situated at a relatively higher elevation and possesses ideal conditions for constructing major facilities, including the Baekje-period royal palace. Together with these locational advantages, the creation of extensive earthen platforms and the placement of core Capital City facilities conferred prestige on the palace precinct. These platforms and the arrangement of principal structures serve as important indicators of Baekje’s technological prowess and economic capacity, demonstrating the existence of deliberate urban planning in this area. After Baekje’s fall, the site’s status as a regional center gradually diminished during the Unified Silla period; however, the high degree of overlapping building remains around the large timber-frame foundations indicates that its function as a central hub persisted. In the Joseon period, the installation and use of a guest hall (guksa), local government office (dongheon), and inner quarters (naea), along with the establishment of a third-class road, illustrate that the site continued to serve as the urban core of Buyeo-eup to this day. In this study, the spatial extent of the Buyeo Gwanbuk-ri area—which has maintained its role as an urban precinct from the Baekje period to the present—was defined and its locational advantages and the characteristics of its archaeological distribution were examined. Based on the process by which spatial functions and characters have overlapped over time, the way in which the Gwanbuk-ri remains were utilized up to the Joseon period was examined. The results indicate that the Gwanbuk-ri site not only functioned as a locus of concentrated royal power but, through successive layers of occupational reuse, emerged as a complex and multifunctional core area within Sabi Capital City.