Tteoksal

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Korean spelling
Korean alphabet : 떡살
Revised Romanization : Tteoksal
McCune-Reischauer : Ttŏksal

As Tteoksal ( Korean 떡살 ) is in Korea denotes a rice cake form, with the traditional way of freshly prepared Tteok ( 떡 ) (rice cake) is decorated on its surface pattern.

history

Tteoksal (rice cake form) and jeolpyeon (a type of rice cake)

The tradition of decorating rice cakes with impressed patterns, symbols or images can be traced back to the time of the Goryeo dynasty (918–1392) and was practiced over the centuries up to the 20th century. With the mechanized production of rice cakes from the 1970s onwards, the tradition of manual shaping using tteoksal gradually disappeared and South Koreans in particular now buy rice cakes produced industrially in a wide variety of shapes and designs.

Since then, rice cake has been an integral and indispensable part of the Koranic cuisine and so the attractive decorations not only testified to the meaning of Korean aesthetics, but also always told something about the families, their status or their spiritual orientation in the way they were presented and used.

For example, in the Joseon period (1392–1910), Chinese characters such as ( 壽 福 ) were used, which mean subok ( 수복 ), a long, happy life, if one wanted such a longing, or the characters ( 富貴 ), which stood for Bugwi ( 부귀 ) for the desire for wealth or the sign ( 多 男 ), for Danam ( 다남 ), when there was a lack of male offspring.

Animal symbols or plant patterns were also used. Butterflies stood here as an example of the desire for a harmonious marriage or plum blossoms for the recovery of youth. Even simple patterns had their meaning, so lattice structures were used to protect against evil spirits and pasta patterns, which were also associated with long life. Important families even used symbols which, as family symbols, underlined the status of the family and sometimes resembled a kind of seal or stamp.

Since tteok was served on all sorts of family occasions and religious festivals, such as weddings, when a newborn child reached the first year of life, at funerals or ancestor worship ceremonies such as the charye ( 차례 ), and it was necessary to decorate the rice cake according to the occasion, Tteoksal was not just a kitchen appliance, but a valuable kitchen utensil of importance.

use

The tteoksal mostly consisted of a high-density wood with a smooth surface. The woods were round, like a stamp, or had an elongated shape between 10 cm and 50 cm. The patterns were carved into the wood as a negative image, so that the desired image stood out as a positive shape on the surface of the rice cake.

Tteoksal collections

Born in 1950 in South Korea and author of several books on the subject of tteoksal, Kim Gil-seong ( 김길성 ) has been collecting old rice cake molds since 1975. After more than 40 years, his collection comprised over 2000 copies. He gave around half to a university museum, the other half remained in his possession. Kim is considered an expert in tteoksal.

Another well-known collector of wood is Kim Gyuseok ( 김규석 ), who has collected over 1000 rice cake molds in over 30 years and was honored for this by the Korean government with the title Korean Living National Treasure in 2013 .

literature

  • Kang Shin-jae: Tteoksal collector Kim Gil-seong . Fall into graceful symbolic patterns of wishes for life. In: Koreana . Volume 9, No. 4. The Korea Foundation , 2014, ISSN  1975-0617 , p. 44–49 (German language edition).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Tteoksal . In: Koreana. Korea Foundation , accessed November 27, 2017 .
  2. ↑ Kang: Tteoksal collector Kim Gil-seong . In: Koreana . 2014, p. 46 .
  3. ↑ a b c Kang: Tteoksal collector Kim Gil-seong . In: Koreana . 2014, p. 44 .
  4. ↑ Kang: Tteoksal collector Kim Gil-seong . In: Koreana . 2014, p. 44 ff .
  5. ↑ A visit with a Korean Rice Cake Mold (Tteoksal) Artisan . Kimchimari , March 3, 2015, accessed November 27, 2017 .