Traditional Korean burial mounds

When North Korea Uncovered (Google Earth) was featured in the Wall Street Journal last May, one aspect in particular generated some skepticism: the identification of thousands of burial mounds scattered across the DPRK’s mountains.

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IHS Jane’s Senior Image Analyst Allison Puccioni, in a blog post for CNN’s Anderson Cooper, confimrmed that this unusual looking landscape is composed of burial mounds.

“It’s sadly ironic that in a time where people can no longer sustain themselves the North Koreans still manage to bury their dead with the painstaking tradition of their culture. The burial mounds are unusually close together probably to save land for agriculture” (Allison Puccioni).

Also, here is a photo of these types of burial mounds in the DPRK from ground level:

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The Korean tradition of burying the dead in burial mounds up on mountain tops and slopes goes back many years.  Here is a brief history in wikipedia.

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One Response to “Traditional Korean burial mounds”

  1. Jack says:

    Hey man, of course it is going to get some critical eyes, and perhaps that is a good thing considering how difficult it is to map the DPRK. Anyway, your resource is awesome (as usual), and thank you for all your hard work.

    Oh, and by the way, I heard Kim is relaxing some of the travel restrictions. Plan to go again with Benos?