Baekjut

Baekjut, also called Geumbaekjo, is the founding goddess of the Songdang bonhyangdang, the mother-shrine from which many of Jeju's village guardian cults trace descent. In the Songdang bon-puri she comes from across the sea, a deity of settled agriculture, and marries Socheon-guk, the hunter-god native to the district. When she urges him to take up farming and he instead devours a whole ox and returns to the chase, the two quarrel and separate. Their numerous children scatter across the island to become the bonhyang gods of its several villages, so that Baekjut is venerated as the ancestress of a wide network of local deities. Her shrine at Songdang remains among the most important ritual centres of Jeju village religion.

Domains

• village guardianship
• agriculture and settlement

Powers

• mother the guardian gods of Jeju's villages

Epithets

• 송당 본향당신 — Guardian deity of the Songdang village shrineHyun Yong-jun, Jeju-do musok jaryo sajeon (Seoul: Singu Munhwasa, 1980) (primary)

Relations

• spouse: Socheon-gukThe pair marry but part after quarrelling over farming and hunting.Hyun Yong-jun, Jeju-do musok jaryo sajeon (Seoul: Singu Munhwasa, 1980) (primary)

Sources

• Baekjut is the founding goddess of the Songdang bonhyang shrine, an agricultural deity from the mainland who weds the hunter-god Socheon-guk and mothers the ancestral village gods of Jeju.: Hyun Yong-jun, Jeju-do musok jaryo sajeon [Dictionary of Jeju Shamanic Materials] (Seoul: Singu Munhwasa, 1980) (primary); Hyun Yong-jun, Jeju-do sinhwa [Myths of Jeju Island] (Seoul: Seomundang, 1976) (secondary)