The dramatic rock pillars at Yeongsil on Hallasan are the setting for a sorrowful Jeju legend about a mother and her many sons. While preparing food in a huge cauldron, the mother suffers a fatal accident; the sons' grief is said to have transformed them into stone. Seeing the pinnacles as members of a family gives a human dimension to the mountain view. This is folklore, not a geological account of the rock formations.
Stories
- First published
- Oct 23, 2026
The Five Hundred Generals of Yeongsil: A Family Turned to Stone
The dramatic rock pillars at Yeongsil on Hallasan are the setting for a sorrowful Jeju legend about a mother and her many sons.

This feature interprets an oral tradition documented by Jeju's provincial government. It is not a report of a current event or a scientifically verified supernatural occurrence.
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What we're seeing
It shows how conspicuous mountain rocks became more than scenery in local imagination.
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What we still don't know
Variants may differ across tellers and villages. Mythic events, powers and explanations of landforms are not independently verified history or science.