Jeongseon, Gangwon Province, South Korea

🇰🇷 Jeongseon is a county in the province of Gangwon-do, South Korea. It is famous as the hometown of "Jeongseon Arirang", a traditional Korean folk-song. It is also the hometown of actor Won Bin and footballer Seol Ki-hyeon.

History It was ruled by the Goguryeo Dynasty during the Three Kingdoms period, called Ingpyae-hyeon (잉패현). After the Silla Dynasty unified the Korean peninsula, it was renamed Jeongseon-hyeon in 757. After the Goryeo Dynasy was founded, it was promoted from a hyeon to a county (gun) in 1012 or 1018.

After the Joseon Dynasty was founded and the territory was divided into 8 Provinces, the region was involved in the province of Gangwon. After the territory was divided into 23 districts in 1895 with the 8-provincial system abolished, it was included in the district of Chugju. When a 13-provincial system was enacted in 1896, it returned to Gangwon Province.

Administrative divisions Towns (eup) • Gohan-eup • Jeongseon-eup • Sabuk-eup • Sindong-eup.

Townships (myeon) • Yeoryang-myeon • Bukpyeong-myeon • Hwaam-myeon • Imgye-myeon • Nam-myeon.

Geography A lot of coal and limestone is buried in the strata formed during the Paleozoic Era in this region. A Karst zone formed from the dissolution of the limestone is located, and many of solutional caves are found.

Natural monuments shaped from the limestone are as follows. • Baekbongryeong Karst zone: Karst zone in baekbongryeong zone is known to be academically useful because karst is located in small area. It was designated Natural Monuments of South Korea number 440 on April 9, 2004. • Jeongseon coral cave: few stony corals are growing in the cave, and there is big coral which is not found elsewhere. Designated as natural monuments number 509 on December 15, 2009.