Traditions of Andong
The heart of Korean Confucian custom, with a mask dance festival and the Hahoe folk village.
Andong is a city in the east of Korea considered the spiritual home of Confucian traditions. Old clans still hold ancestral rites in family houses and academies. The nearby Hahoe Village is a living clan village, and the city is known for its mask dance, Hahoe byeolsingut talnori, and for its soju and salted mackerel.
Masks and ancestors
The Hahoe mask dance dramatises a village's grievances and humour with carved masks of alder wood. Andong also hosts an international mask dance festival each autumn. Families here maintain strict ancestral rites, jesa, with a table of food and an order of bowing.
At the table
Andong jjimdak is chicken braised with glass noodles and soy, jjim, a regional pride. Heotjesabap is a dish of rice with vegetables, originally served after the ancestral rite when hungry guests came late at night. Andong soju is a strong, clear spirit distilled in traditional ways.
Signature traditions of Andong
Also part of it, and being written: Hahoe Folk Village (The living clan village.).
A trail idea for Andong
- Hahoe Village Walk the earth lanes and see the thatched roofs.
- Andong Mask Festival Try the dances alongside the performers.
- Dosan Seowon A Confucian academy beside the river.
Written by the EveryParampara desk with AI assistance. Opening hours, markets and festival dates change; check locally before travelling. Customs differ from place to place and family to family. If this is your tradition and we have it wrong, tell us.
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Photo credits on this page
The small pictures above come from Wikimedia Commons under free licences. Some are cropped to fit.
- Chuseok: by Joseph Steinberg (Baltimoron in Korea) at Flickr, CC BY-SA 2.0, source
- Talchum: originally by photoren, CC BY 2.0, source