Beyond Frontiers and Borderlands: A Reexamination of Tsushima’s/Taema-Do’s Geopolitical Position in Fifteenth Century East Asia

Abstract

In January 2017, a five-year long dispute over the repatriation of a bronze Buddhist statue that was reportedly stolen from a Buddhist temple in the fishing hamlet of Kozuna, Tsushima, came to a close. Based on historical documents in Buseoksa Temple, the South Korean court ruled that the stolen statue should remain in the possession of the Korean temple as it had been taken by Japanese pirates several centuries earlier.