전통사찰의 지형·생태적 입지 특성에 관한 탐색적 연구

초록

This exploratory study quantitatively analyzes the topographic and ecological settings of traditional Buddhist temples in South Korea at a national scale. Building on Kim’s (1985) pioneering study of 17 ancient temples, we expand the sample to 1,089 traditional temples registered with the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. Topographic variables from SRTM DEM (elevation, slope, southness, Topographic Wetness Index), MODIS NDVI-based vegetation variables, stream network density, and geomorphon-based landform classification were extracted within 500 m and 1 km buffers around each temple. To assess how temple settings differ from general national space, we generated five sets of random points across South Korea as reference groups and applied nonparametric Wilcoxon rank-sum tests. Results show that temple surroundings are characterized by higher elevation and steeper slope, with differences more pronounced in standard deviation than in central tendency, suggesting temples occupy spaces of greater topographic variability. Temple surroundings consistently show higher southness and lower stream network density, while TWI value means do not differ substantially from random samples, indicating association with well-drained, south-facing mountain slopes rather than humid lowlands. Geomorphonbased classification reveals that temple surroundings are dominated by the slope group (Spur, Slope, and Hollow), with lower proportions of ridge and lowland groups. These findings indicate that compared to the general national space, traditional temple surroundings are more closely associated with transitional terrain on mid-mountain slopes, consistent with Kim’s (1985) finding of intermediate positions between gentle piedmont slopes and slope breaks.

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