Three pictorial ideographs (Munjado)

Munjado stand for the Eight Cardinal Principles of Confucian morality so central in the Choson period: filial piety, brotherly love, loyalty to the state, trustworthiness, humility, propriety, honor and duty (the three ideographs here, right to left). Animals, plants or objects are paired with a decorative rubric to form the Chinese character for each principle, in these examples a tortoise, crab and pheasants. For a set of eight munjado, see Robert Moes, Auspicious Spirits: Korean Folk Paintings and Related Objects, exh. cat. (Washington, D. C.: International Exhibitions Foundation, 1983), cat. no. 10.