The problem is that "dohong" doesn't have a meaning in Korean. I had to strain to find out that "dohong" is a transcription of the Chinese term 烏銅 "wutong", which means "crow's copper" or "black copper". According to the Chinese treatise, it is an alloy consisting of 100 parts of copper and 1 part of gold. Thus, the Korean dohong, the Chinese wutong and the Japanese shakudo are the same copper alloy in composition. But there are differences in processing technique. For example, in Korea, the black color of the finished product is obtained by etching in urine (aged for a long time in a closed vessel).
It is also very interesting that the information that objects made of this alloy can signal the state of health of their owner finds some experimental confirmation.
|