“Nongsajiksol” is a book on agriculture where farming methods and experiences suitable for the climatic and soil conditions of our country are comprehensively systematized. It was written by a feudal bureaucrat and scholar Jong Cho (? – 1434) in 1429, hundreds of years from now.
The book has a small amount of information with farming experiences limited to certain areas, but it has a lot of valuable information necessary for farming ranging from preparation of seeds, ploughing and preparation of compost and manure to methods of growing several kinds of grain crops.
In addition, written in the book are use of various kinds of farming tools, methods of manuring, and how to cultivate cereals like millet, foxtail millet, wheat, barley, etc. and legumes such as beans, adzuki beans, mung beans, etc., sesame and buckwheat.
Therefore, the book was republished several times until the later period of the feudal Joson dynasty in order to be widely used in agriculture and consulted for other agricultural books.
Although it has some defects due to the purpose of compilation and the class limitation of the author, “Nongsajiksol”, the oldest of all agricultural books from the middle ages of our country still found, serves as an important historical record for research into the development of farming methods and skills of that time.
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