Foreign visitor number to tomb Yeongneung South Korea 2017-2023
There have been 176 foreign visitors to Yeongneung in South Korea in 2023. Although it was an increase from the previous year, numbers had been over 1,000 from 2017 to 2019 before dropping to below 100 during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Yeongneung is the tomb of one of the most famous kings of Korean history, Sejong of Joseon, also called Sejong the Great, and his wife, Queen Soheon. Sejong ruled over the Joseon Dynasty, which encompassed the Korean Peninsula, from 1418 until his death in 1450. He remains one of the most revered individuals of Korean history, signified by a statue of his at Gwanghwamun Plaza in the capital city Seoul. One of his major achievements was the creation of the native Korean alphabet hangul in 1443, which was published from 1446. Together with other Royal Tombs of the Joseon Dynasty, it has been registered as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2009.