Borimsa Temple located on the southern foot of Gajisan Mountain was established in 860 by Chejing (804-880), an eminent Unified Silla monk, under the auspices of King Heonan (r. 857-861). The temple continued to prosper until it had in its precincts about twenty buildings, most of which were burnt down during the Korean War (1950-1953). Only two stone pagodas and one stone lantern remain in the temple’s front yard.
The two pagodas -- one standing in the north and the other in the south of the yard -- have the same structure and size, displaying the typical style of the Unified Silla pagoda with three-story body set up on a double-tier base whose upper tier is considerably larger than the lower tier. Each story of the pagodas consists of a body and a roof carved from a single block of stone; each body is engraved with corner columns, although these are not clear-cut on the second and third stories. Each roofstone has five-step cornice along its eaves and overly upturned corners. Both pagodas are topped with finials each consisting of a group of symbolic ornamental objects.
The stone lantern also exhibits a typical style of Silla lanterns consisting of a square base, two lotus-carved octagonal stones connected by a long, comparatively slender pillar, an octagonal light chamber with four windows, a wide roofstone with floral ornaments at the ends of the hip rafters, and the finial of several symbolic decorative objects.
These two stone pagodas and one stone lantern are in their original good condition complete with the finial, serving as a rare source of knowledge for the Buddhist art of Silla. A document discovered at one of the pagodas revealed that they were erected around 870 when Silla was under the rule of King Gyeongmun (r. 861-875). Historians believe that the stone lantern was also made in the same period.