Sejong Commissions Rain Gauge

1441

King Sejong of Korea ordered the construction of standardized bronze rain gauges to be distributed across the kingdom's provinces, making Joseon the first state in all of recorded history to systematically measure rainfall on a national scale. Data was collected at each station and reported to the capital to improve agricultural planning and flood prediction. Korean science under Sejong's patronage was, by any honest measure, the most empirically advanced government program of its century.