Hanbyeokdang ("cold jade hall") was built in 1404 as a private retreat by Choi Dam, a meritorious official who had helped found the Joseon dynasty, perched on a cliff at the foot of Seungamsan Mountain. It was originally named Woldangnu, but locals started calling it Hanbyeokdang after the water flowing beneath the pavilion, which scatters white against the rocks like shattered jade and runs cold enough to feel it in your bones. Along with Gwanghallu and Hanpungnu, it's one of the three pavilions collectively known in the Honam region as the "Three Colds" (Samhan).
Modern history intruded on this quiet pavilion in 1931. Japanese colonial authorities, building the Jeolla railway line, planned to cut straight through the cliff where Hanbyeokdang stood — which would have meant tearing the pavilion down. Choi Byeong-sim, a 17th-generation descendant of the original builder, objected strongly. In the end, the railway was rerouted around Hanbyeokdang entirely, cut instead through an artificial tunnel carved into the cliff face behind it — the Hanbyeok Tunnel. Colonial-era railway construction was, as a rule, carried out with little regard for local objections; a single descendant's protest actually changing a rail line's route was a genuinely rare outcome. Even today, you can stand on this same cliff and hear both things at once — the trains still running through the Hanbyeok Tunnel, and the Jeonju stream still flowing under Hanbyeokdang exactly as it did 600 years ago.