Meaning of Dragons in Daewung-Jeon of Gaeam-sa Temple, Korea

The reason why Daewung-Jeon of Gaeam-sa temple was famous for its dragon sculptures inside of the building.
As I have posted several times, the dragons have special meaning in Buddhism in Oriental society.
Actually the dragons were originated from China.
It is believed that the dragons were sum of totems of several tribes in ancient China.

But it is uncertain when and how the dragons got the meaning in Buddhism.
The dragons have various meaning in Buddhism.
Sometimes the dragon was a passenger from Bodishattva or Buddha.

In Korean ancient society, the meaning of the dragon was water.
So god of the sea used to be expressed as the king of the dragon in Korean folk story.
In this reason, they made the dragon sculptures in Buddhist temple to prevent from the fire.

As I posted, Gaeam-sa was also fired by the Japanese Army during the invasion 1592 - 1597.
When the temple was rebuilt, they made the dragon sculptures inside of the building.

In the case of Gaeam-sa temple, they made 9 dragons in Daewong-Jeon.

They made the dragon sculptures in every place where they could.
Below is the dragon in the corner of the building.

Usually in other case, there were not so many dragons as like Gaeam-sa temple.
The dragon sculptures in Daewung-Jeon were very realistic.
The face of the dragon was very dreadful to frighten the evil of the fire.

Those sculptures reminded me of some scenes of the film.

Of course, the core of Daewung-Jeon is Buddha statues.

And the ornaments and the decorations around Buddha statues were splendid.

Actually the dragons sculptures in Gaeam-sa temple must be the one of the best in Korea.