The first record of Silla songs occurs in the Historical Records of the Three Kingdoms, though the Memorabilia of the Three Kingdoms adds more information. When King Yuri (24–57), the third king of Silla, made an inspection tour of the country in the eleventh month, ad 28, he happened to see an old woman dying of hunger and cold in the open. He reproached himself saying that it was his fault if the old and the young had so little to eat and were suffering to such an extreme. After covering the old woman with his own coat and giving her food, he ordered the civil authorities to seek out those who could not provide for themselves – the widowers and widows, the destitute, the old and the sick – in order to give them food and shelter. When they heard this story, many people from the neighboring provinces came to Silla to praise the king. That year the grateful people composed the “Tosol ka.”

Earlier, “Tosol ka” was read as “Tonnorae” or “T'ŏnorae,” but now the more plausible reading “Turinnorrae” has been proposed. Turi is a cognate of such words as “peace” (or “peaceful”), “content,” “repose,” and “happy”; hence the term means “song of peace and repose.” To say that this is the first vernacular song and music of Silla does not mean there were no songs in Silla before this period.