Excluding the records of the last two kings, the sillok is designated as the 151st national treasure of South Korea and listed in UNESCO's Memory of the World registry.

The work was scheduled to start in 2014 with an initial budget of ₩500 million, but it was estimated that a total of ₩40 billion would be needed to complete the project.

However, the eight historians of the seventh, eighth, and ninth ranks in the Office of Royal Decrees (예문관; 藝文館) were responsible for maintaining daily records of official court activities.

The daily historical records produced by the eight historians were called sacho (사초; 史草; lit.

The compilation relied on various primary sources, including the sacho, historians' private memoranda, administrative records (시정기; 時政記), and the Seungjeongwon ilgi.

Once finalized, the drafts, sacho, and the historians' private memoranda were pulped in water and expunged (세초; 洗草; lit.

[7][8] Great care was taken to ensure the integrity of the records; historians were guaranteed legal protection and editorial independence, especially from the king.

The Jeonju records narrowly escaped being destroyed by fire and were only saved by the private initiative of several scholars.

After the war, the government began maintaining five repositories at Ch'unch'ugwan, Mount Myohyang, Taebaeksan, Odaesan, and Manisan.

Part of the Manisan collection was lost during the 1636 Qing invasion of Joseon, and the surviving volumes moved to Jeongjok-san on Ganghwa Island in 1678.

They are thus considered relatively separate from the other records, and are not included in the National Treasures of South Korea or UNESCO's Memory of the World register.