This was the first time people in the country knew of her miracles.Historians have long questioned the origins of Lady Saso noting the case of Kim Bu-sik, a Goryeo bureaucrat whom authored the Samguk Sagi (not to be confused with Samguk Yusa), who had been oblivious to these "tales and rumors" (as he puts it) of Lady Saso prior to his visit to Song dynasty China.
Another criticism focuses on these tales as being no different from mere deifications that stems from ideas such as Sinocentrism or Buddhism, which claims unidentified individuals of foreign origins (such as Chinese or Indians) as supposed ancestors of past royals with no grounded evidence.
[9] Claims made by Samguk Yusa (the source material Lady Saso is first mentioned in) is presumed to be the result of Chinese Sinocentrism, aligning with the claims that the Japanese were descended from Xu Fu (徐福), the Xiongnu were descendants of Lü-Gui (履癸王) the last king of Xia (夏) and that the case of Gojoseon (古朝鮮) and Gouwu (句吳) all revolve around China and its cultural significance.
[6] As such, the story of Lady Saso is mostly considered as fiction, which was published under the guise of a non-verfiable legend told in a third-person experience that happened over a century ago prior to its publication.
Following Kim Bu-sik's initial encounter with the legend, Il-yeon mentioned in his book that Lady Saso came from a "royal family", (not necessarily alluding to the Chinese dynasties),[5] which took another meaning of its own within Korea during the Japanese annexation period.
According to modern Korean historians, Il-yeon's claim of “(Lady Saso) coming from a royal family” was distorted once more by a fiction oriented, pseudo-historical book, Hwandan Gogi (환단고기/ Hanja: 桓檀古記) which was first written in 1911 and later published in 1979.
However, it is thought that these false claims found in Samguk Yusa and Hwandan Gogi about Lady Saso is what caused her existence to become so controversial in recent times.