Stone pagodas during the Goryeo Dynasty were built mainly on multi-story stone pagodas of five stories or more, and various new types were created by inheriting and modifying stone pagodas from the Baekje and Unified Silla eras. Cheongju Gyesan-ri Five-story Stone Pagoda is a five-story stone pagoda with a single-story stylobate and belongs to the Goryeo-style single-story stylobate type. A recent excavation revealed that the original location of the stone pagoda was about 8 meters away, not its current location. It can be said that this movement of the stone pagoda is highly likely to have occurred during reconstruction after it collapsed due to damage to the base and body members.
The five-story stone pagoda in Gyesan-ri, Cheongju was built using the grooved joint method, which was the construction technique for stone pagodas during the Goryeo Dynasty. The stone pagoda's stylobate was built using the interlocking joint method, and the space-shaped grooves are carved in the four corners of the stylobate, making the joint between members unnatural. Therefore, the stylobite can be estimated in two ways. This is when the space and myeonseok were made of star stones and when they were joined using the ‘H’ shaped joining method. The characteristic of the single-story stylobate stone pagodas built since the Unified Silla period is the level of the stone at the base of the stylobate, and this feature has been continued until the Goryeo period. Considering the support at each level of the stylobate of the five-story stone pagoda in Gyesan-ri, Cheongju, we can give weight to the possibility that it was built using the ‘H’ shaped joint method. The roof stone of the stone pagoda was also built using the groove-digging method, by digging grooves on the top and bottom and inserting the pagoda body stones. This construction method is the main construction method of the blue stone pagoda, which is a heterogeneous stone pagoda, and also allows for a glimpse of stylistic exchange.
Among the stone pagodas of the Goryeo Dynasty, stone pagodas built with a grooved joint method based on the ‘H’ shaped joint method began to appear in earnest from the 11th century. Considering the heaviness of the roof stone of the five-story stone pagoda in Gyesan-ri, Cheongju and the fact that the roof support is formed all the way to the end of the ridge, it can be dated to the 13th century.