The Cambridge History of Japan, Vol. 3: Medieval Japan

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ACCELERATION OF COMMERCE 369

nation of Sasaki's original sources also reveals that commutation began

early and was practiced most frequently in Owari and the surrounding

provinces on the Tokaido route, in Harima and nearby provinces on

the Sanyodo route, and in the northern provinces of Kyushu. The

number of

shoen

practicing commutation also continued to rise most

rapidly in those provinces into the fourteenth century.

There is an ongoing debate among Japanese specialists concerning

why commutation began to be practiced and why it increased during

the thirteenth century. The older generation of specialists generally

explain the increase in commutation as the inevitable outcome of the

fact that as local markets developed, enabling the dues payers to ob-

tain cash, the dues recipients in the capital demanded commutation.

The relatively early and more extensive growth of the local markets in

shoen located on the major routes and in the northern provinces of

Kyushu is offered as evidence supporting this view. Toyoda Takeshi,

one of these specialists, also cites the relative difficulties and higher

costs of transporting bulky dues in kind as contributing to the increase

in commutation.

In more recent studies, however, a few Japanese historians have

begun to argue that these explanations are unsatisfactory and leave

several questions unanswered. First, if the dues recipients' demand

for cash was the reason for commutation, why does a recent examina-

tion of nearly a dozen shoen reveal that commutation was initiated by

the jito or even the cultivators themselves? Second, if the relative

difficulties and higher costs of transporting dues in kind was a factor

in encouraging commutation, would not the same factor inhibit the

ability of local merchants to buy products from dues payers, inasmuch

as most of what they bought would have to be transported to the

capital and other centers of consumption? That is, the authors of the

recent studies assert that the difficulties and costs of transporting

bulky goods could also have reduced market activities in the prov-

inces,

and this in turn would have made it more difficult for the

cultivators to obtain the cash needed to pay dues. Third, although the

earlier generation of historians assumed that rice - the most important

product that the cultivators sold to obtain cash - was transported to

Kyoto for sale, was there sufficient demand for rice in the capital

where many recipients of dues were still receiving rice from their

shoen

located in neighboring provinces? Finally, if local markets had been

52 On this debate, the best sources are Kodama and Toyoda, Ryutsushi, pp. 71-74; and Sasaki,

Chusei shohin ryutsushi, pp. 250-362.

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370 THE GROWTH OF COMMERCE

developing across the nation, why did the

shoen

of more distant regions

not pay dues in cash, which would have been easier and less costly

than bulky dues in kind to transport over long distances?

Those historians who question the long-accepted views readily con-

cede that their own answers are still far from satisfactory, primarily

because of the few case studies that they have been able to make (in

part because of the scarcity of pertinent historical records). However,

the results of their case studies and subsequent analyses are worthy of

attention.

In regard to the first question, Sasaki's study of six

shoen

that

adopted partial commutation at the insistence of the jito and his analy-

sis of this development are important. These

shoen

were located in the

eastern and central provinces and belonged to such proprietors as the

highest-ranked nobles (including the Fujiwara) and the Todaiji.

Sasaki establishes that commutation was adopted between 1240 and

1331 against the proprietors' wishes when the bakufu ruled in favor of

the jito, who demanded that cash payment of dues be allowed. Why

did the jito opt for commutation? Sasaki posits that the jito demanded

commutation either because the cultivators themselves were demand-

ing cash payment or because the jito, acting as middlemen, could

benefit from commutation. The dues payers might demand commuta-

tion for two reasons. First, the proprietors were demanding dues in

kind in a mix of products not produced by the cultivators themselves

(thus forcing them to incur the costs of selling the products they

produced and buying the mix of products the proprietor demanded).

Second, paying cash was more advantageous, as the jito would have

made certain that the conversion rate between the products was paid

in kind and that their cash value was set in favor of the cultivators (the

prices of rice, cloth, and other in-kind dues in the local markets were

higher than those used in there's conversion rate).

One obvious question that Sasaki felt obliged to answer was why the

jito (except when they demanded commutation for the obvious reason

of increasing their own income as middlemen) battled the proprietors,

to the point of necessitating the bakufu's intervention on behalf of the

cultivators. His answer is that the^tfc's economic welfare depended on

having cultivators better able to meet the jito's demands, even at the

53 See Kodama and Toyoda, Ryutsushi; Sasaki, Chusei

shohin

ryutsushi;

and Kamiki Tetsuo,

"Chusei shohin ni okeru kahei," Kokumin keizai zasshi 120 (1963): 50-65, for an analytic

discussion.

54 See Sasaki, "Shoen," in Nagahara and Inagaki, eds.,

Chusei no

shakai to keizai; Kodama and

Toyoda, Ryutsushi; and Sasaki,

Chusei shohin

ryutsushi.

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ACCELERATION OF COMMERCE 37I

proprietors' expense. Even if the jito did not benefit economically by

the adoption of commutation, they would have fewer political prob-

lems if the cultivators felt indebted to them because of the jito's actions

on their

behalf.

Sasaki recognizes that he is not, based on only a few

case studies, in a position to refute the long-accepted interpretation

that commutation was initiated by the

shoen

proprietors. He thus sug-

gests that what is needed is a careful reexamination, and not a refuta-

tion, of the old views.

On the second question concerning the relative costs and difficulties

of transporting goods versus cash, the existing empirical evidence is

far from sufficient to settle the issue. Although there are a few specific

historical references to the high cost of transporting goods, which are

emphasized by the older historians, a careful examination by Sasaki of

a dozen historical documents citing the costs of transporting goods and

cash demonstrates that it is not possible to conclude that the cost of

transporting cash was lower than that of shipping various products.

Thus,

Sasaki is prepared to argue on the analytic ground noted earlier

that the relative costs of transportation need not and should not be

considered a factor in the increase of commutation.

On this point, however, the older view has not gone undefended.

More recently, Toyoda responded to Sasaki's criticism by contending

that those merchants and specialists of transportation engaging in

long-distance trade were more experienced in overcoming the difficul-

ties of transporting goods over both land and sea; they knew how to

bribe the pirates and brigands and how to protect their wares. They

might also have been better organized in the use of ships and man-

power so that their costs and risks would have been lower than those

incurred by the nonspecialists retained by the shoen owners. Because

Toyoda's rebuttal is based on assertions, the controversy on this point

must also remain unresolved, awaiting further case studies and analy-

ses of quantitative evidence.

The third question regarding Kyoto's ability to consume the large

quantity of rice transported there, owing to the prevalence of commu-

tation, also cannot be answered unequivocally. Even the recent stud-

ies recognize that rice as a proportion of the total dues paid to the

proprietors residing in Kyoto was falling, whereas the population of

Kyoto was rising. Therefore, the answer to this question depends on

each historian's educated assessment as to whether the amount of rice

55 Sasaki, Chusei

shohin

ryutsushi, pp. 350-2.

56 Ibid., pp. 329-30. 57 Kodama and Toyoda, Ryutsushi, p. 72.

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372 THE GROWTH OF COMMERCE

being transported to Kyoto from the local markets exceeded the

demand.

The last question pertaining to the regional distribution of

shoen

that practiced commutation must also remain unsettled because this

also concerns the relative costs and risks of transporting goods versus

cash. Furthermore, there have not been enough case studies to estab-

lish the validity of the assertion, made in recent critiques of the old

view, that local markets in distant regions were sufficiently developed

by this time to enable dues payers to obtain the necessary cash by

selling their products.

Abrogation of debts

The continuing growth of commercial activities, accompanied by the

accelerating use of cash and adoption of commutation, had familiar

and predictable effects on the cultivators. Trading in markets gave

them opportunities to increase their income. They could now pro-

duce more of those products in which they had a comparative ad-

vantage and make more efficient use of labor, land, and osher re-

sources in response to changes in the prices of various products.

Commutation, to the extent that it was adopted, freed them from the

burden of producing predetermined, often disadvantageous, mixes of

products.

Involvement in a cash economy, however, subjected the cultivators

to price fluctuations. Inevitably there were pe?iods of low prices that

forced some to borrow money at a high interest rate, often more than

25 percent per year, in order to pay cash dues. The market-oriented

economy, on the other hand, tended to favor the large

myoshu

and

others who worked a large amount of land; they could better with-

stand the risks of price (and yield) fluctuations and even take advan-

tage of them. They were also able to augment their economic resources

by becoming village moneylenders. The most successful among them

were beginning to accumulate enough cash to acquire more kajishi-

shiki (the right to receive rents from paddies).

However, even in the second half of the Kamakura period, market

activities, monetization, and commutation affected the lives of cultiva-

tors only to a limited extent. Market days were still few; commutation

was far from universal; many cultivators were still paying all or part of

their dues in kind; and the paddies of most cultivators did not yield

58 Sasaki,

Chiisei shohin

ryuisushi,

pp. 328-30.

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ACCELERATION OF COMMERCE 373

large or reliable surpluses that could be sold. Most of the cultivators'

lives were still dictated more by the rhythms of nature than by the

widening ripples of the cash nexus.

The situation was quite different for an increasing number of war-

riors,

to whom cash with which to buy goods and services was becom-

ing indispensable by the early decades of the thirteenth century. This

was one reason that some warriors in their capacity as jito took the

initiative in adopting commutation and that some with more than one

landholding (shotyo) began to appoint monks (sanso), merchants, and

other commoners "wise in the ways of cash" as daikan (magistrates) to

collect the cash dues from their lands.

It did not take long for some warriors to spend more than their

income. By the early decades of the thirteenth century they began to

borrow, often mortgaging their lands, so that they could buy the

goods and services that the markets offered. But this was a develop-

ment that the bakufu could not allow to continue, especially when it

saw that more and more of the gokenin - the direct retainers of the

shogun - were beginning to incur large debts. In 1239, therefore, the

bakufu issued a decree prohibiting jito, many of whom were gokenin,

from appointing moneylenders to the position of daikan or jito-dai for

the purpose of collecting dues. The bakufu issued this edict because

a part or even all of the dues that the moneylenders collected were

being retained by them as payments on loans they had advanced to

the jito. In the following year the bakufu, hoping to eliminate the

problem at the source, issued another decree forbidding the gokenin

from mortgaging or selling land to any non-gokenin or any com-

moner, as well as from indulging in such luxuries as riding in ox-

drawn carriages.

Obviously, these admonitions and prohibitions had little effect, and

many gokenin continued to lose their lands. As a result, the bakufu

issued yet another decree in 1267 to undo the damage already done.

The decree gave the gokenin who had lost their mortgaged land the

right to regain it by repaying the loans in cash or kind. That is, the

decree forced the lenders, who had acquired land from the gokenin, to

accept overdue repayment on the loans. Furthermore, the decree re-

peated the prohibition against all sales of land by gokenin and added

new restrictions disallowing former wives and widows of gokenin to

59 Amino Yoshihiko, Moko shurai, vol. 10 oiNihon rekishi (Tokyo: Shogakkan, 1974), pp. 112-

16.

60 Takeuchi Rizd, ed., Tochi seidoshi, vol. 1 (Tokyo: Yoshikawa shuppansha, 1973), pp. 286-

301.

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374 THE GROWTH OF COMMERCE

transfer land received from their husbands to new husbands and void-

ing the ownership of land by any women except the wives and daugh-

ters of

gokenin.

Also in 1267, the bakufu abolished its office in charge

of appeals concerning decisions made on cases involving sold or mort-

gaged land.

Not surprisingly, this decree caused great confusion and created

many problems. Even the few surviving records show that the prob-

lems thus created were widespread and serious. For example, the

Todaiji vigorously protested a

gokenin's

demand to regain possession

of his land by making an overdue payment; some

gokenin

took posses-

sion of the land they had lost, without repaying their debt; and bitter

disputes arose concerning the ownership of crops growing on land

whose ownership was forcibly changed by the decree.

It quickly

became apparent that the bakufu's decree had seriously undermined

the sanctity of the contracts on which these economic transactions

were based. In order for the bakufu to preserve the political structure,

however, the gokenin, who occupied a central position, had to be

"saved" from the undesirable effects of accelerating monetization, de-

spite the consequences.

The dilemma grew even worse after the Mongol invasions in 1274

and 1281. The invasions themselves and the threats of future attack

forced the

gokenin

to carry an extremely heavy economic burden, first

in fighting the Mongols and then in waiting, combat-ready, for nearly

two decades in fear that another invasion could come at any time.

What made this economic burden on the

gokenin

such a grave crisis for

the bakufu was that unlike in civil wars, it could not in this case

confiscate land from defeated enemies in order to reward the

gokenin,

now even more hard-pressed because of the newly incurred debts. The

bakufu thus once again came to the aid cf the

gokenin

by issuing a

limited decree in 1284 and another, more sweeping decree in 1297.

The decree of 1284 was issued only for the benefit of the

gokenin

northern Kyushu, where the effects of the invasion were especially

noticeable. The decree ordered that the

myoshu-shiki

(rights to dues

from myoden) acquired from

gokenin

be returned immediately and

unconditionally. Throughout the remainder of the century, more and

gokenin

went into debt and lost their lands owing to the costs of

maintaining a defense against the Mongols and living beyond their

means - borrowing in order to acquire desired goods and services

from the market. Thus, by the end of the century, the bakufu realized

61 Amino, Moko

shurai,

pp. 136-60. 62 Ibid., pp. 141-2.

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ACCELERATION OF COMMERCE 375

that it had no choice but to issue a decree to prevent further deteriora-

tion of the gokenin's economic condition.

The result was the Einin

tokuseirei

of 1297. The three articles of this

decree that survive today made the following provisions: Appeals of

decisions concerning the ownership of land would no longer be ac-

cepted (the same prohibition against appeals issued in 1267 had just

been lifted in 1294, causing a flood of

appeals).

One appeal was permit-

ted to nobles and temples, and the litigation for those cases for which

appeals were already in process was allowed to continue. The gokenin

were prohibited from selling or pawning their land, and all the land

that the gokenin lost, by sale or by failure to redeem pawned land, was

to be returned to the gokenin, even of they were unable to repay the

money they had received. The only exceptions to this article were

cases in which more than twenty years had elapsed since the land in

question had been lost and cases in which the land transactions oc-

curred under the bakufu's explicit written permission. Finally, the

bakufu court would henceforth no longer accept any legal case concern-

ing the nonpayment of

loans.

The only exceptions were those cases in

which pawns were currently held by the lenders.

Although with apparent political concessions to the interests of the

nobles, temples, and moneylenders (in whose economic well-being the

nobles and temples were very much interested), the decree was an

undisguised application of bakufu power to protect the gokenin. Impor-

tant also is the fact that the decree's third article - the nonacceptance

of legal cases concerning loans - applied, unlike all previous decrees,

to everyone, including both warriors and commoners. The reason for

this was that the bakufu, in its apparent attempt to justify its protec-

tion of the gokenin and to call this decree tokusei, benefiting all, felt it

necessary to allow "all those impoverished" to come under this arti-

cle's protection.

Again, a predictable amount of confusion ensued that forced the

bakufu to issue detailed directives concerning the sale of

crops,

uses of

promissory notes, goods borrowed or kept for safekeeping, and numer-

ous other circumstances. Worse still, the decree allowing the

gokenin

regain ownership of land without repayment caused the nobles, tem-

ples,

moneylenders, and many commoners to appeal to the court in

Kyoto, forcing the bakufu to negotiate specific cases and to make

exceptions.

63 Ibid., pp. 325-34.

64 Ibid., pp. 329-34. Hall, Japan; Reischauer and Craig, Japan; and Sansom, A History of

Japan all contain discussions of these major wkuseirei.

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376 THE GROWTH OF COMMERCE

The bakufu was forced to rescind the decree in February 1298; it

had been in effect for only eleven months. The repossession of land

that had occurred during these eleven months, however, remained

valid, and so the

gokenin

who were able to take advantage of the decree

gained from it.

No more

tokuseirei

were issued during the Kamakura

period, not because the need declined but because the bakufu was too

weak by the end of the thirteenth century to defy the dictates of a

monetized economy. For the Kamakura bakufu in the final decades of

its power, monetization acted like an illness suffered by an already

deteriorating body. The illness made the effects of the Mongol inva-

sion even more grave, and the warriors' greater dependence on the

markets too became a truly debilitating affliction. In the

final

decades,

the bakufu, further weakened by this illness, was not even able to use

the anodyne called

tokuseirei.

COMMERCE AND CITIES IN THE NAMBOKUCHO AND

MUROMACHI PERIODS

Building on the momentum generated in the latter half of the

Kamakura period and, more importantly, on the continuing rise in

agricultural productivity, the economy in the Nambokucho and

Muromachi periods continued to grow. This momentum continued

unabated into the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, scarcely slowed

by the demise of the Kamakura bakufu and the prolonged political

and military disturbances that culminated in the rise of the Ashikaga

bakufu. The increasing market activities in these periods led to further

specialization, which in turn made production and distribution more

efficient, and the resultant gains were shared, though not without

conflicts, by all classes.

The growth of agricultural productivity was the foundation OA

which the commerce of these periods flourished. Japan during this

ume specialized more and more in products in which each cultivator

and region had a comparative advantage; it improved its irrigation,

used more fertilizer, and adopted new varieties of

rice

and other crops.

A new variety of rice, known as Champa, reached Japan frcm

Indochina by way of China in the Muromachi period and was espe-

cially important to raising productivity. This rice, which was more

resistant to both drought and insects than were existing varieties,

65 Amino, Moko shurai, pp.

332-3;

and also see, for a useful discussion of the political back-

ground of these tokuseirei, Nitta Hideharu, Kamakura koki no seiji katei, vol. 6 (chusei 2) of

Iwanami koza Nihon rekishi (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1975), pp. 1-40.

COMMERCE AND CITIES 377

enabled cultivators in western Japan to double crop and even triple

crop their paddies.

The market forces exerted an ever-stronger hold

on the cultivators, forcing as well as motivating them to become more

efficient.

Growth of

commerce

and za in Kyoto

From the short-lived Kemmu restoration to the fall of the Ashikaga

bakufu, Kyoto remained the seat of power. This meant that during the

fourteenth and fifteenth centuries Kyoto grew both in population and

wealth, and its commerce expanded even more rapidly. But the pro-

tracted civil wars of the Nambokucho period and the Onin War in the

second half of the fifteenth century made the city a battleground,

intermittently slowing or even halting its commerce. Recurring fam-

ines and disease, especially during the 1440s, also eroded both popula-

tion and commerce.

Even with civil war, famine, and disease, the population of Kyoto is

estimated to have grown to more that 200,000 by the time of the Onin

War. If this estimate is correct, it was, in the mid- to late fifteenth

century, one of the largest cities in the world. London, for example,

had no more than 50,000. The large population and commercial sector

gradually transformed the capital. In the Sakyo, from Sanjd in the

north to Gojo and Shichijo in the south, more and more merchants and

artisans engaged in trade, and an increasing number of za, to which

most of them belonged, congregated. Where the major north-south

and east-west roads crossed, machi - administrative units enjoying a

degree of self-government - appeared in the Nambokucho period and

continued to proliferate throughout the fifteenth century. The best-

known and largest machi were Sanjo, Rokkaku, Nishikoji, Shijo,

Gojo,

Shichijo, and Kujo-Omiya.

Although most of the merchants and artisans were small and their

establishments humble, some merchants became quite wealthy during

the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, so much so that the Ashikaga

bakufu began to depend on their wealth to meet its fiscal needs.

It is

66 Kuroda Hideo, "Chusei nogyo gijutsu no yoso," in Nagahara Keiji and Yamaguchi Keiji,

eds.,

Nogyo to nosan kako, vol. i of Nihon gijuisu no shakaishi (Tokyo: Nihon hyoronsha,

1983).

PP- 67-76.

67 Wakita, Nihon chusei toshi ton, pp. 280-317; Endo, Nihon chusei toshi ron, pp. 99-108; and

Akiyama Kunizo and Nakamura Ken, Kyoto "machi" no kenkyu (Tokyo: Hosei daigaku

shuppankai, 1975), which describes the growth of Kyoto from the Heian period to the

eighteenth century.

68 This is a well-known fact discussed in all textbooks. See also Wakita Haruko, Muromachi-ki

no keizai hatten, vol. 7 (chusei 3) of Iwanami koza Nihon rekishi (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten,

378 THE GROWTH OF COMMERCE

known that in 1393, the bakufu began to collect an annual due of six

thousand kanmon - a huge sum considering that the cash value of the

total annual dues of many shoen was less than one hundred kanmon -

from the doso and sakaya in and around Kyoto.

The magnificent cultural life during this period would not, of

course, have been possible without this wealth. The most prosperous

among these merchants were the doso who were pawnbrokers and

moneylenders and who also engaged in warehousing and other com-

mercial ventures; the sakaya, who sold sake and used their earnings

for money lending; and other merchants who accumulated wealth by

importing luxuries from the continent and controlling profitable za.

These most successful merchants, led by about 370 sakaya and 300 to

400 doso, came to be called utokunin (literally, "men of

virtue").

In this

age of commerce in which the

langage

des holies commanded respect,

"virtue" was an appropriate and mellifluous synonym for wealth.

The services and products provided by the majority of the humbler

merchants, artisans, and other specialists expanded throughout the

Nambokucho and Muromachi periods. By the mid-fifteenth century, a

roster of their occupations was long indeed. Toyoda Takeshi, who

examined the composition of the population in a part of Kyoto, using

various local records, wrote:

One cannot but be surprised by the large number of small merchants and

artisans. In 1460 . . . one

finds

on both sides of the Gion

071

[a central north-

south main road] a very large number of persons serving the needs of the

temples and shrines . . . their occupations included, among the artisans,

carpenters, keg makers, smiths,

tatami

makers, makers of Buddhist statues,

and others, and among the merchants, those selling rice, brooms, combs,

needles, rice cakes, dyes, oils, threads, and sakeV

Toyoda's observation can be applied to the entire city because we

have learned from the documents how rapidly the number of za in

Kyoto multiplied in the Nambokucho and Muromachi periods. The

growth of za, called "new " za as opposed to "old" za that had existed

since the previous century, was especially noticeable during the

Nambokucho period. Although it is impossible to ascertain the precise

increase in the number of these za in both periods, there is no doubt

that it was large.

1976),

pp. 88-93;

d Sasaki Ginya, Muromachi bakufu, vol. 13 of Nihon rekishi (Tokyo:

Shogakkan, 1975), pp. 129-38.

69 Inoue Micsusada et at., eds., Nihon rekishi taikei, vol. 2 (chusei) (Tokyo: Yamakawa

shuppansha, 1985), p. 622. See pp. 621-26 for a good general description of the

utokunin

this period. 70 Toyoda,

Chusei

Nihon

shogyoshi no

kenkyu, pp. 363-4.