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COMMERCE AND CITIES 389

transported to Kyoto.

They were quickly joined by several thousand

cultivators from Omi and neighboring provinces. Although no histori-

cal document tells exactly why this uprising began and spread so

quickly, there is no doubt that the main reason was the poor harvest of

the previous year that caused disease to spread and the debt burden of

the teamsters and cultivators to become even heavier. The cultivators

involved in the uprising "took the records of their debt and burned

them" and "attacked, in the name of tokusei [virtuous

rule],

sakaya,

doso,

and temples and robbed them of valuables." They had to be

subdued by the warriors dispatched by several daimyo in response to

the urgent request of the shaken bakufu.

Although only a few ikki were as large as this one,

there were

twenty-six large ikki each involving at least a few hundred people,

between 1428 and the end of the century. A dozen or so of the later

uprisings involved more and more warriors, indicating both the effects

that monetization and the growth of commerce had on their economic

lot and the further weakening of the bakufu. The tokuseirei of the

fifteenth century were perhaps the offspring of a marriage between a

growing commerce that made money even more essential to the daily

lives of all and a central political authority that was gradually becom-

ing less central and less authoritative.

The Kitano sake-malt (kdji) za demonstrates the effects of the chang-

ing political reality of the period on commerce in general and on the za

in particular.

Sanctioned by the Kitano Shrine, a branch of the powerful En-

ryakuji, by the mid-fourteenth century, this za was actively engaged in

selling malt. Documents written during the 1390s, however, show that

its exclusive right to supply malt to about 350 sake makers in most

parts of Kyoto was no longer "protected" by the shrine alone. In 1388,

the bakufu began to levy taxes in exchange for a decree supporting the

za's continued monopoly rights. Clearly, even with the backing of the

Enryakuji, the shrine by this time had become unable to prevent the

bakufu from sharing in the za's profits.

Then, during the early decades of the fifteenth century, the za

95 This is the so-called Seicho do-ikki. An excellent description of it can be found in Sasaki,

Muromachi bakufu, pp.

178-81.

96 Ibid., p. 179.

97 Another major ikki occurred in 1441 and is called Kakitsu do-ikki. A short but good summary

of it can be found in ibid., pp.

181-3.

98 For descriptions of this za, see Yamamura, "The Development of Za," pp. 454-63, and the

works of Japanese scholars that it cites.

Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008

390 THE GROWTH OF COMMERCE

found that many sake makers were providing their own malt instead of

buying it from the za. This apparently occurred because the demand

for sake had risen so that it became more profitable for each sake

maker to build a malt chamber rather than to buy malt from

the za

and

because the sake brewers evidently judged the Enryakuji's power to

have so declined that they could safely challenge the za's monopoly

rights.

The sake makers had, however, underestimated the bakufu's reluc-

tance to become involved at this time in open conflict with the

Enryakuji. In 1419, the bakufu affirmed its support of the za and

allowed it to destroy nearly fifty malt chambers that had been con-

structed by the sake makers. But as the bakufu continued to show

signs of increasing strength and stability in the early decades of the

fifteenth century, the sake makers, motivated by the possibility of

larger profits, continued to build malt chambers as if

test the limits

of the delicate balance of political power then existing between the

bakufu and the large temples. Between 1420 and the mid-i44Os, the

bakufu continued to allow the za to destroy malt chambers when they

were discovered, thus indicating that the bakufu, at least on the sur-

face,

was still maintaining its political stance of not challenging the

Enryakuji's hold on the za.

The sake makers saw the bakufu's actions as an indication of less

than wholehearted support for the za and assumed that sooner or later

the bakufu would choose to support them. They knew that they were a

more lucrative source of tax income for the bakufu than was the za

which owed its primary allegiance to the temple. Meanwhile, malt

chambers continued to be built and destroyed.

This,

then, was the background of the celebrated malt incident of

1444-5.

1° the fall of 1444, the sake makers openly disregarded the

za's monopoly rights and ceased to buy malt.

The za

members immedi-

ately petitioned the bakufu to enforce their monopoly. They locked

themselves in the Kitano temple to await a favorable decision. Despite

this drastic measure, the occupation of a sacred temple, the bakufu

wavered. To abandon the za was the more profitable alternative, but

the bakufu was uncertain whether it wished to risk an uprising of

temples, which could prove costly to

subdue.

After sixty

days

of indeci-

sion, the bakufu resolved to support the za. However, because the

bakufu had clearly shown by its delay that it might be persuaded to

rule against the za, the sake makers of eastern Kyoto presented a

counterpetition asking for permission to make their own malt. Hear-

ing of this, the members of the za again locked themselves in the

Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008

COMMERCE AND CITIES 391

temple, vowing not to leave until the bakufu reaffirmed its decision

favorable to the za.

This time it was the za that miscalculated the remaining power of

the Enryakuji and the extent to which the bakufu could be coerced.

Angered by the za's action, the bakufu ordered one of its leading

supporters, Hatakeyama, to drive the za members out of the temple.

Hatakeyama's troops clashed with the za members, who failed to win

the support of the Enryakuji's well-known soldier-monks. The skir-

mish left forty dead, and the surviving za members fled the temple.

Some of the za members fleeing the conflict set fire to large structures

in western Kyoto, causing a major blaze that reduced much of the

western half of the city to ashes. The za was abolished, and it was not

until after the Onin War that some of its members were allowed to

return to Kyoto. This episode tells us that a political force powerful

enough to secure the profits from the increased sale of a product or

from increased commerce in general found it more profitable to forgo

a share in the monopolistic profits of a za that had clearly become

detrimental to the growth of commerce.

To be sure, many za in Kyoto continued

operate by paying more to

the bakufu, and many survived because they did not have a competing

group able to promise more to the bakufu. In many regions, this cen-

tury of transition

was a

period of

ad hoc

arrangements that depended on

the strength of the regional warrior class, on the degree to which the

bakufu's authority was felt, and on the residual strength of court nobles

and temples. In many cases, as the price for survival, the za paid more

dues to the bakufu or to the regional power, and in others, temples and

court

nobles were

forced

forgo dues from

some regions

while continu-

ing to receive income from others. The trend, however, was

unmistakable - the amount of dues that the za received from temples

and court nobles was fast diminishing. This happened simply because

as the fifteenth century progressed and the za monopolies were more

often challenged, each za had to appeal to the bakufu or a regional

power for the support that

its

original sponsors could

longer provide.

Finally, as the growth of commerce continued, integrating more mar-

kets within a region and even across regions, the political powers and

all who traded in the markets came to realize that the varying measures

of weight, length, and volume being used seriously impeded market

transactions. The absence of a uniform measure of volume (cubic

measure) was especially troublesome.

Even though nearly a dozen measures of weight and length were

Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008

392 THE GROWTH OF COMMERCE

used (to measure land and such widely traded commodities as silk,

cloth, and iron), this problem could be overcome: All these measures

could, if

necessary,

be converted and made comparable. In most cases,

these were measures used since the

ritsuryo

period, and the specialized

use of some measures, such as those for cloth and iron, were pertinent

to only a few specialists.

But the same was not the case for a cubic measure, which was

important during this period because it was used by all who measured

rice in paying and receiving taxes and rents and also in trading gener-

ally. Stated simply, the cubic measure of

rice,

the

tnasu

(square wooden

container), had grown over time; that is, for measuring the same

nominal quantity of rice, the

tnasu

increased by a factor of approxi-

mately 2.5 during the medieval period. For example, in terms of the

measure used in the Tokugawa period, one sho of rice had changed

from approximately 0.4

sho

in the tenth century to almost 1.0

sho

the mid-fifteenth century. And to compound the problem, any precise

conversion was virtually impossible because the size of the

tnasu

grew

gradually from the tenth century to the early sixteenth century by

region and even by

shoen.

Some large temples also used differing sizes

tnasu,

depending on the purposes for which each was used.

It is not difficult to speculate why this occurred. Because rice was

principally a means of paying dues, it was to the advantage of each

dues recipient to enlarge the tnasu used in measuring those dues.

Undoubtedly the rate and rapidity of the increase in size closely re-

flected the political or military power cf each recipient.

Here, it is useful to recall the hypothesis offered earlier to expls±i

the use of

erizeni

by various levels cf political powers to increase ne

real burden of dues with minimal political costs. This situation is

analogous in that enlarging the size cf

tnasu

gradually over time was

also a means to enlarge the real burden of the dues with minimal

political costs. Such a hypothesis also explains why the effort made by

Emperor Gosanjo in 1072 to standardize the size of the

tnasu

- an

attempt to require the use of the "decreed

tnasu"

(senji-tnasu)

- had

little effect and why no political power, either the bakufu or the

shugo

daimyo who were in positions to standardize the measure, did not

make a similar effort.

It is unlikely that the dues payers failed to detect the change in the

size of the

tnasu

by which their dues were measured. Possible explana-

tions for their accepting the larger

tnasu

from dues payers range from

the dues recipients' power over the dues payers, to the latter's willing-

ness to accept this means of increasing dues rather than more explicit

Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008

COMMERCE AND CITIES 393

and potentially more burdensome means such as increasing the rate of

dues or resurveying the arable land. Or it might have been a mixture of

these two reasons. The second reason should not be rejected, because

agricultural productivity was rising from the mid-thirteenth century

on and dues payers were better able to accept the de facto increase in

the dues through the larger size of the masu. And there is no record of

uprising or petition expressing dissatisfaction with the bigger dues

resulting from the masu's increased size.

However, by the mid- to late fifteenth century and into the sixteenth

century, more and more

shugo

daimyo and then

sengoku

daimyo began

to try to standardize such measures. Their motivation was to encour-

age the growth of commerce, as typified by their adoption of rakuichi-

rakuza (promotion of less impeded commerce and limitation of the ,

za's power), a policy they adopted beginning in the mid-sixteenth

century. And it is known that before an effective nationwide standard-

ization of measures of weight and length was adopted in the Tokugawa

period, several shugo daimyo and sengoku daimyo actively promoted

standardized measures their respective domains.

Again, the cubic measure was the most difficult to standardize.

Although limited historical evidence makes it difficult to make any

definite observations, it appears that from the mid-fifteenth century

on, the regional powers and especially Nobunaga, the first of the

unifiers, encouraged the use of kyo-masu (Kyoto masu), the masu that

by then was widely used in the capital, the center of commerce as well

as the seat of the Muromachi bakufu. The kyo-masu differed slightly in

size (with a maximum margin of nearly 5 percent), but one sho of kyo-

masu was roughly equivalent to one sho by the Tokugawa measure (the

kyo-masu later became the basis on which the Tokugawa cubic mea-

sures were established).

In addition, because of the problems with cubic measures in this

period, in virtually no cases is it possible to ascertain correctly the

exact amount of dues collected in rice. If an estimate is to be made over

any length of time, even for a single shoen, let alone broader in-

terregional and intertemporal comparisons, one must allow for the

growth in the size of the masu at differing paces and magnitudes

throughout most of the medieval period."

99 The most useful source on the medieval measures is by Hashimoto Mampei, Keisoku no

bunkashi (Tokyo: Asahi Shimbunsha, 1982), pp. 269-334. The seminal study on the subject

is by Hogetsu Keigo sensei kanreki kinenkai, ed., Chusei ryoseishi no kenkyu (Tokyo:

Yoshikawa kobunkan, 1961). The latter contains analyses of all of the significant historical

evidence relating to the medieval measures.

Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008

394 THE GROWTH OF COMMERCE

CONCLUSION

This chapter has examined the growth of commerce in medieval Japan

and how the many changes that resulted from it transformed the

economy from one with only limited market activities in the capital

region into an economy with an increasing number of six-day markets

throughout the nation.

This transformation was accompanied by such readily visible results

as an increase in both the size and number of urban centers; significant

institutional developments typified by the rise and growth of za and

toimaru; the spread of monetization from the capital to villages

throughout the nation; increased specialization of merchants and arti-

sans who produced more and more products; and the development of a

transportation network linking all parts of the nation and including a

growing number of persons engaged in transporting goods by both

water and land.

Less visible but fundamental to this transformation was

steady and

at times rapid increase in agricultural productivity which began in the

second half of the thirteenth century. This was enabled principally by

the more intensive use of paddies, including double cropping and even

triple cropping in some regions, and to a decreasing number of pad-

dies lost to flooding or drought, owing to improvements in irrigation

and water control. In addition, the economy as a whole was more

productive and efficient. People became much more aware of the ef-

fects that changes in prices could have on their lives, of markets where

they could buy many more goods that others produced more effi-

ciently than they themselves could; and of the many ways that they

could increase their income, by selling products or services or lending

money.

To be sure, the benefits of commercialization and monetization also

produced conflicts of interest between the za and their challengers,

between lenders and borrowers, and between dues recipients and pay-

ers.

Such conflicts took many forms. The za sought protection from

would-be competitors, and the za patrons attempted to gain a greater

share of their profits. Through

tokuseirei,

bakufu tried to protect war-

riors indebted to moneylenders, and dues payers and others who felt

victimized by the changes in the economy expressed their dissatisfac-

tion and demands through ikki. The prevailing political realities of

these three and a half centuries played a crucial role in determining the

specific forms these symptoms would take and the degree to which

their costs would affect the polity's future course.

Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008

CONCLUSION 395

Sengoku Japan inherited a highly commercialized and monetized

economy, but one that was still coping with rapid political and eco-

nomic change and the symptoms and costs of such growth. The most

interesting aspect of sixteenth-century Japanese history is how the

sengoku

daimyo, who reaped the benefits of the growing commerce,

were forced to deal with both.

100

loo On the erizeni issues and other politicoeconomic developments in the Sengoku period, see

Kozo Yamamura, "Returns on Unification: Economic Growth in Japan, 1550-1650," in

John Whitney Hall, Nagahara Keiji, and Kozo Yamamura, eds., Japan Before Tokugawa

(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1981), pp. 327-72.

Cambridge Histories Online © Cambridge University Press, 2008

CHAPTER

JAPAN AND EAST ASIA

In this chapter

shall describe and analyze Japan's relations during

the Kamakura and Muromachi periods with various countries of East

Asia and their governments, including the Sung, Yuan, and Ming

dynasties

China, the Koryo and Yi dynasties

Korea, and

the

Ryukyu Islands.

descriptions

and

analyses focus primarily

Japan's international political relations, particularly Japan's relation-

ship with

its

Asian neighbors, the effect

this relationship on Ja-

pan's internal political developments, and, conversely, the influence

of Japan's internal politics on its international relations.

Because my

research interests lie mainly

the Kamakura period,

shall discuss

developments

that period more extensively than those of the later

Muromachi period.

JAPAN'S INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS

EAST ASIA

Around the tenth century the motive force in East Asia shifted from

the Han People of China to the northern nomadic tribes, often called

the conquest dynasties.

the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries,

East Asian history centered on the rise and fall of the Mongol Empire.

The Southern Sung (i 127-1279) was reestablished after China's terri-

tory was reduced by the consecutive invasions of the Liao and Chin,

which generated

financial crisis owing

the massive military ex-

penses. The Southern Sung, whose resources and level of productivity

were lower than those of northern China, inherited the developments

that took place

various industries during and following the domi-

1 There

are a

number

works

on the

methodology

studying East Asian relations;

the

following cover the thirteenth through the sixteenth centuries: Nakamura Hidetaka, "Jusan,

yonseki no Toa josei to Mongoru no shurai," in Iwanami koza Nihon no rekishi, vol.

(chusei

2) (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1963),

pp.

4-9; Nissen kankeishi

kenkyu, vol.i (Tokyo:

Yoshikawa kobunkan, 1965), pp.

2-7

(reprint

the preceding); Toma Seita, Higashi Ajia

sekai no keisei (Tokyo: Shunjusha, 1966); Tanaka Takeo, Chusei laigai kankeishi (Tokyo: Tokyo

daigaku shuppankai, 1975), pp. 10-20; Sasaki Ginya. "Higashi Ajia boekiken

keisei

kokusai ninshiki,"

Iwanami koza Nihon rekishi, vol.

(chusei 3) (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten,

'976), pp. 100-10.

396

JAPAN'S INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS 397

nance of the Northern Sung (960-1127) and vigorously promoted

foreign trade in hopes of resolving its

financial

crisis.

Japan did not have official diplomatic relations with either the South-

ern Sung or the Koryo (918-1391) dynasties. But it did enjoy close

cultural and economic ties with both China and Korea, especially the

Southern Sung dynasty, through its commercial maritime activity

along the China seacoast which formed one link in the East Asian

trading sphere. This was the reason that the Mongols - who had domi-

nated Koryo in creating a new international order in East Asia after

their conquest of Southern Sung - tried first to entice Japan into the

new order and then to conquer it. Thus, the Mongol invasions were

attempts to force Japan to enter international politics.

The Kamakura bakufu assumed diplomatic powers during the inva-

sions and undertook official trade with the Yiian dynasty of China

(1279-1368) in response to the Mongol's official intensification of its

trade policy during the late Kamakura period. This presaged the diplo-

macy of the succeeding Muromachi bakufu which received investiture

from China's Ming dynasty (1368-1644) and was included in the

Sinocentric international order. The Mongol invasions strengthened

the authoritarian tendencies of the Hojo family, which held the real

power in the Kamakura bakufu, and presented the Hojo with a num-

ber of problems beyond their administrative capabilities, finally caus-

ing the bakufu to topple in 1333.

The Kemmu regime, which destroyed the Kamakura bakufu and

lasted only two years, led Japan into the protracted internal conflict

between the Northern and Southern Courts during the Nambokucho

period (1333-92). During this sixty-year period Ashikaga Takauji

founded the Muromachi bakufu. The war between the courts during

the fourteenth century served to consolidate the power of the

Muromachi bakufu. During this struggle in 1350, the attacks of Japa-

nese pirates

(wako)

began in earnest, spreading from the Korean penin-

sula south along the China coast.

The wako's activities spanned four

centuries and occurred in two phases.

The early phase of

wako

activity began in the thirteenth century and

extended to the second half of the fourteenth, corresponding to the

Nambokucho and early Muromachi periods in Japan, the late Koryo

2 There are many works dealing with the wako, and a number of works on Koryo, Choson, and

Ming relations with Japan also touch on the wako. See especially Tanaka Takeo, Chusei kaigai

koshoshi

no kenkyu (Tokyo: Tokyo daigaku shuppankai, 1959) and Wako to kango boeki (Tokyo:

Shibundo, 1961); Kobata Atsushi, "Kango boeki to wako," in Iwanami koza Nihon rekishi,

vol.

7 (chusei 3) (Tokyo: Iwanami shoten, 1963); and Ishihara Michihiro, Wako (Tokyo:

Yoshikawa kobunkan, 1964).

398 JAPAN AND EAST ASIA

and early Yi (i392-1910) in Korea, and the late Yuan to early Ming in

China. Although the Korean peninsula was their main theater of activ-

ity, the wako reached the China coast as well. During the first phase of

wako activity, the indigenous Chinese Ming dynasty emerged in China

after destroying the intruding Mongol Yuan dynasty, and on the Ko-

rean peninsula, the Yi dynasty succeeded the Koryo dynasty. The

wako problem was a force in the founding of both these dynasties in

China and Korea, and it

evident that relations among Japan, Korea,

and Ming China were established as a result of the

wako

problem. In

Southeast Asia, several new kingdoms were established in the four-

teenth and fifteenth centuries, ushering in an era of revolution and

disorder previously unknown. The second major phase of

wako

activ-

ity occurred in the early to mid-sixteenth century.

The different stages of political, economic, and cultural develop-

ment in these Asian countries occurred within a unified international

order revolving around Ming China. This order was referred to as the

tribute system

and involved the exchange of tribute and largess between

China and other "barbarian" nations. Ming policy forbade Chinese

citizens to leave the country as part of

this

tribute system, but this only

stimulated the development of a flourishing trade in the newly risen

Ryukyu kingdom (present-day Okinawa) and the overseas Chinese

communities to the south. The Ryukyus achieved unmatched prosper-

ity as an intermediary in the trade among Southeast Asia, Japan, and

Korea. The Ming policy forbidding overseas travel failed, and in the

sixteenth century during the Chia-ching era (1522-66), wako flour-

ished along the southeastern China coast. But with the arrival of

Euro-

pean ships, East Asian international relations underwent a dramatic

change.

FOREIGN RELATIONS AT THE FOUNDING OF THE

KAMAKURA BAKUFU

Kyushu had been a base of political power for the Taira family. During

the Gempei War (1180-5), however, Minamoto Yoritomo's younger

brother Noriyori overthrew the Heishi forces in Kyushu. In 10/1185

Noriyori left Kyushu to return to Kamakura and presented the retired

emperor Goshirakawa and Yoritomo with many gifts imported from

the mainland to Kyushu, reconfirming for both men the importance of

Kyushu in foreign trade.

Although initially an eastern power, the

3 These gifts included Chinese brocade, damask, silks, Sung silver coins, tea, ink, utensils, and

matting. There is also mention of the Southern Court in a deed of sale of some land belonging

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