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Maeda_Toshiie
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 Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 7:02 am Post subject: Revenue of the imperial court |
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I am a total amateur when it comes to Japanese history, so forgive me for such a simple question. I would like to know about the revenue stream of the imperial court, is it purely taxes levied from the governors or do the members of the court (including the imperial house) own lands? How does this change with time, especially with the emergence of the Bakufu system? My question would cover not just the Heian period but all the way to the Edo period (again, apologies if this is the wrong section, or that the topic has been discussed before).
When I say court, I mean both the the court nobles and the Emperor. |
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ltdomer98
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| Posted: Thu Jun 24, 2010 9:33 am Post subject: Re: Revenue of the imperial court |
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| Maeda_Toshiie wrote: |
| I am a total amateur when it comes to Japanese history, so forgive me for such a simple question. |
Here's where you're wrong. It's not a simple question at all. It's very complicated, and an excellent question, but I'm not sure anyone can answer it simply in a message board format.
I'm a shill for this book since it's my absolute favorite all time book ever, but if you REALLY want to understand this stuff, read John Whitney Hall's Government and Local Power in Japan 500-1700: A Study Based on Bizen Province. This takes you from the consolidation of the Yamato state all the way up through the first century of the Edo period. I suggest it because at the local level, government = the power to collect taxes and punish criminals. At the regional/national level, it's about who gets to appoint those who collect taxes and punish criminals, and therefore who those folks are sending those taxes and fines to.
| Quote: |
| I would like to know about the revenue stream of the imperial court, is it purely taxes levied from the governors or do the members of the court (including the imperial house) own lands? |
Both. Land started out in the really early period as private holdings, but part of the reforms in the 6th & 7th century was to make all land the property of the state...in other words, property of the Imperial Family. Technically speaking they owned everything. They could then dispense economic power in one of two ways:
1. by appointing someone the governor (kami 守 until it became a meaningless title, shugo 守護 afterwards), granting them the rights to oversee taxes and pocket some of the income.
2. by granting estates (shouen 荘園) as private domains controlled by the grantee, in which case all the income went to the grantee, not the government. Estates were essentially "tax-free".
Estates were frequently granted to temples and shrines (and this was frequently the cause of fighting between them) and also to members of the nobility as income for them. Much of the political wrangling that went on was to gain control of shouen grants or governmental assignments. If I recall correctly, certain government posts had attendant shouen lands that went with them, providing the "income" from the job.
Specific to your question, they didn't just receive income sent on as taxes from the governors in the provinces--the nobles WERE the governors in the provinces. And they owned land in the provinces as private holdings.
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| How does this change with time, especially with the emergence of the Bakufu system? |
More importantly, how did the changes over time make possible the emergenc of the Bakufu system? To be assigned as a governor for a province, you had to be part of the political chess game in the capital. But you couldn't play the game if you were out in the hinterlands actively governating for 2-3 years. Governors began to rely more and more on their administrative assistants, who were frequently local important men who had a following in the districts. A governor would set one of these men as his proxy, letting him run the administration (taxation and law enforcement) of the province in return for sending a sufficient amount of tax income privately to the governor in Kyoto, in addition to whatever went to the Imperial government. Essentially they contracted their Governor positions out so they could stay in Kyoto, play the political game, and get new/better assignments, etc. Over time these "contractors" in the provinces became, for all intents and purposes, the governors in all but name. This was the formation of the upper middle strata of bushi, the uppermost strata being lesser ranking nobles who left the capital in search of opportunity in the provinces through military exploits.
The growing power of the provincial gentry, the continued focus of the nobles on politics in Kyoto, and the rise of a type of middleground noble who had connections in Kyoto but had the military cred to gain supporters in the provinces came to a head with first the Taira and then the Minamoto taking control of the taxation and policing functions of the government. Remember, these were the two revenue producing streams, so essentially it meant political power, even though political power "remained" with the Court, the wielding of the real power transitioned to these warrior-nobles who had one foot in each world. Once the Minamoto took over, Yoritomo assigned his own Shugo to control the taxation and income and his own Jito to conduct policing functions in the provinces. These functions were completely subsumed by the Bakufu, "in the name of" the Imperial Court. The power to resolve disputes between land holders, be they nobles, temples, shrines, whatever, fell into the hands of the Bakufu. THIS was the power shift. This shift solidified and continued in various ways until by the 1500's the regional daimyo had control simply by force of arms, and the court relied on donations of land BACK to them (remember, it originally controlled all land) and the granting of shouen by the daimyo who could do so. Granting land to nobles(or guaranteeing them the ability to collect income from lands they already "owned" but were powerless to collect from) was one of Oda Nobunaga's most powerful political weapons.
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Maeda_Toshiie
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| Posted: Sat Jun 26, 2010 4:13 am Post subject: |
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That's an illuminating reply. I'll get hold of the book when I can.
One question: The de facto independence and power of the various shrines like Mount Hiei and others is due their independence from the taxation that allows them to accumulate wealth and thus power over time?
Another question: what about the Emperor as opposed to the court nobles? I have read that the Emperor was reduced to destitute state at times post-Heian and pre-Edo (since the Tokugawa did provide for the court during the Edo period). Was he dependent on a percentage of the tax revenues of the nobles or did he have his own purse?
I find it interesting that the power structure in Japan developed in such manner from China, despite the Japanese copying many Chinese practices early on (pre-Heian?). China perpetuated a centralized system (after the feudal Zhou dynasty) dynasty after dynasty despite being geographically much larger while Japan headed towards a more decentralized system. Perhaps this has to do with differences in the bureaucracy that developed in the two countries? |
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ltdomer98
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| Posted: Sat Jun 26, 2010 5:51 am Post subject: |
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| Maeda_Toshiie wrote: |
| One question: The de facto independence and power of the various shrines like Mount Hiei and others is due their independence from the taxation that allows them to accumulate wealth and thus power over time? |
In part, yes--in part also to their numerous connections with the nobility. Each noble family patronized many temples. Most of the abbots of the more important temples were members of noble families. For the "lesser" members of the family, maybe a 4th son or someone from a lesser branch, the clergy was a way to receive an important appointment (as, say, the Abbot of Mt. Hiei) that would rank higher than the civil ranks someone of noble, but not upper noble, birth could expect. Mikael Adolphson's essay "Benkei's Ancestors" in Currents in Medieval Japanese History explains this quite well; he cites several abbots who were members of the Fujiwara family. Family connections would be used to gain additional shouen grants or press claims against other temples for lands, honors, etc. As holdings grew and conflict between temples increased, shady characters who were good at fighting and would accept some form of religious connection to the temple were accepted in and voila, you've got warrior "monks".
| Quote: |
| Another question: what about the Emperor as opposed to the court nobles? I have read that the Emperor was reduced to destitute state at times post-Heian and pre-Edo (since the Tokugawa did provide for the court during the Edo period). Was he dependent on a percentage of the tax revenues of the nobles or did he have his own purse? |
"The Court" means "The Emperor". Where I mention above that tax revenue went to the Court, that means that some of it went directly to the Emperor, some went to the maintenance of the Court, some went to the needs of government, etc. The Imperial family also had private estates of its own, of course. Of course the Emperor was "destitute" at times--as the taxation and law enforcement powers devolved first to the Kamakura Bakufu and then the Muromachi Bakufu, he was dependent on them to ensure the flow of money into the Capital. When the Bakufu was occupied with other things (Kamakura = spending on defense against the Mongols, Muromachi = consuming itself during the Onin War), nobody was there to ensure that income came in. After the Onin War devolved into nation-wide civil war, the Shugo and Jito were as often as not upended by their own Shugodai (deputies) or religious militants or peasant insurrection or....you name it. Those Shugo that successfully made the transition into Sengoku Daimyo (the Shimazu, the Takeda, the Otomo, etc.) did so because they focused on securing themselves at the expense of doing Kyoto's work. A daimyo that's worried about having enough spears to equip his men isn't going to be in a hurry to send cash along to Kyoto.
Lamers makes a great case for this being the appeal of Oda Nobunaga to the court nobles, and why they were acting in symbiosis rather than conflict, as many think. The Court wasn't going to have the strength to protect it's estates and ensure income, but a national strongman like Nobunaga could do so. Nobunaga, for his part, could use Imperial recognition as a means of bolstering and legitimizing his power. Nobunaga grants/protects Imperial/noble estates, they grant him prestige and titles, and everyone gets their backs scratched. Hideyoshi did the same thing once he was in power.
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| I find it interesting that the power structure in Japan developed in such manner from China, despite the Japanese copying many Chinese practices early on (pre-Heian?). China perpetuated a centralized system (after the feudal Zhou dynasty) dynasty after dynasty despite being geographically much larger while Japan headed towards a more decentralized system. Perhaps this has to do with differences in the bureaucracy that developed in the two countries? |
Well, I'm no expert on China, but I think you're over generalizing it a bit. That said, Japan didn't *HAVE* a merit-based bureaucracy ever. Not even lip-service was paid to it. You gained office because of your birth, and MAYBE because you could turn a fancy poem, not because you had any administrative skill. Yet another reason why the bushi class was necessary--SOMEONE had to do the paperwork instead of attending moon-viewing parties! I'm guilty of generalizing here as well, but for the most part the things that ensured good government were NOT the things that got you raised in rank. Hence the delegation to underlings, who eventually held the actual power in the provinces.
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JLBadgley
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| Posted: Sat Jun 26, 2010 2:03 pm Post subject: |
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| ltdomer98 wrote: |
| <snip of great info on power bases of temples in Japan> |
I really only have one thing to add here which is the belief in temples' religious and spiritual efficacy as another component of their power early on. It is another factor that led the court to rely on the warriors from the provinces who were less likely to kowtow to the monks' spiritual terrorism (whether because they didn't believe in it or because they believed in service even in the face of damnation is hard to say).
| Quote: |
| "The Court" means "The Emperor". Where I mention above that tax revenue went to the Court, that means that some of it went directly to the Emperor, some went to the maintenance of the Court, some went to the needs of government, etc. The Imperial family also had private estates of its own, of course. Of course the Emperor was "destitute" at times--as the taxation and law enforcement powers devolved first to the Kamakura Bakufu and then the Muromachi Bakufu, he was dependent on them to ensure the flow of money into the Capital. |
One of the things here that might be useful for folks to remember is that this was a bureaucracy. The emperor delegated much of the running of the Imperial Household to others, and things like how much income went where were administrative functions that were taken over by various bakufu; it wasn't just a matter of not paying or not making sure that the money didn't get there, but of appropriating that money for something the governing administration felt was more important (e.g. fighting off their rivals).
| Maeda_Toshiie wrote: |
| I find it interesting that the power structure in Japan developed in such manner from China, despite the Japanese copying many Chinese practices early on (pre-Heian?). China perpetuated a centralized system (after the feudal Zhou dynasty) dynasty after dynasty despite being geographically much larger while Japan headed towards a more decentralized system. Perhaps this has to do with differences in the bureaucracy that developed in the two countries? |
I agree with Domer that you are over-generalizing. China was not so unified as you make it sound, and at times the centralization was much more in theory than in practice.
The main differences between the two countries, as is relevant to the current situation, is that in China, the route to power lay in the throne itself. In Japan, from an early age (the Soga, and then the Fujiwara, are prime examples) it was safer to be the power behind the throne (or even right in front of it).
-Josh |
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kitsuno
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| Posted: Sat Jun 26, 2010 2:41 pm Post subject: |
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I'm pretty sure it was Grossberg's "Japan's Renaissance" that talked about temples being given tax-collection authority during the Muromachi period, but I don't remember the details - maybe someone who has recently read the book would remember?
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ltdomer98
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| Posted: Sun Jun 27, 2010 5:22 am Post subject: |
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| JLBadgley wrote: |
| I really only have one thing to add here which is the belief in temples' religious and spiritual efficacy as another component of their power early on. It is another factor that led the court to rely on the warriors from the provinces who were less likely to kowtow to the monks' spiritual terrorism (whether because they didn't believe in it or because they believed in service even in the face of damnation is hard to say). |
Excellent addition, thanks. But while that was certainly a factor, I think it also had something to do with the temples having had recruited their own brand of "warriors", and the court simply not being able to deal with them. But certainly I think the provincial types would have been less hesitant to tell Hiei where they could stuff their shrine.
| Quote: |
| One of the things here that might be useful for folks to remember is that this was a bureaucracy. The emperor delegated much of the running of the Imperial Household to others, and things like how much income went where were administrative functions that were taken over by various bakufu; it wasn't just a matter of not paying or not making sure that the money didn't get there, but of appropriating that money for something the governing administration felt was more important (e.g. fighting off their rivals). |
This is a flawed comparison for many reasons, but for the purposes of outline in *THIS* example, it helps to think of the Emperor like the Queen of England. Both the Emperor and the QoE have no actual ruling capacity. Yet their existence justifies the government in power. (Parliament for the Brits, the Bakufu for pre-modern Japan). That government is responsible for paying for the upkeep/sustainment of the Emperor/QoE. Now, if there's a war on (Shogunate has to beat off some Mongols, the English are smacking around Napoleon), then the priorities for budget are much different, and the Emperor/QoE might get less.
Now...take that example, and then say if the Parliament's obligation to provide to the QoE is given a value of 100, the obligation of the Bakufu to provide was somewhere around...3. Factor in that at certain times, the Bakufu COULDN'T provide for ITSELF, much less the court (I'm looking at you, Ashikaga of the 1500's--that's when the vast majority of "starving emperor has to sell his autograph to get rice" stories come from).
| Quote: |
| The main differences between the two countries, as is relevant to the current situation, is that in China, the route to power lay in the throne itself. In Japan, from an early age (the Soga, and then the Fujiwara, are prime examples) it was safer to be the power behind the throne (or even right in front of it). |
The difference between a "Mandated" Emperor and a Divine one (simplistic, and I know we could shoot this full of wholes, but it works for our discussion here). A failing Emperor in China could be replaced by the next strong man, because he "lost" his mandate from heaven, and therefore deserved to be dethroned. If the Emperor HIMSELF is divine...then you can't really displace him and set yourself up as Emperor. You co-opt power rather than replace the guy. And hence the Japanese system was born...
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ltdomer98
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| Posted: Sun Jun 27, 2010 5:24 am Post subject: |
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| kitsuno wrote: |
| I'm pretty sure it was Grossberg's "Japan's Renaissance" that talked about temples being given tax-collection authority during the Muromachi period, but I don't remember the details - maybe someone who has recently read the book would remember? |
Tax collection authority, or the right to income from shouen? Might very well be the actual 年貢, but I can't check until August when I'm reunited with my books...
...sigh...
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