Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
ives was sometimes not an enviable one: in some villages he became very much a lord's
man,andaninstrumentofoppression,butfromtimetotimeaheadmanwouldfindhimself
leadingaprotest,attheriskofhislife,andevenbeingexecutedforhisvillagers'misdeeds.
The social connections between village people are often described in terms suggesting
that they were parent-child relations. Thus a
honbyakushō
would be father to his own chil-
dren and any adopted children, but also “father” to his servants and landless laborers who
worked for him. He had a semi-filial relationship with the head of his five-family group,
and through him with the headman's assistant and the headman himself. He could look for
some protection and favor from his “fathers,” but in return he had to support them, by car-
rying out their decisions, and performing appropriate rituals, such as paying respects, ac-
companied by presents, at the New Year. He had also the normal filial duties towards his
real parents, or his adopted ones, and towards those who had acted as go-betweens at his
wedding.
The appointment of headman carried with it either an income or exemption from tax-
ation, and in return for this not only had he the heavy responsibility of representing the
village, but also had to deal with much paper work. Annual returns, such as the religious
register and the pledge of the five-family groups, had to be seen to, with one copy kept in
theofficeandonepassedtotheofficials;thentherewerepapersconnectedwithoccasional
events, like the passing through the village of a lord on his way to or from Edo, or some
court aristocrat on an official visit to a great shrine. For this sort of event he had to arrange
for the road to be swept and sanded, and to see that the required amount of porterage was
available, that adequate refreshment was offered and so on. Originally the farmers would
have provided their own labor for all this, but as time went on the tendency was for the
headmantoexactmoneypaymentsfromtheminlieuoflaborandmaterials,andtoemploy
labor from the pool of under-employed—small-holders, younger sons, and other depend-
ants—which existed in most villages; sometimes special contractors were employed. All
the time there was need for copying instructions and filing the copies, passing on the ori-
ginals to the next village, and generally dealing efficiently with bureaucratic demands.
The greatest responsibility ofthe headman was the collection oftaxes. At regular inter-
vals a survey was made of the village land, taking into account the area of the rice-fields,
their productivity, the area of land given over to dwellings, the size of the dry fields and
crops, the products of the woodlands, any change in usage such as reclamation of waste
land, or reversion to waste of former productive land. Samples of crops were taken, and
from all this the amount of rice and other taxes to be exacted was decided upon. Usually
some 40-60 per cent of the estimated rice-crop was taken, along with money payments to
represent other products. The whole attitude of the officials was that the farmers would
do their best to defraud them, so that the straw bales had to have a double skin to avoid
