| Budget Amount *help |
¥1,300,000 (Direct Cost: ¥1,300,000)
Fiscal Year 2001: ¥500,000 (Direct Cost: ¥500,000)
Fiscal Year 2000: ¥800,000 (Direct Cost: ¥800,000)
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| Research Abstract |
A major issue pursued in this study is the elucidation of the fundamental principles in the organizational structuring of pre-modern feudal samurai organizations consisting of feudal lord clans (daimyo, han leaders) and individual vassals. What I view with importance in this study as the organizational principle within the social group of the feudal samurai lord or daimyo clans is, in simple terms, the fact that the livelihood and status of its members were guaranteed.
It was possible, far course, for samurai to be deprived of their samurai status if, far example, the family line of a vassal were severed based an laws of succession or if there were negligence or violations in the performance of official duties; however, they at least did not lose their status for economic reasons. Even if daimyo vassals felt into a state of poverty, there were no cases of "personal bankruptcy" in which they would abandon their fief under a burden of debt or forfeit samurai status itself and become ronin
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. They would sooner or later be rescued, rehabilitated and returned to their normal state as daimyo vassals. What ultimately guaranteed trie livelihood and status of daimyo vassals were the function of vassal fiefs as collateral and the obligation of the feudal lord who had custody of the fief to provide relief for their vassals. Although daimyo vassals were basically expected to take care of their own various financial problems, at the same time, means were structured within the pre-modern daimyo clans for rehabilitating them as daimyo vassals and guaranteeing their samurai status in one form or another without being neglected if they happened to reach the limits of their own independent efforts. The particular means were devised based on the assumption of the fief, which formed the foundation of vassal livelihood. In this study, I collected historical material regarding the financial affairs of kyunin of han in Kyushu, centered in the Kokura and Kumamoto Hosokawa han, and historical records relating to the fief system and examined the actual manner in which the livelihood and status of the vassals wore guaranteed in pre-modern daimyo clans. It moreover has the role of redefining vertical master-vassal relationships as well as fief-related aspects from an economic perspective while also elucidating the structure of daimyo clans. Less
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