Jokamachi

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Jōkamachi ( Japanese. 城 下町 , literally: "City below the castle", also "castle town") is the name of the cities in Japan that served as the administrative center of a fiefdom ( Han ) during the Edo period . Not every Jōkamachi - contrary to the wording of the term - actually had to have a castle .

history

Fortifications and cities have existed in Japan since the 4th century AD, but the development of castle towns as administrative centers is a development of the Sengoku period .

The Jōkamachi Hiroshima , hand drawing, around 1700. The map is turned slightly to the west. In the center (yellow) the daimyo's castle, surrounded by the Samuraimachi , mainly in the south the Chōninmachi (black), Teramachi (red) mainly in the southwest and northeast.

From 1500 the first Jōkamachi of the Sengoku daimyō , in which merchants, craftsmen and samurai settled. The quarters of the social groups were not separated. There was no regular parcelling. Many were only temporary settlements, disappeared after a few years and were rebuilt elsewhere. Only a few Jōkamachi had a continuous development as the seat of a larger daimyo association such as B. Kasugayama , which in 1570 was the largest city in Japan next to Kyoto with around 30,000 inhabitants .

In 1580, Toyotomi Hideyoshi caused the daimyo, allied with him, to maintain only one castle in each of their provinces or to build a new one in a central location. In 1585 the land was re-measured and the taxes were set for the fields depending on the quality and productivity of the soil. In 1590 the class system of Shi-no-kō-shō was established. The property rights of the land were transferred to the daimyo and their income tied to the calculated tax rate of the country they controlled. Since then, the term daimyo has included a territorial ruler with an income of at least 10,000 koku per year. The 30 richest daimyō had an income of 120,000 to 1,200,000 koku per year, while the 100 poorest had only 10,000 to 35,000 koku. The peasants were disarmed and forced to live in the countryside. The samurai, who were previously professional soldiers, were given the determination of their status to settle in the city as a follower of the daimyo. Merchants and craftsmen, who were supposed to secure equipment and provisions for the troops, were kept in the cities with tax privileges and anti-competition clauses. It was forbidden to run shops outside the cities.

In 1601/02, the existing balance of power found expression in all parts of the country through the construction of cities according to the Koku income. Daimyō, who had been able to establish themselves in their home provinces, built their castles that had existed for centuries and expanded the existing settlements into large Jōkamachi. Hideyoshi's followers, who had survived, built new Jokamachi in the remote provinces. Family members and loyal Tokugawa vassals founded new Jōkamachi within the extended sphere of power of the Tokugawa.

The lords of the newly founded cities changed some repeatedly, daimyo were transferred or deposed. If a daimyo was transferred, the entire samurai population also moved out. If the income of the daimyo was reduced, samurai had to retire from the service and became ronin . Some cities were planned as large centers, but then endowed with a lower income: For example, Takada was founded with an income of 450,000 koku and later, in 1650, had to be content with 150,000 koku, which meant that some planned districts remained undeveloped. Smaller Jōkamachi were given up again and again with the change of rule, but others were founded in new places.

In 1614 there were 186 Jōkamachi, securing the supremacy of the Tokugawa. At the end of the Edo period, 1868, according to the different sources, between 254 and 276 are counted. Over time there were a total of 453 cities, which at one time or another had been referred to as Jōkamachi. Around 1970 there were 114 larger, 174 smaller cities and 165 villages.

Location and attachment

In order to secure the rule of Bakufu over the country, the daimyō's troops had to be deployable at short notice and over great distances, so the locations of the Jōkamachi were selected according to national strategic considerations: They had to be integrated into the national transport network and at the same time supply them the surrounding area. The castles and their cities were no longer allowed to be isolated (for defense purposes), but rather had to be able to determine what was happening in the region through their location and at the same time enable the control of important country roads and the interurban roads. However, they were economically isolated from one another, and all related activities outside the boundaries of the fiefdom had to be carried out via Osaka . As a location for the Jōkamachi, places were preferred that offered an elevated space for the castle surrounded by one, two or even three rivers and at the same time sufficient settlement area for the population. In their installation, care was taken that the country roads run through the districts of the merchants and craftsmen ( Chōnin ). On the one hand, this served a flourishing industry, but on the other hand it also served as a protective measure in the event of an attack: an enemy would always first be directed into the neighborhoods of the ordinary urban population.

Basically, the Jōkamachi of the first phase had all two types of fortifications: The castle area, divided into three sections, which was usually fortified with stone walls and wide moats and was not inhabited with the exception of the daimyō and his family. In addition, the entire city was surrounded by a moat or an earth wall. Only two or three gates led in and out of the city, so that access to the city and traffic could be controlled at all times. At Jōkamachi, which were founded in the later course of the Edo period, the outer wall was dispensed with, as it had proven to be superfluous from a military point of view.

The Jōkamachi Tsuyama , hand drawing, around 1700. To the right of the center of the map the Daimyō's castle, inside a moat the quarter of the higher-ranking samurai, in the north, west, east and southwest further samuraimachi (yellow), southwest, south and east Chōninmachi (gray-brown ), Teramachi (pink) predominantly in the west.

Structure and structure

Jōkamachi, which were rebuilt or rebuilt shortly before the beginning and during the Edo period, differed from city buildings of the previous period in that they were systematically laid out in blocks with a right-angled street system and taking into account the class system. They have their predecessors in the Jinaimachi ( 寺内 町 , English temple cities ) of the 14th century. Cities that had arisen in the vicinity of monasteries and resembled the later Jōkamachi in the way of the street layout and the block division.

Around the center, the castle or residence of the daimyo, the quarters of the samurai ( Samuraimachi ) were divided. The upper and middle tier samurai were located right around the castle area. This area was often separated from the other quarters by walls and moats. Outside of these quarters were the quarters of the Ashigaru , the samurai of the lowest rank, to which all servants of the daimyo were such. B. gunsmiths, falconers and ship captains. The servants of the samurai also lived in this area. Then there were the parcels for the horse stables and warehouses. Exceptions to this strict separation could exist in smaller Jōkamachi, where only the upper samurai lived directly around the castle, while the other samurai and the Chōnin lived in close proximity.

The quarter of the merchants and craftsmen ( Chōninmachi ) joined the Samurai quarter . On the outskirts of the cities, areas were provided for temples and monasteries ( Teramachi ). The priests were housed near the temples or had their own quarters. In some cases, when the income of the fief had risen sharply, as in the case of Hikones (from 180,000 to 310,000 koku), additional samuraimachi , which were inhabited by ashigaru , were attached to these outlying chōninmachi .

Within the Chōninmachi , the population was organized according to occupations in blocks of houses. Several blocks formed a quarter, which was separated from the other quarters by gates. These gates were closed at night and could not be passed or only with special permission. A move within one city to another city district was only possible if all residents of the other quarter agreed, the same applied to buying or selling a house.

Designated entertainment districts ( Hanamachi ) like in Edo , Osaka and Kyōto did not exist in the Jōkamachi. Apart from the three cities mentioned, there were only 22 licensed brothels (two of them in Nagasaki ) in only 21 other cities during the Edo period , but they did not form a separate district . Individual entertainment cities as well as smaller theater there has been beyond, but these were like the bath houses and the homes of Eta and Hinin not by the Chōninmachi shown separately.

The population of the Jōkamachi was more or less dependent on the amount of income that was assigned to the fiefs of Bakufu. The number of samurai was directly dependent. For example, for Hikone in 1695 there are 19,000 samurai with 310,000 koku incomes and for Akita in 1747 17,000 samurai with 205,000 koku incomes. The number of Chōnin was approximately 1: 1, but could vary in individual cases depending on the economic development of the fief. In relation to the cities of Hikone mentioned, there were 15,000 Chōnin and in the case of Akita 21,000.

The assigned size of land for a samurai was based on his income and thus on his rank. The income could range from 1000 koku for the most senior to 40 koku for the ordinary servants. The plot sizes are given as 2000 m² for 300 koku and 1000 m² for 100 koku. With the Chōnin there were no great differences in class, the parcel sizes assigned to them differed only slightly; the properties were generally 25–35 m deep and 5–12 m wide. In addition to the size of the property, the size of the house and the number of floors were also prescribed for them and deviations were not tolerated.

See also

literature

  • Niels Gutschow : The Japanese castle town (Jōkamachi) . Dissertation approved by the Department of Architecture at the Technical University of Darmstadt to obtain the title of doctoral engineer. Darmstadt, 1975.

annotation

  1. ↑ TG Tsukahira: Feudal Control in Tokugawa Japan , Cambridge (Massachusetts), 1970 to Gutschow quoted on page 118, after the Taisei bukan ( Full list of sovereigns ) lists of 1853 265 Jokamachi, of which 158 cities with a castle, 7 Cities without a castle, but equated in rank with the castle cities, and 100 cities without a castle were.
  2. ↑ In Japan itself, Jōkamachi is understood to mean exclusively cities with a castle. The ambiguity arises if a precise distinction is not made between:
    1. List of Han (e.g. in 1868),
    2. List of castles
    3. List of towns with castle of the larger fiefs,
    4. List of cities without a small fiefdom castle. There they were content with a permanent house ( 陣 屋 , jin'ya ),
    5. List of additional titles of the daimyo, such as ( 城主 , jōshu , German lord of the castle).
    See e.g. B. Yamori Kazuhiko: Jokamachi. Gakuseisha 1972, ISBN 4-311-40301-1

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Gutschow, p. 13
  2. ^ Gutschow, p. 15
  3. ^ Gutschow, p. 118 and p. 120
  4. ^ Gutschow, p. 15
  5. ^ Gutschow, p. 21
  6. ^ Gutschow, p. 17
  7. ^ Gutschow, p. 19
  8. ^ Gutschow, p. 17
  9. ^ Gutschow, p. 118
  10. ^ Gutschow, p. 19
  11. ^ Gutschow, p. 21
  12. ^ Gutschow, p. 23
  13. ^ Gutschow, p. 13
  14. ^ Gutschow, p. 29
  15. ^ Gutschow, p. 23
  16. ^ Gutschow, p. 11
  17. ↑ Gutschow, p. 27
  18. ^ Gutschow, p. 29
  19. ↑ Gutschow, p. 27
  20. ^ Gutschow, p. 29
  21. ↑ Gutschow, p. 27
  22. ^ Gutschow, p. 23
  23. ^ Gutschow, p. 23
  24. ^ Gutschow, p. 29
  25. ↑ Gutschow, p. 27

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