Land, Power, and the Sacred

Landed estates (shoen) produced much of the material wealth supporting all levels of late classical and medieval Japanese society. During the tenth through sixteenth centuries, estates served as sites of de facto government, trade network nodes, developing agricultural technology, and centers of religious practice and ritual. Although mostly farmland, many yielded nonagricultural products, including lumber, salt, fish, and silk, and provided livelihoods for craftsmen, seafarers, peddlers, and performers, as well as for cultivators. By the twelfth century, an estate "system" permeated much of the Japanese archipelago. This volume examines the system from three perspectives: the land itself; the power derived from and exerted over the land; and the religion institutions and individuals that were involved in landholding practices.Chapters by Japanese and Western scholars explore how the estate system arose, developed, and eventually collapsed. Several investigate a single estate or focus on agricultural techniques, while others survey estates in broad contexts such as economic change and maritime trade. Other chapters look at how we learn about estates by inspecting documents, landsca