The Moneylenders of Late Medieval Kyoto

Introduction

Introduction This is a study of a group of people, residents of medieval Kyoto, who brewed sake and lent money for a living. Demand for credit was strong in medieval times, and available from a variety of sources. From about the early thirteenth century, sake brewers dominated secular moneylending in the city.1 Under the direct or indirect control, first of Enryakuji, the great Buddhist monastery on Mount Hiei, and later of the Muromachi shogunate , they numbered in the hundreds in the late medieval period (approximately 1350 to 1550). Flush with capital from brewing and a constant flow of interest income, they were seen by the elites as a reliable and plentiful source of tax income. The moneylenders occupy a significant niche in medieval history for their economic function and because, as wealthy and influential townspeople , they were major players in Kyoto’s culture and society. Through their multitude of activities, including moneylending, sake brewing, selfgovernance , and self-defense, and also as participants in a new secular culture of urban commoners, they had dealings with all groups in society. Hence their lives touched the diverse elements that made up the fabric of medieval Kyoto. They experienced firsthand many of the profound changes that occurred over the course of the medieval period as traditional hierarchies gradually weakened. In the process these commoners, because of their economic leverage, found themselves in a temporary ascendancy, flourishing as wealthy and prominent townspeople. There were other moneylenders in medieval Kyoto besides the brewers. Specialist pawnbrokers sometimes offered credit on a small scale in return for pawned items, as did bean-paste merchants and lenders who computed introduction 2 interest on a daily basis. For the most part these were individuals with small lending capacity. In contrast, the brewer-lenders of this study, with their wealth derived from brewing, their numerical strength, and their powerful overlords, constituted a cohesive commercial bloc. Clerical moneylending was also widespread in the medieval period at Enryakuji and other temples like Tōji.2 In the latter half of the medieval period the gozan Zen monasteries, although relative newcomers to the business, engaged extensively in moneylending at low interest rates with shogunal protection.3 Most gozan lending was fairly large-scale, from one Zen temple to another, to the shogunate, or to secular moneylenders, including those of this study. Zen lending was in a different category from that of the brewer-lenders, for it required access to a monastic agent, rendering such loans out of reach to the ordinary person seeking credit.4 Gozan lending declined with the Muromachi shogunate, its protector. This study will examine the activities of the brewer-lenders with occasional reference to these other moneylending entities, individual and institutional. The twelfth through sixteenth centuries, labeled “medieval” by Japanese historians following the Western model, were more than a static time between ancient and early modern.5 They saw the gradual rise to dominance of the warrior class with its own governing mechanisms; the complete permeation of Japanese society by Buddhism, which produced a unique Buddhist-Shinto worldview as well as an array of lay-centered faith sects; a transformation in the nature of property holding; and the emergence of an urban economy and culture. The latter came to full flower in the late medieval period, the focus of this study, beginning approximately with the establishment of the Muromachi shogunate in 1336 and extending to the dismantling of the medieval order in the late sixteenth century, a process keenly felt in Kyoto when Oda Nobunaga destroyed Enryakuji in 1571. Most of the moneylenders’ activities described here took place in the latter half of the medieval period, a time of dynamic upheaval. Peasant invasions, some of them large-scale, were repeatedly visited upon Kyoto; the ten-year Ōnin War brought devastation and long-term change; the Lotus leagues, religious cells of townspeople, dominated city life until they were crushed; and finally the political and economic order was redefined in such a way that the moneylenders’ favorable niche was obliterated. Often the destructive aspects of this period are emphasized, reflecting the concern, perhaps, of elite record keepers who saw their world being threatened . To moneylenders, however, though upheaval could bring destruction, introduction 3 it could also present business opportunities as credit became more essential than ever. More fundamentally, upheaval became the catalyst for social change. As moneylenders and other commoners took the opportunity to distance themselves from their...