Daimyo domain system

In a broad sense, it refers to the territorial control systems of shugo daimyo, sengoku daimyo, and early modern daimyo, but in a narrow sense, it refers to the sengoku daimyo, which had the strongest independent territorial and national character among them. The word daimyo has been used in conjunction with myoden (rice fields) since the Heian period, such as daimyo tato, but the usage directly connected to daimyo territories was when shugo (provincial governors) of the Nanboku-cho and Muromachi periods were called daimyo at that time, and the word territory was also used to refer to the provinces managed by shugo.

Shugo came to be called daimyo and the provinces under their control called ryokoku, because at the end of the Northern and Southern Court period (the end of the 14th century), the provinces under their control were fixed, and the Shugo absorbed the powers and structures of the kokuga (provincial government offices), strengthening their character as a national public authority. Around that time, the Shugo made most of the Kokuga territories into Shugo territories, and incorporated many of the kokujin feudal lords into their power as vassals. The right to levy temporary taxes such as kuniyaku and tansen, which had previously belonged to the public authority of the imperial state, was transformed into the right to levy and collect taxes on a permanent basis, and various judicial powers within the country were gradually concentrated and exercised by the Shugo. In this sense, the Shugo territorial system entered a period of full-scale development from around the end of the 14th century to the first half of the 15th century, but on the other hand, even at that stage the Shugo's control over all of the provinces under their control was still incomplete enough to be considered a uniform lordship. Since manors still widely existed and the shugo did not adopt a policy of completely rejecting them, and there was a strong tendency for the shugo's authority to only be exerted through its connection with and dependence on the power of the Muromachi shogunate, there is a strong hesitation to define this as a feudal domain system.

In contrast, the territorial rule of the Sengoku daimyo, which began with the Onin War (1467-1477) and progressed in earnest especially in the 16th century, did not necessarily depend on one of the 66 provinces as a unit. However, the daimyo had political claims as the only public authority over their territories and implemented various policies with that aim in mind, making them worthy of being called unique feudal states. The contents of these laws included: (1) officially determining the area and land value of each village or fief based on the right to inspect and request land throughout the domain, (2) allocating fiefs and imposing military service on vassals based on the determined area and land value, (3) simultaneously determining the taxes and other obligations of peasants based on the area and land value, (4) exercising superior control as public authority over transportation routes, post stations, markets, cities, mines, uncultivated land, etc. within the domain, and also seizing control over currency, such as the exchange rate between refined and unrefined coins, (5) denying the existence of samurai and peasants who were subservient to others within the domain and seizing judicial power, and (6) enacting feudal laws that would regulate all classes and groups within the domain in common.

Of course, the adoption and implementation of such policies varied greatly among daimyo, and among the territorial rulers, there were also some who had not yet reached that level, and who, while existing in a form not very different from the kokujin lords seen in the Nanboku-cho and Muromachi periods, were not absorbed into the daimyo's power. However, as a general trend, the territories of the Sengoku daimyo were commonly aiming to realize the above-mentioned direction, and the daimyo expressed their own status as kogi (public authority), and even independently exercised diplomatic rights, as the daimyo in Kyushu did, so this is truly worthy of being called a daimyo's territory. However, even in such cases, the unified Japanese state with the Emperor or Shogun at the top was not completely dismantled or denied. The Sengoku daimyo also tried to support a public character, or "kogi-ness," that was different from the individual power of their local lords, by formally connecting with the Shogun or the Emperor. In that sense, the daimyo's territory should be considered a lower-ranking state, and the multi-layered structure of the Japanese state and the daimyo's territory was the state system at this stage.

With the emergence of the bakufu-han system after the Toyotomi government, the autonomy of the daimyo's territories was greatly altered. The daimyo's territories, organized into domains under the shogunate, were not entirely denied their inferior state status that had existed since the Warring States period, and early modern daimyo were the only public authority in the territorial state of domains, and exercised various governing powers appropriate to that status. However, the higher national unifying authority of Toyotomi and the shogunate determined the allocation of daimyo's fiefs, transferred and abolished their fiefs, and established prohibitions on the strengthening of independent military forces and on private warfare, so that early modern daimyo lost the autonomy seen in the Sengoku daimyo. Economically, conditions were created in which financial collapse was inevitable unless the various domains were linked to the three capitals that were directly controlled by the shogunate. In this sense, the feudal domain system of the early modern daimyo was completely transformed, but despite this, the relationship and awareness that the domains were "countries" did not completely disappear until the Meiji Restoration. The Edo period is usually seen as a centralized feudal system with the power of the shogun at its center, but the fact that the decentralization of the domains as daimyo territories was at its foundation was inevitable, as long as the feudal domain system of the Sengoku period is taken as the historical premise. In this sense, it can be said that the daimyo domain system maintained the basic characteristics of territorial rule based on a lord-vassal power structure and of a subordinate state throughout the three stages mentioned above.

[Keiji Nagahara]

"A Study on the Social History of the Warring States Period" by Fujiki Hisashi (1974, University of Tokyo Press)" ▽ "A Study on the Social History of the Warring States Period" by Nagahara Keiji (1975, Shogakukan)" ▽ "Power and Society in the Warring States Period" edited by Nagahara Keiji (1976, University of Tokyo Press)" ▽ "The Sengoku Period" edited by Nagahara Keiji, J. Hall et al. (1978, Yoshikawa Kobunkan)" ▽ "A Study on the History of the Establishment of Sengoku Law" by Katsumata Shizuo (1979, University of Tokyo Press)" ▽ "A Study on the Sengoku Daimyo Period" edited by Nagahara Keiji, all 18 volumes (1983-86, Yoshikawa Kobunkan)

Source: Shogakukan Encyclopedia Nipponica About Encyclopedia Nipponica Information | Legend

広義には守護大名、戦国大名、近世大名の領域的支配体制をさすが、狭義にはそのうちでももっとも独立の領域国家的性格の強い戦国大名のそれをさす。大名ということばは平安時代以来、大名田堵(たと)などというように名田(みょうでん)と結び付けて用いられているが、大名領国に直接連なる用法としては、南北朝・室町期の守護を当時大名とよんだのがそれであり、領国ということばも守護の管国をさして用いられた。

　守護が大名とよばれ、その管国を領国というようになったのは、南北朝末＝14世紀末ごろから守護の管国が固定するとともに、守護が国衙(こくが)の権能・機構を吸収し、一国的な公権力としての性質を強めるようになったからである。そのころになると守護は国衙領の大半を守護領化し、国人(こくじん)領主の多くを被官としてその権力のなかに取り込むとともに、従来王朝国家の公権に属した国役(くにやく)・段銭(たんせん)などの臨時課役の賦課権を守護の恒常的賦課・収取権に転化させ、さらに国内各種の裁判権もしだいに集中、行使するようになった。その意味で14世紀末ごろから15世紀前半にかけて、守護領国制は本格的展開期に入るのであるが、反面その段階でも守護の管国全体に対する支配権は等質に行き渡った領主権というにはなお不徹底であった。荘園(しょうえん)領がなお広く残存し、守護もその全面的否定政策をとらなかったうえ、室町将軍権力との結合、それへの依存によって守護の権能もようやく発揮される傾向が強いところから、これを領国制と規定することには躊躇(ちゅうちょ)する見解も根強く存在する。

　これに対し応仁文明(おうにんぶんめい)の乱（1467～77）を画期とし、とくに16世紀に入って本格的に進展した戦国大名の領域支配は、かならずしも66か国の一つたる国を単位とするとは限らないが、その領域に対しては、大名が唯一の公権力としての政治的主張をもち、それを目ざす諸政策を打ち出していった点で、独自の領国制国家とよぶにふさわしいものがある。その内容としては、（1）領域全体の土地に対する検注権・指出(さしだ)し要求権に基づき郷村(ごうそん)あるいは知行地(ちぎょうち)ごとの面積・貫高(かんだか)などを公的に確定する、（2）その確定された面積・貫高などに基づき家臣団に対する知行割当・軍役(ぐんやく)賦課を行う、（3）同時にその面積・貫高を基準として農民に対して年貢・課役などの義務を確定する、（4）領域内の交通路・宿駅・市場・都市・鉱山・未墾地などに対しても公権力としての上位支配力を及ぼし、あるいは精銭と悪銭の交換比率など通貨に対する統制権を掌握する、（5）領域内に他者に服従する武士・農民の存在を否定し、裁判権を掌握する、（6）領域内の全階層・集団が共通に規律される領国法を制定する、などがあげられる。

　もとよりそのような諸政策は大名によって採択状況・貫徹度に大きな差異があったし、領域支配者のなかにもまだそのような域に達せず、南北朝・室町期にみられる国人領主と大差ない存在形態をとりつつ、大名権力に吸収されない国人領主クラスも存在した。しかし大勢としてみると、戦国大名の領国が前記のような方向の実現を共通に目ざしつつあり、大名は自らの地位を公儀と表現し、九州方面の大名が行ったように外交権すら独自に行使した事実があったから、これこそ大名領国とよぶにふさわしいものである。ただその場合でも、天皇あるいは将軍を頂点とする日本国的な統合体がまったく解体されたり否認されていたわけではない。戦国大名も将軍や天皇と形式的に結び付くことによって自己の在地領主の個別の権力とは異なる公的性格、すなわち「公儀性」を裏づけようとしていた。その意味では、大名領国は下位の国家というべきで、日本国と大名領国との重層構成が、この段階の国家体制であったということができる。

　豊臣(とよとみ)政権を経て幕藩体制が出現すると、このような大名領国の自律性は大きく変質させられた。幕府のもとで藩という形に編成された大名領国は、一面では戦国以来の下位の国家という性質を全面的に否定されたわけではなく、近世大名も藩という領域国家の唯一の公権力であり、それにふさわしい支配諸権能を行使していた。しかし、豊臣・幕府という上位の全国統一権力によって、大名の知行割が定められ、転封(てんぽう)・取潰(とりつぶ)しなどが行われ、いっさいの独自的軍事力の強化の禁止、私戦の禁止などが確立されたため、近世大名は戦国大名にみられたような自律性を喪失した。経済的にも、諸藩の経済は幕府の直轄都市たる三都に結び付かない限り財政的破綻(はたん)は不可避という条件が形成された。その意味で近世大名の領国制は徹底的に変質させられたのであるが、それにもかかわらず、藩が「国」であるという関係や意識は明治維新に至るまで完全には消滅しなかった。江戸時代は集権的封建制という形で将軍権力中心にとらえるのが普通であるが、大名領国としての藩の分権がその基盤にあったことは、戦国大名の領国制を史的前提とする限り必然であったのである。その意味で大名領国制においては、主従制的権力編成による領域支配、下位国家という基本性格が前記三段階に貫通して保持されていたということができる。

［永原慶二］

『藤木久志著『戦国社会史論』（1974・東京大学出版会）』▽『永原慶二著『日本の歴史14　戦国の動乱』（1975・小学館）』▽『永原慶二編『戦国期の権力と社会』（1976・東京大学出版会）』▽『永原慶二、J・ホール他編『戦国時代』（1978・吉川弘文館）』▽『勝俣鎮夫著『戦国法成立史論』（1979・東京大学出版会）』▽『永原慶二監修『戦国大名論集』全18巻（1983～86・吉川弘文館）』

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