Page 226 - Changing Living Spaces

Satoshi Murayama, Hiroko Nakamura, Noboru Higashi and Toru Terao

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0
1600 1650 1700 1750 1800 1850 1900 1950
Sakitsu Takahama

Figure 4 Population Changes in Takahama and Sakitsu, 1690–1879
Sources Amakusa Komonjyo-kai (1988–1993). II/III, 239–405; Amakusa-cho Kyoiku-
iinkai (1985–1998); UkM, Ueda Yoshiuzu Diaries; UkM, Village Records; UkM, Population
Register of Amakusa Islands in 1692]; Morinaga (1986).

and fields, but were simultaneously supported by village and commercial
networks (Murayama et al. 2017, 238).
In societies that suffered from frequent disasters and epidemics, mor-
tality crises were a social premise, and therefore economic societies and
individual families were doomed to be challenged by sudden failure. On
the one hand, economic historians can wonder how ‘markets’ sustained
economic growth in such societies. On the other hand, environmental
historians can examine the resilience of the land and the ability of people
and natural conditions to recover.

Historical Sources for the Local Analysis
The administrative diaries of a village, or mura in Japanese, are quite val-
uable historical material. The local governors of Takahama wrote dia-
ries every year, which were carefully preserved in the depository of the
Ueda House, the family of the village head (shoya), until the present time,
more than 200 years ago. These diaries detail the disasters and important
events that occurred in the area and how the people of Takahama under-
stood and managed them.
A shoya was the term for a peasant in the early modern villages of
Japan. However, the term also refers to the administrative representative
of the village. In Japan, the village head and administrator, i.e. the shoya,
was free to keep an administrative diary to ensure the continuity and se-

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