From classical to medieval?daughter of the Northern Fujiwara chieftain had a son with the sovereign, chances were high that
that child would become the crown prince. It must also be noted that imperial consorts would
normally return to the residence of their parents for childbirth. As a result, a child would be
raised, not in the emperor’s household, but more commonly in the household of the woman.^6
The importance of this arrangement must not be underestimated. Imperial children, including
crown princes, were accordingly brought up in the house of their maternal grandfather, who
could exert considerable influence over future sovereigns through childhood education.
Regental offices were undoubtedly crucial in establishing Fujiwara control at court, though
they were not always essential to it. The Fujiwara chieftain par excellence, Michinaga (966–1027),
for example, served as regent for only for a short while, using instead the title of nairan (internal
examiner of documents) for most of his career. In other words, the Fujiwara dominance, though
exerted through their female relatives as mothers of emperors, relied less on specific titles than on
direct, private connections and influence over the emperor.^7 Nevertheless, scholars frequently
see enough of a change with the appointment of Fujiwara regents and their continued influence
that they refer to the period from 858 to 1068 as the era of the Fujiwara regency.^8
Such a periodization rests on the notion that the regency represents a fundamental change
from the preceding court structures, but as even a casual examination of court political opera-
tions shows, other than a shift in favor of the Fujiwara at the expense of the emperor within the
court, one would be hard pressed to find any other significant changes.^9 In other words, the
weakness in the sekkanke jidai approach is its exclusive focus on the Fujiwara regents, which tends
to result in other changes being overlooked. In fact, some scholars have pointed to the tenth
century as a more dramatic time of transition away from the statutory state structures, leading to
substantial political and social changes. This broader view is best represented by the ōchō kokka
theory.
One of the first Japanese scholars to argue that the tenth century was one of transition away
from the ritsuryō (legal and penal codes) state was Ishimoda Shō (1912–1986).^10 As also argued by
Sakamoto Shōzō (b. 1926), one of the most substantial changes came in the administration of the
provinces and the collection of taxes. For example, whereas taxes had been tied to specific fam-
ilies that had been assigned paddies in the ritsuryō system, beginning in the early tenth century,
taxes were assigned to units called myō assigned to a local cultivator, who was responsible for
delivering taxes based on the unit rather than the family. In addition, while the imperial court
continued to appoint governors, the latter were given a free hand in the collection of taxes as
long as a specific amount was delivered to the capital. In many cases, these governors were either
relatives or close allies of the Fujiwara or other powerful families at court. Thus, the imperial
court basically ceased its direct administration of the provinces to secure a steady flow of taxes by
governors who could do as they pleased in the appointed areas.^11
Hashimoto Yoshihiko (b. 1924) provided a closer analysis of the court structures in which he
maintained that the rule of nobles added three new characteristics to the ritsuryō state: the estab-
lishment of the regent titles, the establishment of rituals and precedents, and the collaboration of
the noble houses. In addition, much of the political action was transferred to the “meeting of the
high council” (jin no sadame), where ranking nobles and advisers met to make expedient deci-
sions.^12 In Hashimoto’s view, the jin no sadame spurred the emergence of the council and meetings
of the retired emperor’s headquarters (in- no-chō), which led in turn to the early medieval rule of
kōke seiken (“aristocratic regime”).^13 Hashimoto received some critique for not recognizing the
central role that the emperor continued to play, and for failing to sufficiently emphasize those
changes that did in fact occur in governmental procedures.
In the end, it is land management and the changes in tax collection procedures that received
most attention in discussions about the tenth century transition and the royal- court state. For