Geography in history and history in geographycontrast, involved a zigzag pattern wherein upon reaching the sixth lot at the end of a column, counting
for the seventh lot would resume from the top of the neighboring column.
16 Suzaku Boulevard, the thoroughfare that began from the entrance into the imperial palace compound
at Suzakumon and which divided the city of Nara into east and west, connected with the Lower Road
(Shimotsumichi) beyond Rajōmon in the south. Numbered rows began to the south of Rajōmon, while
the counting of columns to the east and west was based on their proximity to the Lower Road. Here the
urban grid pattern tied to Suzaku Boulevard and the rural land divisions centered on the Lower Road
to which each corresponded. The point of departure for starting to count each ri of land was, to the east
of the Lower Road, from the northwest corner, while to the west of the Lower Road the process began
from the northeast corner.
17 Debate on medieval cities has, in fact, developed along similar lines.
18 Kinda, Jōri to sonraku no rekishi chirigaku kenkyū.
19 Sano Shizuyo, Chūkinsei no sonraku to mizube no kankyōshi: keikan, seigyō, shigen kanri.
20 Yoshida Toshihiro, “Chūsei sonraku no kōzō to sono henyō katei: ‘shōson = sankyogata sonraku’ ron
no rekishi chirigaku- teki saikentō”; Itō Toshikazu, “Chūsei Tōgoku no ‘horinouchi’ gun ni kansuru
rekishi chirigaku- teki kenkyū: Kita- Kantō o jirei toshite,” and “Kii no kuni no ‘Yamahata (Yakihata)’
ni kansuru rekishi chirigaku- teki kenkyū.”
21 Perhaps the most impressive single study is Kinda Akihiro et al., Nihon kodai shōenzu. For the medieval
period, see Katsuragawa ezu kenkyūkai, Shōenzu no kosumorojī – jō, ge, as well as Fujita, Shōen ezu ga
kataru kodai, chūsei.
22 Ashikaga Kenryō, Chūkinsei toshi no rekishi chiri: machi, suji, zushi o megutte.
23 Kinda Akihiro, “Kokufu no keitai to kōzō ni tsuite,” 63.
24 Kobayashi Kentarō, Sengoku jōkamachi no kenkyū.
25 Kobayashi, Sengoku jōkamachi no kenkyū.
26 Yamamura Aki, Chūsei toshi no kūkan kōzō.
27 Mizuta Yoshikazu, “Jinai- machi no keitai saikō”; Kanai Toshi, Jinaimachi no rekishi chirigaku- teki kenkyū;
Amano Tarō, “Ōsaka Ishiyama Honganji Terauchi- chō puran no fukugen ni kansuru kenkyū: ichihitei
to naibukōzō o megutte.”
28 My most recent publication on this is “Chirigaku kara mita tōshiteki na ba: kaiga shiryō ni ‘tōshi’ keikan
o saguru.”
29 A thorough explanation of Amino’s concept of muen appears in Alan S. Christy’s introduction to
Rethinking Japanese History, xx–xi, and elsewhere in that volume.
30 As Alan Christy notes,
for Amino, the terms rural and urban have little to do with scale and everything to do with the
character of daily life. An urban settlement is inescapably a part of a circulation network. It is
a place where exchange is a fundamental activity, where production is premised upon con-
sumption elsewhere, and where equivalences between things are determined. Amino charac-
terizes as urban town after town that most Japanese would think of as hopelessly isolated and
miniscule. He highlights the vast networks and constant mobility that he believes animated
the Japanese past. With the proliferation of urban nodes in a network covering the islands,
even the images of rural communities where agriculture was dominant are unstable, for the
“city” is no longer far away.
Amino, Rethinking Japanese History, xvii–xix
For Amino’s ideas on medieval urban places, see Chūsei toshi- ron and Muen kugai raku. In English, see
Rethinking Japanese History.
31 Itō Takeshi, Tōshi no kūkanshi. I have discussed these ideas at length in my “Review of Itō Takeshi Toshi
no kūkanshi.”
32 For more on this idea, see Fujita, “Chisekizu o mochiita keikan fukugen to saigai fukko.”
References
Amano Tarō. “Ōsaka Ishiyama Honganji Terauchi- chō puran no fukugen ni kansuru kenkyū: ichihitei to
naibukōzō o megutte.” Jinbunchiri 48–2 (1996).
Amino Yoshihiko. “Chūsei toshiron.” In Iwanami kōza Nihon rekishi 7 chūsei 3, 253–303. Tokyo: Iwanami
shoten, 1976.
Amino Yoshihiko. Muen kugai raku: Nihon chūsei no jiyū to heiwa. Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1978.