Commerce and towns in medieval JapanClassical and medieval Hakata was the largest base in Japan for overseas Chinese merchants to
put down residential roots for the purpose of trade. The archeological evidence for this is twofold.
Pottery bearing marks of certain Chinese trade organizations far outnumber any other that has
been unearthed in Hakata. The other evidence is remote: stones unearthed in China’s coastal city
of Ningbo dated 1167 bear inscriptions of contributions of ten kanmon each to a local temple
walkway by three Chinese merchants, two living in Hakata and the other intending to live there
temporarily. This proves that both long- and short- term living patterns could be found among
Chinese merchants in Hakata. Textual evidence of Chinese residents includes an 1116 inscription
in a sutra collection by a Tendai monk who had traveled to China: he describes a Hakata
neighborhood where Chinese merchants and boat captains lived.^28 These are a few of the late
Heian period textual references to Chinese people in Hakata and the foreignness of the city.
Massive finds of pottery suggest that many Chinese merchants were concentrated in their
own community in medieval Hakata, located between today’s train station and the port. Early
medieval textual evidence corroborates this: some of them intermarried with Japanese residents,
and some were interred after death in a local Zen temple.^29 A Chinese resident named in a 1252
dispute over non- payment of a shrine tax is referenced with a term (Hakata gōshu) that identifies
him as a boat captain from China living in Hakata.^30 He held constabulary (jitō) rights to a small
island whose overlord was Munakata Shrine, suggesting how deeply members of this community
could be assimilated into the local power structure. Nor were all non- Japanese residents only
from China: there is also a 1412 reference to a delegation from Java in the city and Hakata
archeological digs have yielded pottery from Vietnam and Thailand as well.^31 Hakata’s essential
medieval character as a multi- ethnic border zone of commerce was reflected in the variety of its
residents who acted as agents of trade with the outside world.
Natural disasters and history
Natural occurrences shaped the urban and commercial scene as did human activities. Historians
have long appreciated the effects of disease and epidemics on the human population, as well as
harsh weather causing crop failure and famine. Particularly since the Hanshin earthquake of
1995, there has been a greater awareness of the role played by natural disasters in shaping history.
For example, archeological evidence suggests that fires following earthquakes devastated most of
Kamakura city at one time or another during the medieval period, while geological analysis of
earth samples near the port of Kamakura indicates that liquefaction occurred, including possibly
in the merchant sector.^32
Medieval trade routes could even be altered by natural disasters. In 1498, for example, a huge
earthquake generated a tsunami that damaged a broad swathe of the Pacific coast from Ise to the
Bōsō Peninsula (present- day Chiba).^33 Anotsu in Ise and Asaba in Tōtōmi province were among
the region’s ports completely destroyed, forcing survivors to move and obliterating segments of
the combined sea and land trade route that ultimately linked Kyoto to that entire coastal region.
Pottery and roof tiles made at the Seigaya kilns in present- day Shizuoka were indirect casualties
of the disaster: transported before 1498 in short steps by boat and on land to the Tōkaidō main
route and beyond, their production dropped precipitously when the tsunami destroyed links in
the trade route. In an economy as developed as late medieval Japan’s, trade was a multi- stage
process comprising production of goods, transport to an entrepot for sorting, and then shipment
to markets for retail sale.^34 Small ports like Anotsu and Asaba served a transshipment function, in
effect, for goods eventually bound for markets. It is the archeological rather than textual record
that narrates this natural blow to medieval trade and commerce.