The Ancient Japanese Good-Family Clans and Piracy (3-1) ——“Goko” or Belligerent Hire (1)——

The central government issued an order March the 27th, 867, saying, “In sordid places such as markets, ports, and arterials, maneuvers should be employed, detectives should be placed, bounties should be offered, and pardons should be dangled to leave no place for wicked and wild people to stay.” Why in “markets, ports, and arterials”? Why not on remote islands? The start of ancient Japanese piracy had something to do with the rise of marine transport along the Seto Inland Sea. In 756, the central government decided that the tax rice from Sanyo-do and Nankai-do Regions be sent to the capital by rowboat, and had provincial governments build dockyards and ports along the Seto Inland Sea. As the marine transport was improved and institutionalized, more and more boats and rowers were needed. At the same time, as we have already seen, the enclosure of seashores along the Seto Inland Sea was progressing. The closed-out fishermen were inevitably to be organized as salt-production laborers or rowers. However, as it was ancient times, scrambles over transportation did not raise their salaries, if any, but worked to “go-ko” in Japanese, or literally “belligerent hire” over them.