An Overall Research and Historico-geographical Study on the Existing Documents Concerning Applications for Water-mills and for Hydroelectric Stations

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Since water-mills were taxable objects, setting and disposal of water-mills were controlled by law. Those who operated water-mills in the way of business had been obligated to place an application for setting or disposal of water-mill. Those applications placed have been generally preserved in the prefectural offices for good. So, by studying those documents we can trace year by year the development and utilization of hydraulic resources by the use of water-mills.As for the state of preservation of the documents, those in the prefectures of Tokyo, Ishikawa, Kyoto, and Gumma are in an excellent state. To our great disappointment, no documents have been preserved in the prefectures of Nagano, Gifu, Niigata, and Yamanashi, where presumably a lot of water-mills one existed. Was it too much trouble for the officers in charge to handle properly too many applications?In most cases, the purpose of setting a water-mill was to use it for processing rice or for grinding grain to fine powder. Other exapmles were for spinning, twisting, sawing, and pulverizing porcelain clay. A remarkable example of a water-mill is found in an application for a boat-mill, a flour mill to be set floating on the stream of Tonegawa River in Saitama Prefecture.In many places the existence of a mill made trouble with the use of water for irrigation and ferry service.Since it was obligatory for one who planned to establish a hydroelectric business, there were a lot of applications placed in the Meiji and Taisho Eras extant in such prefectures as Ishikawa, Miyazaki, Niigata, and others. Because the hydroelectric business was an enterprise which needed a lot of capital money, enterpreneurs of Tokyo and Osaka were very active behind the scene all over the country and often made trouble with the local planners.