Study on the Formation and Development Process of the Merchant in the Pre-modern Period

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Our aim was to discover the common rules of how pre-modern merchants formed and developed, and how they influenced the entire country or various districts. We did this by looking into some cases of merchants in Kyushu.Kusumoto and Miyazaki focused on the Ishimotos who were a wealthy merchant in Amakusa. Many documents were available on this family, but most of them were in disarray. Three years have been needed to put them in some order. Using a computer, this process is now 90% completed, and you have easy access to these documents.The Ishimotos were connected to Kohnoike and Mitsui, so that we investigated the historical records of the economics department at Osaka University, the Mitsui Library, and the National Archives. We also looked into the historical materials at the Kagoshima Prefectural Library and Reimeikan because of the relationship between the family and the Satsuma Man.Though the Ishimotos' management, mainly that of the Kasei period has been studied, we started our study from researching "Gingashicho" of the Kyoho period to see how the management formed. We also looked into what the commercial distribution should be by investigating "Yorozubaibaikocho", "Funakanjocho" and "Misebaibaicho" of the Horeki period to the Anei period. During the 2001 fiscal year, we researched from the Anei period to the early years of the Tenpo period, and we found that the commodities were limited. Besides, there was a change that people in Amakusa and Shimabara came to produce much cotton. The Ishimotos' management tried to convert in the Kasei period.Iwasaki researched the historical documents of the Odas which developed new rice fields in Ojika. Ohga studied lumber dealers of the Nobeoka Han. We expected to find out common rules by the study about the management of some merchants in Kyushu, but accomplishing our purpose is impossible without collecting more cases.