The British Library's Sado Mining Scrolls

THE BRITISH LIBRARY'S SADO MINING SCROLLS HAMISH TODD AMONG the nearly eleven hundred works acquired by the British Museum from the collection of Philipp Franz von Siebold^ in 1868 were three hand-painted scrolls depicting mining activities on the Japanese island of Sado. The scrolls belong to a genre of manuscripts known as Kinzan emaki #|IJ^# (Illustrated scrolls of gold mines)^ or Kwginzan emaki 4?IIUJ^# (Illustrated scrolls of gold and silver mines), which provide a detailed representation of both the underground mine workings and the various refining processes and administrative operations that went on above ground. Sado, an island measuring 857 square kilometres, lies thirty-five kilometres off the north-west coast of Honshu. For over eleven centuries from 702 it was a province in its own right but on the establishment of the prefectural system of local administration in 1871 it became part of Niigata Prefecture. Today it is well known as the home of the Kodo drummers but in the past its claims to fame were as a place of exile for disgraced notables^ and, more relevant to this article, as a source of gold and other precious metals. The earliest reference to gold from Sado is to be found in the Konjaku monogatarishu ^^^M^ (Collection of tales now past)'* which dates from the early twelfth century. One of the stories describes how the Governor of Noto, having heard of the abundance of gold on Sado, sends iron-workers to the island to bring some back. This story is generally thought to refer to gold-panning rather than to actual mining and for many centuries it was this alluvial gold, with some silver, dug from the sands of the seashore that constituted Sado's riches. During the latter half of the sixteenth century the exploitation of auriferous copper containing small amounts of gold and silver, mined from the hard rock in underground workings, allowed the island's full potential as a source of precious metals to be developed. Following the arrival in Japan of the Portuguese missionaries and traders, the increased need for gold and silver for trade acted as an incentive for the exploitation of Sado's mineral resources. A merchant called Toyama Mouemon ÛJ/^^f^P^ opened the first mine at Tsurushi in 1542. Then in 1589 the warlord Toyotomi Hideyoshi ®g:^^ (1537-98) ordered the samurai Uesugi Kagekatsu ±.Vi>f^B (1555-1623) to take troops to the island to seize control of the mine. Five years later, anxious to finance his campaign against Korea, Hideyoshi sent mining experts to the island to speed up production. Following the death of Hideyoshi and the rise to power of Tokugawa Ieyasu 130 (1542-1616) the new Tokugawa government also began to take an interest in Sado and its riches. In 1600 the island was placed under the direct control of the Shogunate with an official called the Sado datkan '^miXt: (Deputy for Sado) and later the Sado bugyo \^m.^n (Commissioner for Sado) in charge of operations. Initially the focus of activity was the Tsurushi mine but during the tenure of the first Sado datkan, Tanaka Seiroku 15 4^^7^ , came the discovery of the Aikawa mine which was to prove the most important and profitable of all those on the island. To encourage the development of mining operations the Shogunate introduced a system called unjo nymatsusei '^}LMIV\ (levy bidding) whereby prospectors were given freedom to search for deposits of gold and silver. If they were successful in finding ore they were permitted to exploit it to recoup their costs over a specified period. Thereafter every ten days an auction was held at which contractors submitted bids {nyusatsu) of how much levy (unjo) they would pay and mining rights were awarded to the highest bidder.^ In 1603 Ieyasu appointed Okubo Nagayasu X^^^"^ (1545-1613), who was, like his predecessor, an experienced and able administrator trusted by the Shogun, to take charge of operations on Sado. Nagayasu was responsible for technological and administrative improvements which considerably increased the profitability of the mines for the government. He established his office (Jin^ya WM. or Bugyosho ^tfpff) at Aikawa and revised the way in which the mines were managed. Although the unjo nyusatsu procedure had succeeded in stimulating the opening of new mines and productivity in the short term, it did not provide resources for the necessary long-term investment and so Nagayasu initiated the nmake ^^ (division of profits) system. The precise details of this altered over the years but its basic principle was that in jikiyama Ef-U (literally 'directly controlled mountains' (i.e. mines)) the Bugyosho provided funds for major works such as tunnelling, improving drainage and introducing new technology. It also paid for materials and equipment. The ore extracted from the mine was divided with the mine operator (j/amanushi iî). The rate varied over the course of the Edo Period (1600-1868) starting at around forty per cent for the Bugyosho but as the Shogunate took on more and more aspects of running the mines this increased to more than sixty per cent. Other privately run mines {jibunyama U ^>UJ ), although under the ultimate control of the Bugyosho, were left to the day-to-day control of entrepreneurs who did not receive subsidies and who paid a straight levy on the ore they extracted. The Archimedes screw pump (suijorin i^^M) was first introduced in 1618, in an effort to tackle the perennial problem of flooding, and this heralded Sado's most productive period. During the 1620s it is estimated that an average of six to nine tonnes of gold and silver were extracted annually. But the boom was short-lived and by the middle of the seventeenth century the industry was in decline for a variety of reasons. Following the closing of the country to all but a handful of foreigners in 1639 overseas trade was drastically reduced and the value of gold and silver declined. The search for new ore deposits led to the digging of ever deeper tunnels. The expense of constructing them and keeping them from flooding caused costs to climb steeply and the Shogunate's annual revenue decreased, dropping from over 6,000 kan (22,500 kilogrammes)** of gold and silver in the 1620s to less than 1,000 kan (3,750 kilogrammes) by the end of the 1660s, In 1651 the government ordered the closure of the less profitable mines. When a new Bugyo Hagiwara Shigehide îîiriM^ was appointed in 1690 he made a concerted effort to revive operations and invested heavily, including the excavation of a new thousand-yard- long drainage tunnel. As a result of his efforts revenue rose to 2,000 kan (7,500 kilogrammes) per annum in the first decade of the eighteenth century but thereafter the decline continued with the Tokugawa Bakufu reluctant to risk further spending, and by the 1730S its income from the mines had fallen to 300 kan (1,125 kilogrammes). It was not until the beginning of the Meiji Period that matters improved. Following the end of its seclusion policy the Shogunate dispatched an Enghsh mining expert, Erasmus Gower (1830-1903), to Sado to make a thorough survey of the mines. He arrived in January 1868, just as the Tokugawa regime was collapsing, and had to return to Tokyo almost immediately. In 1869 the new government took over the mines on Sado and sent Gower back to the island to resume his work. He remained until 1872 and with other foreign experts arranged for the provision of more modern equipment in the hopes of resuscitating the mining industry. In 1886 the Meiji government decided to introduce non-convertible paper currency. The need to produce silver coinage to exchange for this brought about a revival in Sado's fortunes and in that year its mines produced 36 kan of gold and 938 kan of silver. Ten years later the island's mining operations, together with those at Ikuno in Hyogo Prefecture and the Osaka Refinery were sold to the Mitsubishi Company for 1,730,000 yen. Mining continued on a small scale until the last mine finally closed in July 1985. It has since been reopened as a museum. SADO MINING SCROLLS IN GENERAL The first of the mining scrolls is believed to be Shokasegikata emakf il^:^^#, commissioned by the Sado bugyo during the Kyoho Period (1716-1736). It underwent major revisions in 1759 and again in 1819 to refiect various changes in the technology employed or in the administration of the mines. Kinzan emaki were produced in some numbers during the Edo Period and depict many different mine sites around Japan.^ A survey of scrolls representing the Sado mines carried out by the TEM Research Institute as part of their preparations for constructing a scale model of the Aikawa mine^ found seventeen scrolls on Sado itself and twenty- three elsewhere in Japan. Ford and Brown^*' mention three scrolls in the United Kingdom, although, interestingly, not the British Library's, and examples are known in other European collections.^^ Although scrolls depicting other sites are found, the majority represent mines on Sado. The Sado scrolls were painted by artists, known as ezushi ^[Uffi, who were employed by the Shogunate office in charge of the island's mining activities, the Bugyosho. The first of these was Yamao Kakken \hMM%i , who was appointed by Hagiwara Yoshiharu V^ Sado bugyo from 1732 to 1736. Their primary purpose was to provide an 132 accurate representation of the complicated workings of the mines, both below and above ground for the benefit of the hugyo and other officials appointed by Edo every few years.

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