Women's Black-Seal Letters in Sixteenth-Century Japan

Early Modern Women: An Interdisciplinary Journal 2013, vol. 8 Women’s Black-Seal Letters in Sixteenth-Century Japan Tomoko L . Kitagawa n “Did Women Have a Renaissance?” Joan Kelly explored various ways Iof measuring the status of women in Renaissance Italy, concluding that the existing periodization in historical studies did not fit the history of women. Kelly’s work, though based on the European Renaissance, has been helpful in rethinking the history of early modern women outside Europe. While Kelly’s argument is based on the assumption that women’s historical experience was much different from men’s, epistolary practices in late sixteenth-century Japan indicate that men and women went through the same cultural transition in such a way that gender differences became minimal. In this essay, my focus will be on women’s epistolary practices during Japan’s unification era (ca. 1550–1603), which is considered to be the transition between medieval (1192–1603) and early modern Japan (1603–1868). By way of providing background I will first give an account of the scholarship on the epistolary practices of medieval Japan. I will then dis- cuss the changes in the rules of correspondence during the unification period and examine the document called black-seal letter, which exempli- fies how quickly women adopted these changes. Finally, I will suggest that the need for this gender-neutral writing arose during repeated wars, for women had to carry out traditionally male roles in the absence of men. This essay thereby calls attention to a brief period in which women in late medieval Japan experienced a “renaissance” with their male contemporaries, 317 318 EMWJ 2013, vol. 8 Tomoko L. Kitagawa and suggests some reasons why women were integrated into a culture that until then had been separated by gender. Letters in Late Sixteenth-Century Japan A series of civil wars broke out in the mid-fifteenth-century, and the state of recurring wars lasted until three military leaders pacified Japan. It is important to note, however, that the unification of Japan was not accom- plished only through violence and military aggression. Epistolary exchang- es had a pivotal role in making promises, issuing edicts, and finalizing agreements. Accordingly, the unifiers, the first two in particular, brought about changes in epistolary culture, and elite women, who had previously deployed a female writing style in their letters, soon adopted the newly emergent writing protocol. 1 . Epistolary Practices Prior to Unification Epistolary culture was widespread among the elite samurai class during the medieval period. Letters were written on three different types of paper: solid paper (tategami 竪紙), folded paper (origami 折紙), and cut paper (kirigami 切紙).1 On solid paper, the sentences were written from top to bottom and from right to left. On folded paper, sentences were written in two rows along the crease. Cut paper could be any paper that was smaller than the above two — often a fragmented note. In all three formats, the body of the text begins immediately without a salutation; the date and the sender’s name with signature or a seal follow; and the recipient is desig- nated at the end of the letter.2 (See Fig. 1). The choice of paper reflected the social status of the sender. According to Nirō Aida, solid paper was most frequently used by the highest author- ity (the shogunal house), and it was occasionally used by other elite samu- 1 On the earlier form of rules of correspondence, see Momose Kesao 百瀬今朝雄, Kōan shosatsurei no kenkyū 弘安書札礼の研究 (Tokyo: Tokyo Daigaku Shuppankai, 2000). 2 The date is not always recorded in every letter. Women’s Black-Seal Letters 319 Origami Sample 1 1 Content Starts Here 2 2 1 2 1 2 ird last line: Date Second last line: Sender’s Name (signature/seal) Last line: Attention Tategami Kirigami Figure 1 . Formatting of the Letters.3 rai such as the shogun’s deputies (kanrei 管領) and the governors (shugo 守護).3By contrast, lower-class samurai often wrote on folded paper.4 During the later medieval period, the rules of correspondence (shosatsurei 書札礼), acquired through the actual exchange of letters rather than from manuals, functioned as a shared code of writing. For example, one apparent rule required that at the end of the letters, senders should sign off either with hand-written signatures (kaō 花押) or with seals (in 印). In general, documents with signatures were considered to show greater respect for the recipients, because a hand-written signature was seen as evidence of a more deliberate production process for the document.5 As a result, documents with cursive signatures were more highly valued by the 3 Adriana Boscaro, 101 Letters of Hideyoshi: The Private Correspondence of Toyotomi Hideyoshi (Tokyo: Sophia University Press, 1975), xii-xiii. 4 Aida Nirō 相田二郎, Sengoku daimyō no inshō: Inpanjō no kenkyū 戦国大名の印章：印判状の研究 (Tokyo: Meicho shuppan, 1976), 37. These choices must have depended on the availability and price of paper as well. 5 Amino Yoshihiko 網野義彦 ed., Namae to keizu, kaō to inshō 名前と系図・花押と印章 (Tokyo: Asahi Shinbunsha, 1989). 320 EMWJ 2013, vol. 8 Tomoko L. Kitagawa recipients.6 Since seals were easier to apply, they were often used on official documents.7 2 . The Epistolography of the Two Unifiers The first unifier of Japan, Oda Nobunaga (織田信長 1534–1582), sent out many letters as he seized political power in the late 1570s. His con- solidation of power and leadership in the mid 1570s was reflected in the changed manner of his writing. Originally from a middle-class samurai family, Nobunaga used both solid and folded paper when he first began writing letters.8 Even after he attained a much higher social status, he did not switch entirely to the high quality solid paper. In 1577, however, Nobunaga stopped writing his signature and began to stamp all of his letters.9 Nobunaga used his new seal, which included his political slogan, “spread militarism over the whole realm (tenka fubu 天下布武),” to convey his prominent status in the hierarchical structure; as a result, his stamped letters were highly respected by their recipients.10 The second unifier, Toyotomi Hideyoshi (豊臣秀吉 1536/7–1598), left behind more than 4,000 letters written after Nobunaga’s death.11 6 Atsuko Suzuki has pointed out that stamped letters could also be used among those in close or regular contact. See Suzuki Atsuko 鈴木敦子, “Hizen koku ni okeru sengoku ki no inshō shiyō 肥前国における戦国期の印章使用,” in Sengokuki inshō inpanjō no kenkyū 戦国期印章印判状の研究, ed. Arimitsu Yūgaku 有光友學 (Tokyo: Iwata Shoin, 2006), 319. 7 The use of seals began in the late fifteenth century. Ishimoda Shō 石母田正 has argued that their increased use was due to the standardization of the writing style of official documents in which the seal became a necessary part of the production process. The stamped documents effectively minimized the personalities of the senders and, as a result, legitimized the documents. Discussed in Murai Shōsuke 村井章介, “Shohyō: Sengokuki inshō inpanjō no kenkyū 書評：戦国期印章印判状の研究” Rekishigaku kenkyū 歴史学研究, 830 (2007): 47–48. See also Suzuki, “Hizen koku,” 322. 8 Aida, Sengoku daimyō, 38. 9 Yamamuro Kyoko 山室恭子, Chūsei no naka ni umareta kinsei 中世の中に生まれた近世 (Tokyo: Yoshikawa Kōbunkan, 1991), 249, 291. 10 Yamamuro, Chūsei, 249; Aida, Sengoku daimyō, 41. 11 Yamamuro, Chūsei, 280. Women’s Black-Seal Letters 321 Unlike Nobunaga, Hideyoshi continued to sign his private correspondence and documents relating to landholding, though he stamped his public directives.12 The fact that Hideyoshi separated the signed and stamped letters serves as evidence of his awareness of the rules of correspondence and of the two separate epistolary identities. During these two unifiers’ lifetimes, the rules of correspondence grad- ually changed; the use of seals in particular became an important feature to express social dignity, a use that eventually spread to the unifiers’ contemporaries, especially those in the elite samurai class. During Hideyoshi’s reign, this practice became common among the elite samurai, and gradu- ally, as Hideyoshi stamped his seal in red ink, the other elite samurai began stamping theirs in black, reserving red for Hideyoshi. 3 . Women’s Epistolary Practices Prior to unification, women who wrote letters were mostly female servants (nyōbō 女房), assisting either in the imperial court or shogunal house. Since these women often played the role of informing the public of the emperor’s or shogun’s will,13 female attendants composed memoranda in a unique language called “the language of court women” (nyōbō kotoba 女房言葉), and written in Japanese characters (hiragana 平仮名), rather than in the Sino- Japanese words and phrasing (kango 漢語) used by men in their writing.14 During unification, when the emperors were disempowered, writing by court women decreased, while the letters written by women around 12 Yamamuro, Chūsei, 291. 13 Wakita Haruko 脇田晴子, “Muromachi sengokuki no machi to mura 室町戦国期の町と村,” in Nihon joseishi 日本女性史, ed. Wakita Haruko, Hayashi Reiko 林玲子, and Nagahara Kazuko 永原和子 (Tokyo: Yoshikawa kōbunkan, 1987), 90. Both the courts and bakufu employed women called nyōbō. Their writings were called the female servants’ memos (nyōbō hōsho 女房奉書). In contrast to those of male servants (hōkōnin hōsho 奉公人奉書), the female servants’ memos conveyed the wills of emperors more informally. 14 Akiko Jugaku, “Nyōbō kotoba,” in vol. 2 of Gender and Japanese History, ed. Haruko Wakita, Anne Bouchy, and Chizuko Ueno (Osaka: Osaka University Press, 1999), 136–37. The language has also been found in court diaries titled Oyudono no ue no nikki お湯殿の上の日記. 322 EMWJ 2013, vol. 8 Tomoko L. Kitagawa Nobunaga and Hideyoshi increased, some of which are still extant.15 The most notable feature of their letters is that they had been written at the discretion of the women around the unifiers.

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