黎朝聖帝の目指したもの --十五世紀大越ヴェトナムの對外政策--

Abstract

The first half of the period from 1450 to 1680, which was called "the Age of Commerce" by Anthony Reid, corresponds to the first half of the Le era in Dai Viet (Vietnam). In scholarship on Vietnamese history, the viewpoints of historians who focus on the landmass or a single nation have been the mainstream, so the relations between the outer maritime world in the East and Southeast Asia and the foreign policy of the Le government, especially of the most prosperous reign of King Le Thanh Tong, have yet to be fully analyzed. In recent years, however, the number of studies from the viewpoint of maritime history, using the outcome of the research on ceramics trade and emphasizing the importance of the existence of the Ming empire and the Ryukyu kingdom has increased. This essay will employ the limited number of records in the Vietnamese chronicles and laws as well as information from newly introduced inscriptions to indicate the following points. According to an analysis of the foreign trade policy in the first half of the Le era and the aim of the military expansionist policy of King Thanh Tong, we see that the Le government also took administrative control of foreign trade, issuing a "sea ban" similar to the haijin policy of the Ming, though less rigorously enforced. The government, however, had to cooperate with illegal trade ships that resisted the Ming ban to export new commodities like ceramics. Ryukyu kingdom, which played an important role in the fifteenth century maritime world of Southeast Asia, did not maintain an official trade relationship with Dai Viet because the kingdom had been established as a new trade center with the aid of Ming empire and Dai Viet had continued its dispute with the Ming from the time of its founding. With respect to the military expansion policy of King Thanh Tong, we cannot deny the possibility that he sharpened his consciousness of being a "Middle Kingdom" and succeeded in exploiting commodities from small peripheral "vassal states" in the tribute system for a short time. However, it is not possible to conclude whether his policy of military expansion was closely link to the foreign trade policy because research on this point has been insufficient.