<研究ノート>鎌倉期公家知行国の国務運営

Abstract

This article attempts to clarify the actual situation of provincial administration at the level of a chigyo-kokushu 知行国主(a provincial proprietor)kl the Kamakura period. Earlier studies presumed that the sodehan, a monogram that was affixed at the beginning of a kokushi chosen 国司庁宣 (a provincial governor's decree)and a kokusen 国宣 (a provincial proprietor's decree), was that of the chigyo-kokushu and that he administered provincial affairs. However, in some proprietary provinces, the sodehan was that of a keishi 家司 (a member of the household of a chigyo-kokushu). This was thought to be the case because a specially designated keishi managed the provincial administration. In this paper, such a keishi is identified as a kokumu-bugyo 国務奉行 (an official charged with provincial affairs), and the system in which such a kokumu-bugyo administered a proprietary province is labeled the kokumu-bugyo system. This system was adopted by the upper nobility, such as the imperial family 天皇家, and the regental houses 摂関家, whose members occupied the highest levels of the imperial bureaucracy. In proprietary provinces administered under the kokumu-bugyo system, two people, the chigyo-kokushu and the kokumu-bugyo seem to have had administrative control. Therefore, earlier studies thought that two chigyo-kokushu existed in a single province at one time. However, the kokumu-bugyo who was privately entrusted with the administration of a province by his lord and the chigyo-kokushu who was publicly granted the rule of a province from the Chiten-no-kimi 治天の君 (a retired emperor, who had actual control over the state), cannot be treated on the same level. The first duty of the kokumu-bugyo was to carry out provincial administration and to bring profit to his lord. In order to fulfill this responsibility, he made use of the lord's household organization and sometimes his own. The kokumu-bugyo held a central position in his lord's household, which indicates the importance of this post was central to the management of a proprietary province.