<論説>戦国期の徳政と地域社会 : 「在地徳政」史料の再検討

Abstract

かつて瀬田勝哉氏は指置状なる史料を検討し、伊勢国小倭郷の地侍衆が郷を範囲とする徳政(貸借・売買契約の破棄) を実施していたと見て、「在地徳政」論を提唱した。しかし現在、指置状から何を読み取れるかで見解が割れている状況にある。そこで本稿では、指置状について、「在地徳政」を自明視せず、文言を慎重に吟味し、関連史料を踏まえながら、再検討を進めた。その結果、指置状の本質は、「在地徳政」ではなく、徳政に対応して地域の経済・宗教秩序の混乱を抑えようとした点にあると判明した。戦国期の南伊勢では上位権力たる北畠氏の徳政令を中心に徳政の脅威が広まっており、徳政を警戒した蔵本や成願寺が小罪郷の地侍衆に指置状を求めたが、かかる指置状の発給には蔵本の融通や成願寺の宗教行事を維持する意味合いがあったのである。今後、他の「在地徳政」を再検討しつつ、徳政に対応する慣行を発掘し、戦国期徳政研究を深化させるべきだろう。

Based on a rereading of basic historical sources on zaichi tokusei (local debt moratoria), this article clarifies how people in local society responded to the tokusei (cancellation of debts and sales contracts) that were frequently issued during the Sengoku period, Seta Katsuya who examined the documents known as sashioki-jo of Joganji in Ichishi-gun in Oyamato-go in Ise, saw the powerful landed warrior class implement a tokusei in the go (district), which was their territory, and argued that such local, firmly limited tokusei, i.e., the zaichi tokusei, existed on a broad scale during the Sengoku period. This theory of zaichi tohusei appears to have become the scholarly consensus for a time, but criticism was leveled at the theory with the critics arguing that it was not possible to infer the implementation of the tokusei by the landed warriors on the basis of the sasihioki-jo. Nevertheless, sashioki-jo are particularly difficult to interpret documents, and opinion is still divided over what can be read from the saishioki-jo. Thus this article attempts a re-examination of the sashioki-jo. In the first section, I make a careful study of the wording of the sashioki-jo and confirm what data can be gleaned from the documents. This is that it is a historical fact that the landed warriors of Oyamato-go received offerings upon request and issued sashioki-jo to insure rights to land that had been rented or purchased by contract. One cannot interpret these sashioki-jo as indicating that they served as a direct opportunity sought by the landed warriors or that landed warriors implemented tokusei and that disputes over tokusei based on honshuken 本主権 (right of residency) took place, as has been indicated by earlier scholarship. Moreover, I point out that honshuken referred to the latent right of return by the former owner. Next, in the second section I broaden my sights to encompass the province of Ise, in which Oyamato-go was located, and collect and examine examples of tokusei, considering the background to the issuance of sashioki-jo. In Ise during the Sengoku period, the Kitabatake and other leading clans such as the Nagano and Oda issued tokusei orders in specific areas (zaisho betsu) and over wide areas based on their autonomous policies and the exercise of opportunities, and disturbances broke out over the tokusei in the area around Ise Shrine. Thus it can be said that in particular the people of the territory of southern Ise, which was property of the Kitabatake, were intimately involved with the tokusei. This is directly indicated for example by the appearance and increasing number of tokusei tanpo mongo (passages assuring security against tokusei) in bills of sale in Ise province, and one sees that a significant percentage of the people in the environs of Ise Shrine were conscious of the tokusei in developing a policy for the tokusei. It is difficult to imagine that this situation and Oyamato-go were unrelated, and considering the relationship between Oyamato-go and the Kitabatake clan, the probability is great that the people of Oyamato-go were wary of the tokusei, and chiefly the tokusei ordered by the Kitabatake. It is as a result of this that the sashioki-jo appeared. Then in the third and fourth sections I examine renken (a series of connected documents) that include sashioki-jo that have hardly gained the attention of previous scholarship. Attesting the actions of the people involved with the sashioki-jo, I deduce the significance of the sashioki-jo. First, the issuance of the sashioki-jo by the landed warriors of Oyamato-go was the result of the seeking of powerful assurance of the tokusei tanpo mongon regarding their rights to commended and purchased property by the financier Kishida and Joganji who were wary of the threat posed by the tokusei. In regards to the above-mentioned commended property, it appears at first glance to be unrelated to the tokusei that cancelled debts and sales contracts, but in fact purchased land was often commended and was exposed to the threat of the tokusei. In addition, the issuance of these tokusei meant the lending by the financier Kishida and religious ceremonies by Joganji such as memorial and pre-mortem funerary rites were maintained. In other words, we can find the significance of the sashioki-jo in the face of turmoil in the economic state of Oyamato-go and disorder in the religious sphere in responding to frequently issued tokusei. Furthermore, I have been able to prove the fact that the issuers of these sashioki-jo, the tokuseishu (the landed warriors), and the robunshu (the leadership of the landed warriors), who had fought to preserve the rights of the landed warriors, sustained the order of Oyamato-go on multiple levels. In short, the essential character of the sashioki-jo is found in the fact that they were a practice that attempted to maintain the social order in local society by coping with the tokusei and not that they were zaichi tokusei. In the future it is necessary to analyze other examples of zaichi tokusei and examine the validity of the zaichi tokusei theory. On the other hand, as regards the practice of coping with the tokusei that has been deduced in this article, further examples must be uncovered. If the study of both the tokusei and the response to tokusei proceed together, the portrayal of the Sengoku period, during which they were frequently issued, will undoubtedly become clearer.