• DOI:10.1353/mni.0.0057
• Corpus ID: 201773949

The Lamp-Oil Merchants of Iwashimizu Shrine: Transregional Commerce in Medieval Japan

@article{Gay2009TheLM,
  title={The Lamp-Oil Merchants of Iwashimizu Shrine: Transregional Commerce in Medieval Japan},
  author={Suzanne Gay},
  journal={Monumenta Nipponica},
  year={2009},
  volume={64},
  pages={1 - 52}
}

• S. Gay
• Published 31 July 2009
• History
• Monumenta Nipponica

DURING the medieval period, a group of lamp oil dealers near Kyoto built a prosperous business niche of remarkable durability and geographic reach. Based in the community of Ôyamazaki , located on the Yodo river south of Kyoto, they started out in the Heian period as producers and purveyors of oil to the nearby Iwashimizu Hachiman shrine. As lay affiliates ( jinin or jinnin ) of the shrine, they participated in and helped finance its major festivals in return for special privileges as protected merchants, in particular, access to raw materials on shrine lands and exemptions on tolls. They steadily extended their geographic range, which from the thirteenth century reached from Owari and Mino provinces in the east to Kyushu in the west; as they plied the trade routes connecting these regions, they acquired raw materials that they shipped back and processed into oil at Ôyamazaki. They submitted some of the finished product as a service tax to Iwashimizu shrine; they also supplied some oil to the imperial court and regency families and then sold the rest locally as a commodity. Thus even at the beginning of the medieval period they were both purveyors and merchants. Toll barriers posed the main impediment to their prosperity: the tariffs charged on travelers and goods at these ubiquitous stations could make transport costs prohibitive. To overcome this obstacle, which often exceeded the protective powers of Iwashimizu shrine, the oil merchants sought and received the mediation of the imperial court and later of the