Demographics of Japan before Meiji Restoration
This article is about the demographic features of the population of Japan before the Meiji Restoration.
Before the establishment of the Shūmon Ninbetsu Aratame Chō ( religious and population investigation registers?) system by the Tokugawa shogunate, several less reliable sources existed upon which an estimate of the population was made. The first record of the population was the Chinese text "Records of Three Kingdoms" (simplified Chinese: 三国志; traditional Chinese: 三國志; pinyin: Sānguó Zhì), where the number of houses in eight countries of Wō (Wa (倭 Japan, Japanese?)) was estimated at 159,000.
The household registration system (Hukou (simplified Chinese: 户口; traditional Chinese: 戶口; pinyin: hùkǒu) or Huji (simplified Chinese: 户籍; traditional Chinese: 戶籍; pinyin: hùjí)), which is called koseki (戸籍 family registries?) in Japanese, was introduced from ancient China to Japan during the 7th century. According to "Nihon Shoki (日本書記?)", the first koseki system, called Kōgo no Nen Jaku (?) or Kōin no Nen Jaku (?), was established between 670 or 690, and was to be readministered every six years. However, most of the original koseki texts were lost because they were to be preserved only 30 years. The oldest koseki fragments - which were reused as reinforcement papers (Shihai Monjo ( scroop document?)) in Shōsōin (正倉院?) - records names, ages and estates of people including slaves (e.g. 1,119 persons were recorded for the village named Hanyū (?) (present day Tomika-chō (富加町?)) in 702)). A discarded lacquer-coated paper document (Urushigami Monjo ( lacquer paper document?)) found in Kanoko C Ruins (鹿ノ子C遺跡?), Ishioka, Ibaraki records the total population of families of taxpayers in Hitachi no kuni (常陸国?) in 795 was 191,660 (excluding families of officers, families of workers for Shintō shrines and slaves); this is the only reliable remaining census recorded for a whole province before the Edo period. The ancient koseki system later collapsed during the early Heian period, when aristocrats achieved power as landowners of Shōen.
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