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[[File:Preparing-silk.jpg|right|thumb|450px|"Court Ladies Preparing Newly Woven Silk," ink and colors on silk, handscroll, [[Emperor Huizong]] of the [[Northern Song Dynasty]], Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 12.886.]]
*''Japanese'': 絹 ''(kinu)''
*''Japanese'': 絹 ''(kinu)''
==Domestic Production==
==Domestic Production==
[[File:Silk-cocoons.jpg|right|thumb|350px|Silk cocoons being prepared for spinning.]]
Over the course of the Edo period, textile merchants based in the [[Nishijin]] district of [[Kyoto]] extended their control over the silk industry, at least in central Japan, establishing vertical organizations in which a given Nishijin merchant claimed within his operation silkworm farms, spinners, weavers, and dyers, as well as transportation, marketing, and wholesale and retail operations. Many of these families, or the firms they established, continue to hold prominent places in producing the highest-quality silks and [[kimono]] today. It is estimated that at its height in the Edo period, Nishijin's textile industry may have employed as many as 100,000 people, including weavers, spinners, dyers, and others. There were at this time roughly 7,000 ''takabata'' "high looms," which were used to produce the highest quality textiles, and which required two operators at a time; most textiles were produced using the single-operator ''hirahata'', or "flat looms."<ref>Moriya Katsuhisa. "Urban Networks and Information Networks." in Chie Nakane and Shinzaburô Ôishi (eds.) ''Tokugawa Japan: The Social and Economic Antecedents of Modern Japan''. University of Tokyo Press, 1990. p98.</ref> By the 1720s, roughly 90% of silk processing in the archipelago was done in and around Kyoto.<ref>Kaplan, Edward The Cultures of East Asia: Political-Material Aspects. Chap. 16 & 18. 25 June 2003 <http://www.ac.wwu.edu/~kaplan/>.</ref>
Over the course of the Edo period, textile merchants based in the [[Nishijin]] district of [[Kyoto]] extended their control over the silk industry, at least in central Japan, establishing vertical organizations in which a given Nishijin merchant claimed within his operation silkworm farms, spinners, weavers, and dyers, as well as transportation, marketing, and wholesale and retail operations. Many of these families, or the firms they established, continue to hold prominent places in producing the highest-quality silks and [[kimono]] today. It is estimated that at its height in the Edo period, Nishijin's textile industry may have employed as many as 100,000 people, including weavers, spinners, dyers, and others. There were at this time roughly 7,000 ''takabata'' "high looms," which were used to produce the highest quality textiles, and which required two operators at a time; most textiles were produced using the single-operator ''hirahata'', or "flat looms."<ref>Moriya Katsuhisa. "Urban Networks and Information Networks." in Chie Nakane and Shinzaburô Ôishi (eds.) ''Tokugawa Japan: The Social and Economic Antecedents of Modern Japan''. University of Tokyo Press, 1990. p98.</ref> By the 1720s, roughly 90% of silk processing in the archipelago was done in and around Kyoto.<ref>Kaplan, Edward The Cultures of East Asia: Political-Material Aspects. Chap. 16 & 18. 25 June 2003 <http://www.ac.wwu.edu/~kaplan/>.</ref>