Tribute

• Japanese/Chinese: 貢 (mitsugi / gong)

"Tribute" refers to gifts, whether in the form of coin or precious metals, or that of goods such as rice, silk, aromatic woods, or horses, presented from one polity to another in acknowledgment of the superiority and suzerainty of the latter. Trade between China and most other polities, for the most part, for many centuries, formally and officially only took place in this manner. Giving tribute to the Chinese Court was an essential prerequisite for engaging in trade.

Examples of tributary relationships can be seen especially in the relationship between Ming China and Muromachi period Japan (see kangô bôeki), and took place as well between the Kingdom of Ryûkyû and certain outlying islands, such as the Miyako Islands or Yaeyama Islands, which were not controlled directly, but which might be considered tributaries of the Kingdom.

Ming China

The Sinocentric world order and system of tributary relations was, in theory, in place from as early as the Han Dynasty (206 BCE - 220 CE) until the late Qing Dynasty (1644-1911), but was strongest in the early Ming Dynasty, i.e. from 1368 until sometime around 1550. As Angela Schottenhammer explains, prior to the Ming dynasty, the Sino-centric worldview and tribute system were more a claim than a reality, and after the 1550s or so, Chinese maritime/economic power weakened.

Ming China regarded Korea, Japan, and Ryûkyû (through which it obtained access to Southeast Asian goods) as its most important tributaries, and categorized all of its tributary states into six categories:

• (1) The first category included 18 East and Southeast Asian polities, including Korea, Japan, Ryûkyû, Annam, Champa, Cambodia, Thailand, and Java.
• (2) The second category included the remaining Southeast Asian polities, especially island polities such as those in the modern-day Philippines, Indonesia, and Sri Lanka.
• (3) & (4) The third and fourth categories included Jurchens, Tatars, and other tribal peoples to the north.
• (5) & (6) The fifth and sixth categories included tribal peoples and other groups to the west.

References

• Schottenhammer, Angela. "The East Asian maritime world, 1400-1800: Its fabrics of power and dynamics of exchanges - China and her neighbors." in Schottenhammer (ed.) The East Asian maritime world, 1400-1800: Its fabrics of power and dynamics of exchanges. Harrassowitz Verlag, 2007. pp1-83.