Itowappu

• Japanese: 糸割符 (ito wappu)

The itowappu system was a system in which a guild of Kyoto, Sakai, and Osaka-based textile merchants was granted a monopoly on the domestic sale of Chinese silk imported by Dutch and Chinese merchants in Nagasaki. The system was implemented by the Tokugawa shogunate in the 17th century in efforts to better manage the silk market.

The system was put into place in 1604, and abolished in 1655, after which trade in silk returned to being free. The competition of a free market, however, drove prices up, aggravating the problem the shogunate was seeking to solve: namely, that the shogunate desired to see more silk come into the country, and less silver flow out. Meanwhile, in the intervening time, Chinese and Dutch merchants were permitted entry into the monopoly-holding guild in 1631 and 1641 respectively.

The system was revived in 1685...

References

• Robert Hellyer, Defining Engagement, Harvard University Press (2009), 52.