Tortures Used in the Middle and Latter Half of the Meiji Era (1868-1912) #2 (Soybean Flour)
January 1965
Meiji Chu-koki Rinchi #2 (Kinako)
[Tortures Used in the Middle and Latter Half of the Meiji Era (1868-1912) #2 (Soybean Flour)]
38.0 x 54.3 cm Painting in Watercolors and Ink
This painting shows a torture called kinako (soybean flour) imposed in the check house (kaikoba). The victim was forced to sit on the dirt floor with his wrists and ankles tightly tied together with ropes and water was poured over his head and body. The ropes contracted and constricted his arms and legs. One of the regulators hit him not with a stick but with a hemp rope (hosobiki).
The victim shrieked and rolled around every time he was hit. This torture was called kinako in the Taisho era (1912-1926).
[Translator's Notes: The name of this torture kinako supposedly comes from the fact that the victim was covered with dirt like a rice cake covered with soybean flour after he rolled around on the dirt floor.]
Exemplary punishments were seen in all of the small and middle-scale coal pits in the Chikuho region. Most of such pits were called assei yamas (pits ruled with an iron rod). Bosses of miner groups (nayagashira) and personnel supervisors (hitoguri) hit the victims without binding them with ropes. Rule-breaking miners were beaten without struggle. It was probably because each of them was reconciled to the punishment they received, considering that they would make atonement for their sins with their pains.
Translation Assisted by Mr. Nathan Johndro
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