Changing Pits (Yama) in the Meiji Era (1868-1912)
1964 - 1967

Meiji Tentaku/Yaotsuri (Yautsuri)/Yamakae
[Changing Pits (Yama) in the Meiji Era (1868-1912)]
38.1 x 54.3 cm Painting in Watercolors and Ink

Main Text
The workers in small-scale coal pits moved more frequently than those in larger pits. Well-prepared pit workers took all of their belongings with a yoke and a pair of baskets when they moved. (Most of such workers had nothing but the clothes they wore and such an appearance was called kitanari or kita no kaminari.) However, they could borrow a considerable amount of deposit (katairekin) or contract money (aritsukekin) from the pit they moved to.
Small and middle-scale coal pits had shops providing rental service of quilts and mattresses, mosquito nets, pickaxes, and so on. Boardinghouses called o-nayas lent the same things. Some coal pits without such services paid the expenses of the above things for workers and deducted the cost from their monthly wages. The rental for a quilt and mattress or mosquito net was 30 sen (0.3 yen) a month, and a pickax was the same because they were quickly worn out. (Everyone said that the sun and meals of rice would always follow them if they moved towards the large smokestacks of coal pits.) That is why lots of pit workers moved to one pit after another, and such workers were called hagama kofus [miners who would not stably work long at a pit]. (They were unstable like the round-bottomed hagama rice cooking pot on a flat place is.)

Text at the Bottom Left
The ropes for hanging baskets were tied in the same way as the ropes for baskets called sena kagos used for carrying coal out of the pit.


Translation Assisted by Mr. Nathan Johndro

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