Pit Workers and Fights #1
1958 - 1963

Yamabito to Kenka #1
[Pit Workers and Fights #1]
21.0 x 30.0 cm Ink Painting

In the Meiji era (1868-1912), people thought that coal pits were accompanied by quarrels and fights. The biggest fight, which was the talk of this region around 1897, was the one which occurred at a "Buzen no kaisha" [a mine company in the Buzen area of the Chikuho region] (in Gotoji Town in Tagawa County). It was said that the fight was so fierce that it looked like a war. It was a duel between two large miners' groups, each called an o-naya. Seven hundred men from one side and two hundred and fifty men from the other side confronted each other with a valley between them. They reportedly threw dynamite at each other and the number of the dead of both sides reached as many as thirty-nine. It is horrible that this fight lasted as long as three days.
It seemed that men without tattoos were not regarded as full-fledged miners (yamabito) even in the middle of the Meiji era.


Translation Assisted by Mr. Nathan Johndro

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