Ōoka Tadasuke

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In this Japanese name, the family name is Ōoka.

Ōoka Tadasuke (大岡 忠相?) (1677 - 1752) was a Japanese samurai in the service of the Tokugawa shogunate. During the reign of Tokugawa Yoshimune, as a magistrate (machi bugyō) of Edo, his roles included chief of police, judge and jury, and Yamada Magistrate (Yamada-bugyō) prior to his tenure as South Magistrate (Minami Machi-bugyō) of Edo. With the title Echizen no Kami (Governor of Echizen or Lord of the Echizen), he is often known as Ōoka Echizen (大岡越前?). He was highly respected as an incorruptible judge. In addition, he established the first fire brigade made up of commoners, and the Koishikawa Yojosho (a city hospital). Later, he advanced to the position of jisha bugyō, and subsequently became daimyo of the Nishi-Ōhira Domain (10,000 koku).

Ōoka was born in 1677, but did not come into public notice until he was 35, when he was appointed an obscure judgeship. When he accepted this job, he found out that there was a long–standing boundary dispute between the farmers of the Yamada and Wakayama (Kishū) fiefs.

While it was obvious that the Yamada claim was the just one, however, no previous judge had been fool enough to irritate Yoshimune, Lord of Kishū, as he was very close to the shogun. However, Ōoka took up the case, and immediately settled it on its merits.[1] Yoshimune was so impressed that when he became shogun five years later, he took the unusual action of promoting Ōoka over hundreds of other candidates, to the important post of machi–bugyō (magistrate) of Edo (old name for Tokyo). The post of machi–bugyō combined the duties of mayor, police chief, judge, and fire marshal.

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[edit] Famous cases

In addition, the figure has taken on a legendary status in a number of stories about his wise and imaginatively unorthodox legal decisions:

One of the most famous stories is called "The Case of the Stolen Smell" where he heard the case of a paranoid innkeeper who accused a poor student of literally stealing the fumes of his cooking by eating when the innkeeper was cooking to flavour his dull food. Although his colleagues advised Ōoka to throw the case out as ridiculous, he decided to hear the case. The judge resolved the matter by ordering the student to pass the money he had in one hand to his other and ruling that the price of the smell of food is the sound of money. However, this story is an adaptation of Rabelais's Pantegruel, and was re–told as Japanese folklore.

In ''The Case of the Bound Jizo or Suspect Statue'' was called upon to discover the thief of a cartload of cloth from a local kimono maker. Ōoka ordered a statue of Jizo of the Narihira-san Tōsen-ji, a temple in Tokyo, to be bound and brought forth to be called to answer for dereliction of its custodial duty. When the bound statue arrived in the courtroom, the spectators burst into laughter. Ōoka sternly ordered each spectator to be punished with a token fine for their outburst. Each was ordered to provide a small swatch of cloth as a fine. When the spectators paid their fines, the robbed kimono maker identified the piece of cloth from one spectator as identical to the cloth stolen in the crime. The spectator, who was the actual thief, was arrested, and Ōoka ordered the Jizo statue released as having discharged his duty. In 1925, the statue was removed from downtown Tokyo to a little temple called Nanjo–in on its outskirts. The statue still stands, and is wrapped in rope tied by hopeful victims of thieves. However, the statue is worn almost smooth because of over 200 years of binding. This story strongly resembles a Chinese tale, but the statue does exist. History has many stories with similar ideas which occur around the world.

[edit] Ōoka in fiction

Ōoka Tadasuke has been the central character in two jidaigeki television series. In one, Ōoka Echizen, actor Gō Katō played the lead. In the other, Meibugyō! Ōoka Echizen, Kinya Kitaōji played the same role.

In addition, series such as Abarenbo Shogun have portrayed Ōoka as an intimate of the shogun Tokugawa Yoshimune.

Other actors who portrayed Ōoka include Ichikawa Danjūrō XII in Honō no Bugyō Ōoka Echizen no Kami (Tokyo Broadcasting System, 1996) and Sakae Takita in the 1995 Taiga drama Hachidai Shogun Yoshimune.

Judge Ooka has also appeared in the Samurai Detective book series by Dorothy and Thomas Hoobler, including The Ghost in the Tokaido Inn (1999), The Demon in the Teahouse (2001), and In Darkness, Death (2004; Edgar award winner), The Sword That Cut the Burning Grass (2005), A Samurai Never Fears Death (2007), and the upcoming Seven Paths To Death (Fall 2008)

[edit] Trivia

[edit] References

  1. ^ Murdoch, James. (1996). A History of Japan, p. 334.


Preceded by
none		 Daimyo of Nishi-Ōhira
1748-1750		 Succeeded by
Ōoka Tadayoshi
Preceded by
Ōoka Tadazane		 Ōoka clan head
1700-1751		 Succeeded by
Ōoka Tadayoshi
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