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About JINJI KOSHINROKU (who's who) Database
"JINJI KOSHINROKU" is a who's who published in 1902 by Naoji Uchio who founded a publisher, JINJI KOSHINJYO, in 1901. It contains information for the prominent people of the modern Japanese society and information based on the family registration surveys -- their biographical sketch, occupation, and status as well as their families and relatives' information. The series of JINJI KOSHINROKU had been published every other year since then untill 2009. (JINJI KOSHINJYO became a joint-stock company in 1934 and merged JINJI KOSHINROKU with other who's who during the world war II.)
JINJI KOSHINROKU has been widely used as a reference material for obtaining information for the prominent people. Not only that, but also JINJI KOSHINROKU is a vital research resource for the study of humanities and sociology. Using the information from JINJI KOSHINROKU, we can reveal how Japanese society changed under the influence of rapid Western civilization, industrialization, and urbanization, overseas expansion, war, and depression after the Meiji era. However, we have not fully utilized the wide variety of information in it. The National Diet Library Digital Collection has electronic images that are open to the public. However, but there is no search system.
To overcome this problem, this database was created by digitizing the full-text data of specific editions of JINJI KOSHINROKU. In addition to the full-text search, we extracted individual information (gender, date of birth, birthplace, status, rank, order, etc., family, relatives, educational background, employment history, address, etc.) from it, so that you can also search these key items in this database. Currently, the 1st edition (1903), the 4th edition (1915) and the 8th edition (1928) are available. Constructing this dataset and combining it with other historical materials and documents, we have achieved several researches already. For example, we presented the change in the elite society from the Edo period to the Meiji period, the rise of credit investigation and secret detective work in the industrialized and wealthy society under the Industrial Revolution, the formation of the "new nobility" consisting of the old and new noble families, and the clarification of the changes in the family system and women. In addition, obtaining the data from the multiple series of the JINJI KOSHINROKU, we conducted the time series analyses of the economic and political elites. -
SEARCH
[A-1] - – You can search by specifying the item to be searched.
- – If the button to the right of the item is "and," space will function as an "and" search. You can switch to "or" by clicking on it, in which case space will function as an "or" search.
- – Items to be selected from the pull-down menu can select by clicking on them, and the selected items will change color and have a checkmark. Click again to deselect the item. You can check multiple items at the same time. The "Select All" and "Clear" buttons above allow you to select and clear all items at once. The number on the right side of each item indicates the number of corresponding.
- – The default search between each item is "and," but you can switch to "or" search from "Search between items" at the bottom.
Overall search You can search all items at once. For example, "Yukichi Fukuzawa" is not a recorded person of JINJI KOSHINROKU, but he appears in the "parent" or "description." Please use this function when you want to find something related to any item or when you do not know which item it is listed in. Edition You can specify the edition to be searched. Name You can search by the name of a recorded person. In the "JINJI KOSHINROKU," names are listed as the equivalent of "entry" in dictionaries. In our research, we use the term "name of the recorded person" as a name, and the person being recorded is referred to as "the recorded person." You can also search by hiragana, but the readings of a name (pronunciation) are automatically estimated and may not be correct. Gender You can search by the gender of the recorded person. The gender is not recorded in the "JINJI KOSHINROKU," so it is estimated from the description. Birthday You can search by the date of birth of the recorded person automatically obtained from the description. If you select "Exact Date," the search will be done for the person who was born on that date. If you select "Range," the search will be done for the person who was born on the date in the range. Any of the year, month, and day can be empty. Age You can search by full age, which is calculated from the year of birth of the recorded person. If you select "Age designation," the search will be done for the person of that age. If you select "Range," the search will be done for the person of that range of ages. By default, the age is based on the year of publication, but you can change the base year. Court rank You can search by the court rank of recorded persons. Court honors You can search by the court honors of recorded persons. Merit grade You can search by the merit grade of recorded persons. Title You can search by the title of recorded persons. Qualiifcations You can search by "Kinkeimanoshikou" and "Jakoumanoshikou" as a qualification of recorded persons. Family rank You can search by the family rank of recorded persons. Even if family rank is not explicitly recorded, a titled person is assumed to be a "kazoku." Location of register You can search by the prefecture where the person is registered. The prefecture, etc., recorded with the "family rank" is used as the location of the register. Parentage As of previous family rank, this section includes shogun's family, bakushin, kugyou, ryukyu-ou, jousyu, ryousyu, hansyu, kokurou, karou, hanshi. As of parentage, this section includes xx family generations and the cadet branch of the family. Occupation You can search by the occupation of recorded persons. Parent You can search by the name of the parent of the recorded person, which is inferred from the description. Relationship You can search by the relationship of the recorded person, which is inferred from the description. Family You can search the family of recorded persons. Biography You can search the biographical sketch of recorded persons. Educaiton You can search by the former school of the recorded person, which is obtained by pattern matching from the description. Political Party You can search by the name of the political party recorded in the description. Income tax and Business tax You can search by the amount of tax paid by the recorded person. Since this item appeared in the 10th edition, it is not available. In the fourth edition, the same person was estimated from the 19th edition of "Nihon Sihnsiroku" (December 1914, Kojyunsha), and the tax amount was displayed. However, we considered it inappropriate to mix different information and deleted it (February 6, 2019). Address You can search by the address of the recorded person. In some cases, prefectures are omitted in the original data, but even in these cases, the prefectures' names are added. Phone number You can search the phone number of recorded persons. Relative You can search by the names listed as "references" (relative) in "JINJI KOSHINROKU." Degree You can search by the degree of the network of the recorded person listed in "reference" of "JINJI KOSHINROKU" as a node.
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SEARCH RESULT
The search result shows the name and date of birth of the recorded person and the search items. Keywords used in the search will be highlighted (except using the function of overall search).
Each item can be sorted in ascending or descending order by clicking ∧∨.
Example: Search results for the keywords "井上" as a name and "東京帝国大学" as a description.
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Details display of the recorded person
[B-1] The name of the recorded person is shown. [B-2] The contents are displayed for each item. For more information about each item displayed, please refer to [A-1] about search. -
– In the "Bibliography" section, the information about the family tree and the family members' information is separated into different paragraphs to make the contents more comfortable to read.
In the "Relative" section, a link allows you to click on a name to access the corresponding person. - – "Pronunciation" is automatically estimated and may differ from the correct reading.
- – "Another name" indicates a former name or childhood name that appears in the description.
[B-3] Display a digital image of the corresponding page of "JINJI KOSHINROKU." [B-4] Display related information. - – If the recorded persons' information is also available in other editions, you can access that page.
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– If there is a parent-child relationship in "JINJI KOSHINROKU," the corresponding person will be displayed. The recorded person will be displayed in red (as shown in the figure below, the page of "安田善之助"). All the recorded persons with the parent-child relationship are displayed, so brothers are also displayed. However, since this function displays the parent-child relationship, if the parent is not recorded, the brothers will not be displayed even if they recorded in JINJI KOSHINROKU.
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– In the "Bibliography" section, the information about the family tree and the family members' information is separated into different paragraphs to make the contents more comfortable to read.