Introduction

During the Edo period (1600–1868), the trade in human beings was totally banned in Japan and gradually disappeared. Thus, those who had to work to repay their debts became indentured servants for only a specific period of time. However, the contracts of prostitutes persisted in keeping them in slave-like conditions. Most of the girls who belonged to licensed or unlicensed brothels in this period had been sold as apprentices by their parents or relatives and were subsequently forced to work as prostitutes in order to repay the advances their parents received as payment for their ‘apprenticeship’.

In this chapter I will first provide a general overview of human trafficking and the custom of debt servitude throughout Japanese history, as well as the history of prostitution in the Edo period. Then I will shift my focus to the prostitutes of the licensed brothels in the port city Nagasaki, which was the only city in which foreign trade with the Chinese and the Dutch was conducted. I will examine their contracts, working conditions and lives, as well as the social structure in which this system was approved.

‘The Trade in Human Beings’ throughout Japanese History

In Japan, human trafficking has generally been prohibited since antiquity. However, this does not mean that such trade did not exist. Under the ancient ritsuryō legal system, persons of the lowest social strata, who could be considered slaves, could in fact be bought and sold.