The purpose of this monograph is to reexamine the hitherto-made researches on the miscellaneous labour services (_??__??_ zayao, zoyou) under the Code-Statute system of the Tang and Ancient Japan and to consider what it means that the Taxation Statutes (_??__??__??_) of the Tang do not have any article prescribing for zayao.
There are many fruitful studies on the taxation system and the financial administration under the Tang Dynasty.The institutional study was thought to have been completed by the publication of _??__??__??__??_ and _??__??__??__??__??_; The Remnants of the T'ang Statutes and The Addenda. But in the year 1999, a written copy of the Statutes of Tian-Sheng (_??__??__??_) under the Northern-Sung Dynasty was discovered in the Tian-Yi-Ge Library (_??__??__??_) in Ning-bo City. The full text of discovered ten scrolls is not yet made public, but the scroll of the Taxation Statutes is already published. We have come to know many articles of the Taxation Statutes of the year 737 (_??__??_25), and be able to have some images of the whole constitution of them.
Under the Tang, Zayao is not included by the complex of taxes keyi (_??__??_), which is a poll tax levied on every adult male (_??_ ding), consisting of zu (_??_), yong (_??_) and diao. (_??_) It is not a liability of annual labour service of fixed days, but necessary enough and temporary corvée.
Therefore, the Taxation Statutes do not include a specific article prescribing for zayao. Zayao services are parts of the imposition system (_??__??_ chaike), in which citizens are appointed to specific workers and compulsory labourers (_??__??_ seyi) according to their grades of household based on the property assessment. The appointed citizens in general enjoy the exemption from the duty of zayao labour, and in case that they have heavier duties to do, are exempted not only from zayao but also from a part or the whole of keyi taxes. It was quite natural in the Tang era that all citizens should make some kinds of services for the Emperor according to their social status and property.
On the other hand, the Taxation Statutes of Japan prescribe that zoyou should be a corvlabour service of fixed days, but necessary enough and temporary corvée within the limit of sixty days commanded by provincial governors. Zoyou is included by the complex of taxes (_??__??_ kayaku) as well as chou (_??_) and you (_??_), and looks like one of taxes for the central government. For example, the provincial authority makes zoyou labourers to produce some kinds of tributes and serve for the Tenno's visits. Thus zoyou service is turned into a poll tax in Ancient Japan, and this supports a hypothesis that a local chieftain leads members of the community under his influence to make services for the central government or for provincial governors.
