明治期における大阪機械鋳物業の形成

抄録

In the Meiji period, foundries for machines and tools were separate from foundries for household goods such as pots and kettles. Most of the foundries in Osaka were small factories employing fewer than ten workers, and followed a process of modernization different from that of the government factories and the large privately owned ones, both of which were highly capitalized. While the latter modernized their casting processes with imported technology and under the tuition of foreign engineers, the small and medium foundries gradually adapted existing indigenous technology. In the late Meiji period, there were five areas with clusters of foundries surrounding the center of Osaka. However, unlike Kawaguchi in Saitama prefecture, which specialized in casting, in Osaka machine workshops existed alongside foundries. The relationship between them was horizontal and interdependent rather than vertical.