In Japan, before the nineteenth century cotton was one of important cropcultures. The alluvial plains of Osaka were reckoned among the most widely cultivated areas for cotton, and four farming methods of cotton cultivation had been used there. The practice of cotton plant cultivated in normal farm-land belonged to the first group. As to the second group, there was the practice of cultivating the newly reclaimed land “Shinden”, from the seventeenth centrury downward. Shinden being made of sandy soil, in those days, cotton culture was the only farm product in a land of this kind. In the third group there was a practice of culturing in the paddy-field every other year, a paddy rice plant and a cotton plant. In the year when cotton plants were being cultured, there was no irrigation of the paddy-field. In the fourth group, earth was laid on the ground inside each parcel of a paddy-field and converted into fields under crops; then cotton plant was cultured there.
The author, in this paper, observed especially this fourth method of cotton culture.
The farm-land under cultivation in the paddy-field, in those days, was generally called “Handa”. About 60-70cm difference of undulations existed between the farm-land and the paddy-field in the Handa. There was an almost repeated cultivation of the cotton crop on the higher place or farm-land. On the contrary, in lower places, or paddy-fields, a paddy rice plant was cultured every year. The percentage of area under cultivation between farm-land and paddy-field, though it was divided in area, was about fifty-fifty on an average. At present, though the farm-land has been nearly converted into the paddy-field, on the cadastral map drawn in 1886 or 1887 there is an example which signifies such a Handa.
Handa was widely distributed in the eastern area of Osaka and the lowland area of central Kawachi. These are generally lower marshy lands, 10 meters above sea-level. So being flooded, the cultivated fields were often completely submerged. In years when precipitation had been little, crops suffered from deficient rain and irrigation water for the paddy-field, and it was the source of many droughts. A newly designed land utilization having its origin in this characteristic of region which sustained damages from both submergence and drought, as a natural result, was “Handa”.
As there grew a greater need for water for irrigation in those areas, since a water-course of the Yamato which was an important river-head for irrigation was replaced a new course in 1704, so that Handa was extensively incorporated as a new practice in those areas though the Handa was already observed in the land register drawn in 1594; that is to say, in opposition to the area under paddy-field in the Handa showed a decrease, area under farm-land increased piece by piece. After 1890, however, area under farmland decreased gradually and nowadays it cannot be seen very clearly. At last it was inverted into paddy-fields. The following two factors are the real reasons why area under farm-land had disappeared: By the pressure of good quality and low-price import raw cotton, cotton culture was agronomically put at a disadvantage and, in addition, the drainage and irrigation facilities had been reformed.

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In the mountanious regions of Central Japan a characteristic house type is wide-spread, which with its shingled, less steep, and two-sided roofs reminds us of chalets in the European Alps. Although the external appearence is nearly the same everywhere in these regions, the plan of houses, i.e., the room arrangement, is more or less different from place to place.
In the southwestern region of Nagano Prefecture, along the upper regions of the Kiso River, Dr.G. Fuzishima, Prof. of Architecture, Tokyo Univ., classified in 1947 two types of the house plan: a) Ontake-type (Fig. 2 and 3) and b) Araragi-type (Fig. 4 and 5). Both types, belong to the Hiromagata-type in general, and present a quite distinct principle of room arrangement. On the other hand, on the left bank of the Hida River, one of the tributaries of the former in the northwest, we found in 1958 another type of house plan, which we should like to call the Takehara-type (Fig. 9).
These three types mentioned above divide their own realm, and come into contact with each other in the Sakashita-Midono region in the upper course of the Kiso River.
Their distribution and nature are not yet decided. However, we may be able to say, at least, that the investigation of the problems might play an important role in the field of study about the geography of rural habitations in Japan.

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