The Pawprints of History by STANLEY COREN

Author:STANLEY COREN
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: FREE PRESS
Published: 2002-07-15T00:00:00+00:00

There are many other accounts from this period of people who were imprisoned or executed for crimes, actual or alleged, against dogs.

Unfortunately, although the laws were designed for the moral purpose of ending the practice of harming, killing, or abandoning dogs, the results were not what Tsunayoshi had intended. Instead, his Laws of Compassion had triggered an increase in the number of stray dogs roaming the streets of Edo in search of food. Packs of dogs were becoming a nuisance and sometimes were a danger, especially since people felt that they could not beat off threatening dogs without placing their own lives in jeopardy.

By 1695, fifteen years into his reign, the shogun felt that he had to intervene for public safety. Because of his proclamations requiring compassionate treatment of dogs, he was left with few choices. He could not require that the strays be exterminated, since this would suggest that he had been wrong in his initial prohibition of the killing of dogs. So, to protect the public from marauding packs of dogs, he had no alternative other than to house the animals in public kennels. The greatest financial burden that this incurred fell upon the samurai, who were instructed to build the kennels. The upkeep of the dogs was based upon a special tax, called the inu-buchi or “dog ration,” based upon the size of each house’s frontage. Obviously, the wealthy samurai had larger houses and thus paid greater taxes then the common people. As might have been predicted, soon fewer stray dogs were dying due to starvation and injury, so the number of dogs in the city rose dramatically. Within two years, more than forty thousand dogs were housed in the public kennels. Because these dogs were provided with a generous diet and there were now so many of them, the dog tax was quite large and burdensome.

Many of the samurai of the time were becoming very angry at this situation. Supported by taxes themselves, now they were forced to pay taxes to support dogs. To many, this suggested that dogs had been accorded the same status and respect that the samurai were entitled to. In fact, it was even a crime to insult or chastise a dog, unless there was clear proof of the dog’s wrongdoing, and then any form of criticism could only come from its registered owner or the public kennel master. One samurai vented his anger by publicly crucifying a dog, then posting a proclamation next to the corpse claiming that the dog had taken advantage of the shogun’s authority. He maintained that the dog had behaved insolently and without respect to his human superiors and was now receiving a just punishment. The shogun was outraged. An order for the samurai’s arrest was issued, and he tried to flee the city. He was captured near the city gates, and after a trial was ordered to commit seppuku.

As the enforcement of the Laws of Compassion became stricter, the general population actually started to be afraid

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