THE TAIKWA REFORM. 645-708 A. D. It was in the year 645 A. D. that a small league of supporters of the imperial institutions, under the leadership of two true statesmen, Prince Naka-no-ōye and Nakatomi-no-Kamatari, overthrew the disloyal family of Soga. For the first time in Japanese history, the Chinese system of year-periods was adopted, and the name Taikwa ("Great Change") was applied to the period which began with this year. No more appropriate name could be invented, for the reforms henceforth introduced, known in history as the Taikwa reformation, were of such a sweeping character as to transform within a few years all the fundamental institutions of the central and local administration. The model of the changes was found in the system of politics and society of China, which had lately come under the sway of the dynasty of T'ang, the centralized government and refined civilization of which had excited emulation in the minds of the Japanese reformers. The memorable year 645 A. D. thus marks the beginning of the exhaustive reformation which was completed only after fifty-six years, extending over the reigns of six sovereigns, for it was not till 701 that the celebrated Taihō code of laws brought the work of state reorganization to a close. It would hardly be necessary for us to study the reforms in detail, which brought profound changes upon nearly all the features of national life. The central institution of the new state may be said to be the land system. Formerly, noble families abused the influence of their position and extended their territorial estates so greatly that the commoner was in a state of perpetual eviction. Between the rich and the poor had grown a widening gap. Now the reformers, after their Chinese model, boldly confiscated to the state all the landed estates of private individuals, which they then allotted equally among all the people above the age of six at the rate of two _tan_ for a male and one and one-third _tan_ for a female (a _chō_, or 10 _tan_, at the time being approximately equal to two acres), subject to a redistribution at every sixth year. Naturally neither the periodical redistribution nor the system of equal allotment itself could be long maintained, but the notion that the ownership of land was ultimately vested in the state was not abandoned until the present reign, when the people of all classes were at last allowed to own land.