明清洲田与芦课制度的运行

The Operation of the Reed Marsh Fields and Reed Taxation System of the Ming and Qing Dynasties

明初,在镇江至九江的江洲上就近砍割芦苇,由工部执掌,以上供物料的方式供应朝廷之需。由明迄清,长江中下游的江面芦洲经历三次重大制度调整:第一次,弘治元年(1488),主要针对镇江至九江段芦洲。南京工部设立芦政主事,在剥离各类芦洲后,对大部分芦洲征收芦课,正式确立芦政制度。其间经历芦柴的折银化等过程,芦洲之征亦从上供物料转变为“课”;第二次,嘉靖二十七年(1548),朝廷重新整饬芦政体系,芦课以原额的方式仍由南工部执掌,其他大部分芦洲租课上交户部管理,充作边用,此次清查涵盖整个长江中下游江面芦洲,在此过程中,“洲”变为“洲田”,但由于芦洲仍然保持着官有属性,芦课的“租课”性质并未改变;第三次,自顺治三年(1646)开始,芦课在江宁芦政衙门专司与地方官征解藩司间数度摇摆,至康熙十年(1671),最终形成全归户部管辖,由地方官征解藩司的格局,芦课由“课”转变为“杂赋”。

In the early Ming Dynasty,the reeds,as firewood supplied to the imperial court,were cut in the nearby Yangtze River marshes from Zhenjiang to Jiujiang under the administration of the Ministry of Works.During the Ming and Qing dynasties,three adjustments were made to the administration system of the reed marshes in the middle and lower reaches of the River.The first was made for the reed marshes between Zhenjiang and Jiujiang in 1488,when the Ministry of Works in Nanjing established a reed marsh authority levying reed tax on most reed marshes according to the classification of the reeds,which marked the official establishment of reed marsh administration system.Since then,the reeds supplied to the court were converted to the silver money,and so the reed supply levying was converted into reed“taxation”.Covering the entire middle and lower reaches of the River,the second adjustment in 1548 restructured the administrative system that the Ministry of Works in Nanjing still administered the original reed taxation,and the reed marshes’land rent was mostly handed over to the Ministry of the Revenue to be used as frontier military expenses.Meanwhile,the concept“reed marsh”was changed into“reed marsh field”,but as the reed marshes were still government-administered,the nature of reed tax as land rent remained unchanged.During the third adjustment since 1646,the reed tax collection right swayed between the Jiangning Reed Marsh Administrative Office and the local taxation office several times till 1671,when a new system was established that the latter levied the reed tax under the Ministry of the Revenue,which means that the“land tax”was finally transformed into an“additional tax of the land tax”.