On the first floor of Palaceside Building, inside MOTTAINAI STATION & SHOP, is the office of the Mainichi Newspapers Mount Fuji Restoration Campaign. Besides working to have Mount Fuji listed as a World Heritage site, the campaign — with alpinist Ken Noguchi and others — cleans litter on and around the mountain to preserve its beauty.
Lately, talk of a major eruption has put Mount Fuji in the headlines. Its most recent eruption was about 300 years ago, in 1707 (Hoei 4) — the famous Hoei eruption, one of the three great eruptions in recorded history. Over 16 days of intermittent activity, volcanic gravel and ash fell mainly to the east, reaching as far as the Boso Peninsula. In present-day Gotemba and Oyama, Shizuoka Prefecture, ash piled up to three meters, devastating surrounding areas.
The shogunate's recovery measures then draw attention. Unable to cope alone, Odawara domain was placed under direct shogunal control for relief. With finances strained, the following year a tax of two koku (2%) per 100 koku was levied nationwide nominally for ash removal. It was the only purpose-specific tax of the Edo shogunate. Yet of some 400,000 ryo collected, only about 160,000 ryo went to disaster relief; the rest was diverted to shogunal finances. We cannot judge Edo by today's standards, but it resonates with post-quake reconstruction and recent tax debates.
The 2005 draft report of the Central Disaster Management Council's expert panel on passing on disaster lessons mentions this tax, but not that more than half was diverted — perhaps deemed unnecessary to report.