Sasagatani Copper Mine Production Data (1837-1866)[笹ヶ谷銅山生産データ (天保8年-慶応2年,1837-1866)]

The aim of the Sasagatani Copper Mine Production data is to support the pursuit of research on the question of the extent to which the Hori family, who operated the mine from 1837 to 1971, made profits from extracting copper ores in the mine. Available archival data document revenues from the sale of copper ores, while being silent on the costs of production. This makes it impossible to conclude whether or not copper extraction was a profitable enterprise at Sasagatani. Because most of Japan's copper ores mined in West Japan are of comparable quality to that of Sasagatani, as were labor costs and technical capacity of extractive operation, the question of the profitability of copper extraction is of major importance for understanding the political economy of copper mining in 19th-century Japan. This data set is the first step in quantitative analysis of the Hori Family Archives (Tsuwano, Shimane prefecture) in the pursuit of an empirically grounded answer to the above question. Together with a companion data set on transportation costs (due to be deposited in Fall 2026), it will help clarify profit margins or the absence thereof during the period under consideration. The research and production work for this data set was funded by the European Research Council (ERC) through the Horizon 2020 research and innovation program as part of the Beyond Eureka: The Foundations of Japan's Industrialization, 1800-1885 (J-InnovaTech) project directed by Aleksandra Kobiljski (CNRS) under the grant agreement (GA) no. 805098.