A Note on Typology and Evolution of Asian Rice Culture--Toward a Comparative Study of the Historical Development of Rice Culture in Tropical and Temperate Asia--

When I contributed two articles [Tanaka 1987a; 1987b] to a three-volume publication entitled lne no Ajia Ski (Asian History of Rice Culture), I considered the possibility of combin-ing them and comparing the historical develop-ment of rice culture between tropical regions like Southeast Asia and temperate regions like Japan and East Asia from both ecological and historical perspective. After publication, I had the chance to present my views orally at the ninety-eighth meeting of the Kansai Society of Agricultural History under the title of "Evolu-tion of Rice Culture-Southeast Asia and East Asia, " where I discussed the interrelationship between natural environment and rice-growing technologies in the two regions and presented some viewpoints for regional comparison of his-torical development in Asian rice culture. This article is principally based on the discus-sion at this meeting and aims to present a framework for comparing evolutional processes of Asian rice-growing techniques from ecohis-torical perspectives. I "Agronomic Adaptation " and "Technological Adaptation&quot