Nenkan (年官)
The term Nenkan means the right to recommend a person to an official post that was granted to Imperial families and court nobles in the ancient/early medieval period in Japan. Under this system, the Retired Emperors, Imperial families and court nobles were given certain official posts every year, invited applicants for the posts in question and recommended one of the applicants to the post in return for the payment of ninryo (fee for getting official post). This system was meant to pay a kind of salary to the above people and started in the early Heian period when such posts were given to sangu (three empresses). It was the sale of official posts, like the jogo system under which temples/shrines and guji (the chief of those who serves a shrine) were given posts for the same purpose. However, this system gradually declined.