In the ranks of the Imperial bureaucracy, the Sangi came between the Shōnagon (minor councillors) and those with more narrowly defined roles, such as the Sadaiben and Udaiben who were the administrators charged with oversight of the eight ministries of the government.

[2] In an early review of the Imperial hierarchy, Julius Klaproth's 1834 supplement to Nihon Odai Ichiran conflated the hierarchical position with a functional role as the director of palace affairs.

Any exercise of meaningful powers of court officials in the pre-Meiji period reached its nadir during the years of the Tokugawa shogunate, and yet the core structures of ritsuryō government did manage to endure for centuries.

[6] A dry list provides a superficial glimpse inside the complexity and inter-connected relationships of the Imperial court structure.

The next highest tier of officials were: Other high-ranking bureaucrats who function somewhat flexibly within the Daijō-kan were; The government ministries were eight semi-independent bureaucracies.