Page from Genryaku kohon
manuscript copy of part of the
Man'yoshu (late 12th c.) |
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A large number of poems having to do with Asuka are preserved in the Man'yoshu, Japan's earliest collection of poetry, compiled in the latter half of the 8th century. Some of the poems that have to do with Asuka were composed by such renowned poets as Kakinomoto-no-Hitomaro and Takechi-no-Kurohito, and others were composed by reigning emperors and empresses of the Asuka Period. Those poems which deal specifically with Asuka begin near the very beginning of the anthology with the poem (see above) composed by the Emperor Jomei (593-641) on the occasion of an "inspection of the country" (kunimi) from Ama-no-Kaguyama (one of the "Three Mountains of Yamato," now usually called simply Kaguyama) Many of the poems dealing with Asuka were composed at the time of events and incidents which are also recorded elsewhere in historical sources. Such events include military expeditions to Korea during the reign of the Empress Saimei, various moves of the dynastic residence and the building of the new capital city at Fujiwara, the civil disturbance known as the Jinshin no ran, the uprising of Prince Otsu, and the deaths of various imperial scions. These historically oriented poems, together with the other poems relating affairs of the heart or describing the natural landscape, enable us to come into contact with the consciousness and feelings of the people of that time. In the times during which the poems of the Man'yosho were being written, the seminal germs of Japanese Literature, seen also in the songs and poems included in the Kojiki and Nihon shoki (quasi-historical and historical records compiled in the early 8th century), were in the process of coming to flower. |
