4496

Updated: October 14, 2026

To be able to adapt the Chinese ideographs skilfully to the purposes of written Japanese was a feat achieved by comparatively few. Much richer, however, is the realm of poetry. The compiler's name is not known certainly; he is believed to have been either Tachibana no Moroe or Otomo no Yakamochi. Old manuscripts and popular memory were the sources, and the verselets total 4496, in twenty volumes.

F. (Frank) Brinkley - A History of the Japanese People : From the Earliest Times to the End of the Meiji Era