淑き人のよしとよく見てよしと言ひし
吉野よく見よ良き人よく見
吉野よく見よ良き人よく見
- Roma-ji
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Yoki hito no yoshi to yoku mite yoshi to iishi yoshino yoku miyo yoki hito yoku mi
- English Translation
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The good men of old
looked well and found it goodly,
and called it 'good'—so
look well on Yoshino now;
good folk, look well, look well now.
- Meaning
- The worthy people of old looked well at this place, found it good, and called it so—Yoshino. Look well upon Yoshino, all you good people of today; look well!
- Commentary
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Book One Miscellaneous Poems 27
Headnote: "A poem composed by the Emperor when he journeyed to the Yoshino Palace"
On a journey to the Yoshino Palace, Emperor Tenmu calls on the good people of today to look well at Yoshino, the place the worthies of old looked on, found good, and named. Repeating the sounds yoshi, yoku, and yoki eight times in a playful, lilting rhythm, it praises the land of Yoshino. The left note, citing the Nihon Shoki, records a visit to the Yoshino Palace in the fifth month of 679, the eighth year of Emperor Tenmu. On that occasion the Emperor, with the Empress (later Empress Jitō) and six princes including Prince Kusakabe, swore that they would support one another and never quarrel. The poem is thought to have been composed at this so-called Yoshino Pact, and one senses a wish to bind the princes together.
Emperor Tenmu, whose personal name was Prince Ōama, was a son of Emperor Jomei and Empress Kōgyoku (Saimei). After the death of his elder brother Emperor Tenji, he defeated Prince Ōtomo in the Jinshin War, took the throne at the Kiyomihara Palace in Asuka, and laid the foundations of the ritsuryō state.
The first line, "the good men," refers to cultivated people, thought to be the sages of old. The original script uses a variety of characters for yo—淑, 良, 吉, 好—showing playfulness even in the writing.
The second line, "looked well and found it good," stacks the same sounds, yoshi and yoku, to shape the rhythm.
In the third line, "called it good," shi, the attributive of the past ki, modifies Yoshino in the fourth line, making the ancients' calling the place "good" the origin of its name.
The fourth line calls out in the imperative, "look well on Yoshino," and the poem breaks here.
The last line means "good people, look well," mi being taken as "look!" By matching "the good men" of the first line with "good folk" in the last, it links the sages of old with the people of today.
- Author
- Emperor Tenmu
- Source
- Manyoshu
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Utsusemi no inochi o oshimi nami ni nure irago no shima no tamamo kari osu
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Haru sugite natsu kitaru rashi shirotae no koromo hoshitari ame no kaguyama