Man'yoshu—from the holdings of the National Diet Library (1)

摘要

Reiwa is the name of Japan’s current regnal era, which began on May 1, 2019. The name Reiwa was derived from a phrase found in the Man’yoshu, an 8th century anthology of Japanese poetry. This was immediately newsworthy in Japan, because it was the first time that the name of a new regnal era was derived from a Japanese source rather than from classical Chinese literature. The National Diet Library (NDL) holds several different versions of the Man’yoshu as well as a variety of materials related to it, some of which date back to the Edo period. In this article, we take a closer look at some of these historical materials.