SOURCE: “Tamekane's Life: The First Rise and Fall,” in Kyōgoku Tamekane: Poetry and Politics in Late Kamakura Japan, Stanford University Press, 1989, pp. 19-40.

[In the following excerpt, Huey discusses Abutsu's position in the conflicts between Tameie's heirs.]

To some degree Tamekane's problems were not of his own creation but repercussions of events that occurred a half-century earlier, in the days of his great-grandfather and grandfather. Tamekane's great-grandfather was the illustrious Fujiwara Teika, recognized as a poetic genius in his lifetime and practically deified by succeeding generations. His grandfather was Teika's only legitimate son, Tameie.¹

Much as Teika had wished to pass on his poetic knowledge (and his land rights) to his son, Tameie at first showed little inclination for verse; he seemed to prefer kemari (a kind of kickball). Indeed, members of the Mikohidari house, Teika's branch of the Fujiwara family, were almost as famous for their kemari skills as for their poetry. But gradually Tameie developed into a competent and prolific poet. Though he never attained his father's level of greatness, many of his poems were quite good, even innovative, and as Teika's heir, he was considered the poetic sage of his day.

In 1248 Retired Emperor Go-Saga commissioned him alone to compile an imperial anthology, although often such works were compiled by committees. The result of his efforts was Shokugosenshū (Later Collection Continued). In 1259 Go-Saga again requested him to put together a collection, but this time, on the petition of several rival poets, the Bakufu compelled the Retired Emperor to include them (one was the Shogun's own poetry teacher) in the commission. They completed their anthology, Shokukokinshū (Collection of Ancient and Modern Times Continued), in 1265.

The events surrounding the commissioning of these two anthologies foreshadowed the problems that Tamekane would encounter in a later day. Over the centuries imperial commissions had been in some sense a barometer of poetic activity. If an anthology was given to just one poet to compile, it was a good indication that he either was clearly the superior poet of his day, or was a favorite of the Emperor or Retired Emperor. When a committee was chosen, it usually meant that the various poetic schools were of roughly equal skill and / or political influence.

With the establishment of the Kamakura Bakufu, the situation had become even more complicated. Many in Kamakura took an active interest in poetry, and the military government was not above intervening in imperial anthologies, as they did in the case of Shokukokinshū. An even more dramatic case had occurred several decades earlier. When Teika was compiling Shinchokusenshū (New Collection of Ancient and Modern Times) in the early 1230's, the Bakufu forced him to remove roughly one hundred poems by such political enemies as Retired Emperors Go-Toba and Juntoku, who had been among the anti-Bakufu forces during the Jōkyū Disturbance of 1221 and had subsequently been exiled for life.² Although the odds are overwhelming that none of the excised poems had even subtle political content, the Bakufu seemed reluctant to allow their enemies the prestige of a voice.

Tameie sired at least five sons by three wives. … Tameuji and Tamenori were born of his first, and principal, wife, as was another son, Genshō, who became a monk at the age of twenty. After this wife died, and after Tameie had taken the tonsure in 1256, his new mistress, whom he had met in 1253, bore him Tamesuke and Tamemori. This woman, Ankamon-in Shijō, is better known now by her clerical name, the Nun Abutsu. A fifth son, Tameaki, was of a different mother.³

In a fascinating twist of history, the problems that ensued when Go-Saga came to favor a later son over his first-born were echoed a few decades later in the Mikohidari house. In 1256 Tameie, stricken with what he thought was a terminal illness, took the tonsure and settled his estate, willing the most important part to his eldest son, Tameuji. This included both proprietary and jitō rights to Hosokawa-shō (modern-day Hyōgo Prefecture), from which the Mikohidari house derived much of its income. [Jitō rights were usually reserved for Kamakura vassals. But the Bakufu had awarded them to Teika for, among other things, his service as poetry teacher to the Shogun Sanetomo (1192-1219). Having both proprietary and jitō rights to an estate amounted to virtually absolute control over its income.] It also included the library that Shunzei and Teika had accumulated. This consisted of rare early manuscripts, copies that Teika had made of important literary works, and many of Teika's own critical writings, as well as things Tameie, himself considered a poetry master, had collected or written. The possessor of these documents could claim to be Teika's true poetic heir—all the more so because many of the writings were secret.⁴

Brower and Miner suggest that “Tameie and Japanese Court poetry might have passed serenely into extinction had he not … taken to wife a most remarkable woman, commonly known by the religious name she took after his death, the Nun Abutsu (d. ca. 1283).”⁵ And Ishida Yoshisada maintains that if there had been no Abutsu, rivalries would probably never have developed among Tameie's descendants.⁶ Both observations are overstated. They ignore, among other things, the abrasive personalities of several of the other participants in the family dispute and the very real literary differences among them. It is fair to say, however, that the union of Abutsu and Tameie was to have far-reaching consequences.

Tamekane was the offspring of Tameie's second son, Tamenori, and his principal wife, who also bore him a daughter, Tameko. Tameko appears to have been the elder of the two, though this is a matter of some dispute, since her dates are not known.⁷ Tamekane was born in 1254.

Tamekane's mother is a shadowy figure, but it appears that her family had served the Saionji house and the Jimyō-in line of the imperial family.⁸ Tamenori's connection to the Saionji family is clear enough. Teika's principal wife had been one of Saionji Kintsune's daughters. It was she who gave birth to Tameie.⁹ Thus Kintsune was one of Tamenori's great-grandfathers.

Tamekane's progress through court ranks and offices in his early years was normal for one of his station. At the age of five he entered the service of Retired Emperor Go-Fukakusa, where he stayed until he was twenty-five.¹⁰ He also had close ties with the Saionji house. As Emperor Hanazono noted in his diary: “In Tamekane's youth he was supported by the Lay Priest and Prime Minister Sanekane, and was treated more or less as a retainer.”¹¹

One other notable event marked Tamekane's early life. In 1270, at the age of seventeen by the Japanese count, he moved in with his grandfather Tameie and began to study poetry under him. Tameko joined them. They continued their studies with their grandfather until his death in 1275, though they did not live with him through all those years.¹² Tameie appears to have entrusted the brother and sister with what at that time would have been considered privileged teachings, for Tamekane says in his diary that he and Tameko used special texts of Kokinshū (one in Teika's own hand), with marginal notes by Tameie, to instruct Fushimi, Go-Fushimi, and Eifukumonin. Although the texts themselves probably came from Tamekane's uncle Tamesuke (as will be discussed later), Tamekane goes on to say, “The two of us told of traditions that had been passed down to us by Tameie during the Bun'ei era [1264-75].”¹³

Tamekane began to come into his own after Fushimi became Crown Prince in 1275. By the autumn of 1276 he had made sufficient name for himself as a poet to be included at two palace poetry parties. One was the Kameyama Jōkō Sentō Kangen Wakakai (Priestly Retired Emperor Kameyama's Music and Poetry Party at the Sentō Palace), held on the nineteenth day of the eighth month. If he submitted any poetry at that party, it is no longer extant. On the thirteenth day of the following month, he attended the Dairi Goshu Utakai (Palace Five-Poem Poetry Party), at which Retired Emperor Kameyama called on each of the participants to submit five poems. Ishida cites two poems that appear in later imperial anthologies, and based on their headnotes and attributions, he argues that they are among the five Tamekane submitted at this gathering.¹⁴ As probably Tamekane's earliest known public works, they are worth nothing here:

SGSS 345. From among the five poems read on the thirteenth night, ninth month, second year of Kenji [1276]

… Sky clears
Around the moon
As it climbs brightly;
Off on distant mountain's edge
Floating clouds linger.

SSZS 1578. On One Mind, from five poems composed upon request at the palace on the thirteenth night, ninth month, second year of Kenmu. [Ishida (“Kyōgoku Tamekane,” pp. 281-82) notes that some scholars argue that the date here (Kenmu 2, or 1335) means Tamekane must have lived beyond 1332, the year Emperor Hanazono, among others, claims he died. But Ishida maintains that this is a copyist's error, and the reign year should read Kenji. In fact the Nihon Bungaku Nempyō gives no indication that there was any poetry gathering in the palace on Kenmu 2 ix 13 (Ichiko, p. 111).]

… How fleeting!
Our parting on that twilight dawn
Now past—
I did not imagine
It would be our final one.

Neither of these poems is particularly distinguished, and one finds little hint of Tamekane's later style. Perhaps this is why the conservatives who compiled the anthologies in which they appear found them acceptable.

In 1278 came further indications that Tamekane was being taken seriously as a poet. At a poetry party on the twenty-first day of the first month, he attended in the role of “poetry adviser.”¹⁵ More significantly, later that year he was asked, along with other respected poets of the day, to submit a one-hundred-poem sequence to be used as source material for an imperial anthology commissioned by Kameyama and compiled by his uncle Tameuji.¹⁶ This anthology, Shokushūishū (Collection of Gleanings Continued), was formally presented at the end of 1278 and included two poems by Tamekane, as well as three by Tameko. This marked the first time either brother or sister had been published in an imperial collection.

Tamekane's two poems are quoted here, since they are the earliest of his verses included in an imperial anthology:

ShokuSIS 976. Topic unknown

… I shall not forget
That midnight vision
Faintly seen
By moonlight filtered
Through broken mists.

ShokuSIS 1167. From a one-hundred-poem sequence submitted for consideration

… Even as I ponder
The flow of generations
Through which we served,
The burden of Seki's Fuji River
Now falls upon myself.

The second poem is an interesting piece of complexity that sheds some light on Tamekane's character. “Seki's Fuji River” refers to Teika's famous work the Fujikawa Hyakushu (Fujikawa One-Hundred Poem Sequence).¹⁷ Like so many of Teika's sequences, this one was regarded as a model and was emulated by generations of later poets, including Tameie and Abutsu. The title of the sequence is derived from its opening poem:

… Long-awaited,
Spring has come
To Seki's Fuji River.
Yet in deep mists the river sobs,
Still blocked beneath by ice.

Tamekane has preserved the imagery, much of the vocabulary, and the concessive structure of the earlier poem. But while Teika's poem was a scenic description, Tamekane's is an allegory. On the surface the poem says merely that the poet is moved by the coming of spring to Fuji River to ponder the passing of time—and his illustrious ancestor. But his use of the word tsukaekoshi (“to have served”) signals a deeper meaning. The reference is to the Mikohidari house's service as “court poets” to a succession of Emperors. The last two lines imply that Tamekane considers himself heir to Teika's poetic legacy, or at least feels a sense of responsibility to his heritage. In light of this it might seem surprising that Tameuji would include such a brash poem in Shokushūishū, particularly one by the son of his brother and rival, Tamenori, though Ikeda Tomizō, among others, notes that the dispute between the brothers did not really become serious until after Shokushūishū, or indeed, because of it.¹⁸

Up to this point in Tamekane's literary life, Retired Emperor Kameyama was the center of poetic activity.¹⁹ But fissures were beginning to develop in the world of poetry, and the tensions that led to them had begun some years before. When, in 1263, forty years after the birth of his first son, Tameie had a son by Abutsu, he rewrote his will, leaving the proprietary and jitō rights to Hosokawa-shō, and the extensive poetic document collection, to Abutsu's son, Tamesuke. Tameuji and Tamenori were willed, respectively, residences at Nijō Avenue and Kyōgoku Street, from which they and their descendants derived their surnames when the Mikohidari house split. Tamesuke and his descendants took the name Reizei, after the residence that Tamesuke was given on Tameie's death.

Naturally, Tameuji was not happy about this turn of events, and a bitter inheritance dispute ensued when Tameie died in 1275. Literary historians might assume that the heart of the matter was the invaluable literary collection Tamesuke stood to inherit. But it was no easier making a living as a poet then than now, and what most concerned the disputants at the time were undoubtedly the rights to Hosokawa-shō. The situation they faced was this: according to imperial court law, one could will one's estate to whomever one wished (it need not be the eldest son), but once the will was made it could not be changed; Bakufu law, on the other hand, recognized one's right to change a will.

Abutsu saw that the best chances for a settlement in favor of her son, Tamesuke, were with the Bakufu. Not only did the Bakufu permit the changing of a will, but it was Kamakura that granted or rescinded jitō rights. These were in general more important (which is to say lucrative) in this period than proprietary rights, over which the imperial court had jurisdiction. Thus, in 1279 Abutsu set off to Kamakura to plead her case.

Where did Tamenori stand in this dispute? As second son, he probably never expected any major inheritance for himself. From that standpoint he had no apparent reason to take sides. But in fact by 1279 (the year he died, and the year Abutsu went to Kamakura), he and Tameuji were at bitter odds over poetry. They excluded each other from poetry contests at their homes,²⁰ and just months before he died, Tamenori wrote an angry letter to the Bureau of Poetry, protesting that his children, Tamekane and Tameko, had been slighted by Tameuji in the Shokushūishū. Years later, Tameuji's son, Tameyo, claimed that Tamenori's untimely death in the fifth month of 1279 was divine retribution for this letter of protest, which constituted the breaking of an oath of allegiance Tamenori had sworn to the Nijō house in 1278.²¹ In fact, there was much to criticize about Shokushūishū, which Masukagami (a narrative history, or rekishi monogatari, of the Kamakura period, completed by 1376 and often attributed to the renga master Nijō Yoshimoto) dismissed as “an imitation of Shokukokinshū; one would be hard put to find its rival for mediocrity.”²² There is no denying that the collection favored the poets of the Nijō school.

In 1280 Tamekane was taken into the service of Crown Prince Fushimi as one of the Prince's poetry teachers.²³ From that point on, his life was inextricably tied to the vicissitudes of the Jimyō-in line. And it is here that his career as a poet and politician really began. Through the next decade, his star rose rapidly, both as a poet and as a courtier. Fushimi's growing affection and respect for him can be seen in an incident related in Nakatsukasa no Naishi Nikki, a diary kept by one of Fushimi's ladies-in-waiting.²⁴ It took place on the nineteenth day of the fourth month, 1283. Tamekane had been away from the palace for some time, possibly in seclusion for some political misdeed. On this spring evening Fushimi missed him and was moved to send him a poem, a rare honor for one as low in rank as Tamekane was at that time.²⁵ Fushimi clearly had a high opinion of Tamekane's aesthetic sensibilities and believed that he alone would understand the Crown Prince's feelings. Besides sending Fushimi a suitable reply poem, Tamekane also exchanged poems—including his only known chōka (literally, “long poem”) [*A chōka is a poem of indeterminate length, with alternating lines of five and seven syllables, ending with an extra seven-syllable line and usually followed by one or more envoy-like tanka. In formal collections the form had more or less gone out of style by the Heian period, although it was still sometimes used in correspondence and laments. In discussing this passage, modern Japanese scholars do not deal with the chōka at all. One would have expected such a thing to be of at least historical interest, but perhaps this is an indication of just how inconsequential Japanese scholars consider this long form to be except as it is found in Man'yōshū.]—with two other courtiers.

By this time, too, the lines in the family dispute among Tameie's heirs were firmly drawn. Tamekane and Tameko were both in the service of Fushimi and had thus cast their lot with the Jimyō-in line. They had also grown close to Abutsu, who was still in Kamakura pleading her son's case before the Bakufu. In her diary Izayoi Nikki (Diary of the Waning Moon), we find some sympathetic poems on the topic of travel that she exchanged with Tamekane and Tameko back in the capital:²⁶

Tameko

… Across the distance
My thoughts reach out to you
In traveler's robes;
I wonder how you fare, sleeves wet
With tears and early winter rain.

Abutsu's reply

Just ponder awhile
These drops on my sleeves
… As I push through mountain paths,
Tears, or dew, or winter rains—
They're all as one.

Tamekane

… You left your home
With early winter rains
Soaking your traveler's robes.
Now it must be freezing snow
That gathers ever deeper on them.

Abutsu's reply

… Wind off the bay blows cold
On the lining of my traveler's robes
In this the Tenth Month.
From early winter rain clouds
Now snow is falling, too.

This moral support must have been comforting to Abutsu, for she did not seem to have many friends in the capital at the time. When Tameie died in 1275, she had hidden away some of his literary documents, apparently fearing that initial decisions in favor of Nijō Tameuji might deprive her son of this valuable library. It seems this was no secret in Kyoto, for several contemporary or near-contemporary sources make note of it. For example, Tameie's son Genshō claims in his Genshō Waka Kuden (Genshō's Oral Teachings on Waka; ca. 1294) that shortly after his father's death, Abutsu hid some important literary documents, including things written in Teika's hand.²⁷ Some thirty years later Tameyo makes the same charge in the Enkyō Ryōkyō Sochinjō.²⁸

Sometime after Abutsu's arrival in Kamakura, Retired Emperor Kameyama, who was jisei no kimi at the time, ordered her to turn over to Nijō Tameuji the documents she was holding back.²⁹ But she only partially complied, withholding many of the more precious documents and padding the collection with forgeries.³⁰ The material she withheld evidently became the nucleus of the Reizei family library, which remained secret until 1981, when the descendants of Tamesuke opened their storehouse, called the Shigure-tei, and turned its holdings over to the Heian Museum in Kyoto.³¹ The dispute over these documents exacerbated the growing antagonism among Teika's descendants.

Also fueling the antagonism was the fact that a poetry group had begun to form in Crown Prince Fushimi's court, with Fushimi, Eifukumon-in, Tamekane, Tameko, and Saionji Sanekane at its center. Shino Hiroshi marks a poetry contest held in 1285, called the Kōan Hachinen Shigatsu Uta-awase (Poetry Contest in the Fourth Month of the Eighth Year of Kōan), as the first exclusively “Kyōgoku” poetry contest. The participants were Tamekane, Minamoto Tomoaki, the sponsor (called by the court title Dayū in the text, but probably Sanekane), and Tameko, here identified only by the title Gon-chūnagon no Tsubone.³² These poets, however, were still experimenting. As Iwasa Miyoko notes, their early efforts are not at all like the style we now associate with the Kyōgoku school, and indeed “can hardly be thought of as poems.”³³

Still, two of Tamekane's early poems, one informal and one formal, show the direction he was taking. The first example is one of a great number of draft poems by various Kyōgoku poets (including 244 by Tamekane) discovered on the back of the original manuscript of Kanmon Gyoki, a fifteenth-century diary by Prince Gosukō-in:³⁴

… Well, now!
Of this morning's fallen snow
I should like to ask
Where have we a sign
Of spring's arrival?

Two things are immediately apparent about this poem. One is its conversational, prosaic tone, and the other is the ji-amari, or extra syllable, albeit a quasi-elision, in the last line. The ji-amari is frequently encountered in more mature Kyōgoku poems, as is deliberately prosaic wording, which belies somewhat Iwasa's contention that the discovery of these poems dramatically alters traditional perceptions of the Kyōgoku style.³⁵

The second poem is from the poetry contest held in the fourth month in the fourth month of 1285. …

… Alone the night through,
Exhausted by thoughts of love
Till it grows light;
Cruel the drumming sound
Of ceaseless rain.

This poem is more conventional than the other, though it, too, features a weak (that is, consisting of consecutive identical vowels) ji-amari, here in the second line. Hitori ite (translated as “alone”) is also an unusual phrase, particularly as a first line.³⁶

The 1280's, then, were the formative years for the Kyōgoku group. Crown Prince Fushimi's court provided a kind of salon in which these like-minded poets could practice their art. Tamekane gradually emerged as the master, and sometime between 1285 and 1287 he wrote the poetic treatise that is the only extant critical work of the Kyōgoku group—Tamekanekyō Wakashō.³⁷

Scholars differ on what prompted Tamekane to write this treatise. Ishida, among others, suggests that it was meant to commemorate Fushimi's accession to the throne in 1287.³⁸ If so, it could be thought of as a kind of “declaration of principles” for the new Kyōgoku school. Others, like Tsugita Kasumi and Iwasa Miyoko, maintain that it is primarily an anti-Nijō tract, motivated by the growing antagonism between Tamekane and Tameyo as representatives of their respective schools of poetry.³⁹

These explanations are of course not mutually exclusive. In fact, as we shall see later, the treatise does take a theoretical stand toward the writing of poetry and in that sense can be seen as a declaration of principles; but it is also quite polemic in places, understandably so, since the principles it espouses run counter to the prevailing attitudes of the time. The important point for present purposes is that in writing this work, Tamekane emerged as the spokesman for the Kyōgoku school.

With Fushimi's accession to the throne, Tamekane the politician also began to come into his own. His court promotions, which up until then had been orderly if not especially rapid, began to come more quickly. In terms of offices he rose in quick steps from Middle Captain of the Left to Head Chamberlain (1288), Consultant (1289), Commander of the Gate Guards (of the Right and the Left, both 1290), and Provisional Middle Counselor (mid-1291).⁴⁰ By contrast Nijō Tameyo, who had progressed somewhat faster than Tamekane in his early years, was not promoted at all during this period.⁴¹ Tamekane also climbed one full court rank in this period, to Senior Third Rank. And in 1292 he was promoted again, to Junior Second Rank.

In the seventh month of 1293 he was sent as an imperial messenger to Ise Shrine to deliver Fushimi's prayers for the protection of the country (there had been earthquakes and fires that seemed to bode ill) and to offer up thirty of the Emperor's poems to the gods. The importance of the mission can be judged from the fact that every night of Tamekane's absence, Fushimi prayed fervently in the palace shrine.⁴²

Two entries from Fushimi's diary shed light on the relationship between him and Tamekane during these years:

1289 i 13—… Lord Tamekane's resolve is inexhaustible and unmatched. His greatest virtue is his devoted service to the throne.

1292 i 19—[Fushimi had just related a very auspicious dream and had asked rhetorically whether anyone else had had such a fortuitous vision.] Lord Tamekane then said, “On the first of this month I dreamt that there were three pine trees on a mountainside and that I opened my mouth and swallowed them. I believe they represent the three prayers that I have. One is that I be able to serve my lord forever. One is that lord and retainer remain united and never turn their backs on each other. And one is that I discover the principle of non-birth [i.e., Nirvana]. Were not the three pine trees in my dream an auspicious sign?”⁴³

Those of a less-charitable nature might accuse Tamekane of sycophancy, or at least one-upsmanship. Yet Fushimi, who was by no means a fool, accepted his sincerity. The remark about Nirvana gives a hint of Tamekane's religious inclinations. Though he does not appear to have been pious to any boring degree, it is evident from this and from the obituary in Hanazono's diary that he was a serious student of the Buddhist Dharma, particularly its relationship to poetry, and in this he reflected the increasing tendency in medieval Japan to view art as a religious practice.

A further mark of Fushimi's esteem came in the eighth month of 1293, shortly after Tamekane's return from Ise, when he was asked to join Nijō Tameyo, Asukai Masaari, and Kujō Takahiro in drawing up plans for another imperial anthology. [*The Asukai branch of the Fujiwara family produced a series of fine poets and scholars from the time of Shinkokinshū. During this period its members maintained close ties with the Bakufu without compromising their standing in Kyoto. Masaari (1241-1301) was especially known for his expertise in Genji Monogatari. Although related by marriage to the Nijō house, he appears to have steered a neutral course through the disputes of his day. Kujō Takahiro (d. 1298) was not one of the best poets of his day, though he had been asked to submit poems during the time of the Kōan Hyakushu. My account of this committee's deliberations is from Ishida, “Kyōgoku Tamekane,” pp. 287-89; and Fushimi Tennō Shinki, entry for Einin 1 (1293) viii 27, in Shiryō Taisei, vol. 34, pp. 326-27.] Each of these four men was the leader of a major poetry group.

Although Fushimi did not pack the committee with Kyōgoku poets, it is significant that he chose Tamekane to serve at all at so early a stage in his poetry career. There is no questioning Fushimi's loyalty to the Kyōgoku style. But as a group the Kyōgoku school was less than ten years old, whereas the other three schools could claim generations of history. Fushimi could hardly ignore Tameyo, for the Nijō house was, legally at least, the main branch of Teika's descendants. Yet obviously Tamekane and Tameyo could not be expected to work smoothly together, for Tameyo was the eldest son of Tameuji, who had so bitterly feuded with Tamekane's father. The addition of the other two men, then, served at once to balance the committee, to bring the presumably moderating influence of older men to the deliberations (Masaari was fifty-three, and Takahiro seventy-two), and, possibly, to give Fushimi an excuse for including Tamekane.

From the very start the committee's deliberations did not go smoothly. First, Masaari had to withdraw because of illness, though Fushimi left him on the committee so as to maintain the carefully selected balance. Beyond that, at Fushimi's insistence the committee had to resolve four problems before it could formally begin the anthology. One was deciding whether the formal commission should be issued in the eighth month, the ninth month, or the tenth month. Tameyo favored the tenth month because Gosenshū (Later Collection; mid-10th century) had been commissioned in that month. Tamekane reviewed in detail all the previous imperial anthologies and noted that there was no pattern in the timing of their commissioning. He and Takahiro maintained that the month and day of the formal commission did not matter.

The second problem was even more arcane, having to do with whether the formal order should be written or presented in person to the compilers. All agreed that precedent dictated that it should be a written order. The third problem concerned the eras to be represented in the collection. This was the most significant theoretical issue the committee faced, and not surprisingly Tameyo and Tamekane disagreed over it. Tameyo argued that since the best of the ancient poems had already appeared in imperial collections, theirs should include poems only from the late Heian period on. Tamekane held that since in recent years all poets had begun to imitate the ancients, it would be better to include poetry from the earliest period on. Takahiro again agreed with him.

The final problem was again rather esoteric. As we saw in the case of the Kōan Hyakushu, it had become the practice to call for hundred-poem sequences from all important poets when an imperial anthology was to be compiled. The question was whether this call should be made before or after the anthology had been formally commissioned. On this the committee was agreed that no clear precedent applied.

Fushimi reviewed the committee's deliberations and sided with Tamekane on all the debated points. On the very same day, the twenty-seventh of the eighth month, he formally ordered the anthology, noting that poems from earlier eras were to be considered, provided they had not appeared in other imperial anthologies. He specifically excepted Man'yōshū (Collection for Ten Thousand Generations), apparently on the grounds that it was not actually an imperial anthology. There was a move to add Tamesuke to the list of compilers, but it was blocked by Tameyo, who filed a formal protest and countered that his own son, Tamemichi, ought to be included. Fushimi resolved the matter by reconfirming the original four.

Not surprisingly, the project was never completed. Tameyo, chafing at his less-than-dominant role, declined the commission. Tamekane, as noted earlier, was forced to resign his court offices and go into seclusion in 1296, and was exiled to Sado Island two years later. Takahiro died in 1298, and Masaari in 1301. Fushimi lamented the failure of the undertaking in a famous poem in which he puns on the place-name Waka no Ura (literally, Poetry Bay) to suggest that the failure of his plans for a poetry collection resulted in a situation as bleak as a shoreline without birds. The poem is quoted in Masukagami:⁴⁴

… In ages to come
Shall my reign always bear
The desolate mark
Of one in which plovers of verse
Failed to gather in Poetry Bay?

Although the commission was never fulfilled, the entire process showed that Tamekane was now a poetic force to be reckoned with. Further indication of this came in 1295, with a polemic entitled Nomori no Kagami (Reflections in a Field Guard's Mirror). Although often attributed to Rokujō Arifusa (1251-1319), its authorship has not been definitively established.⁴⁵ In any case, it is a bitter attack on Tamekane's approach to poetics and poetry. Interestingly, the work's criticism is couched in anti-Zen, anti-Jōdo, pro-Tendai religious terms. In other words its religious stance is as orthodox as its poetic one.

The section relevant to our concern consists of a six-point analysis of Tamekane's poetry set in paradoxical, prescriptive terms. Under each of the six headings, the author—be it Arifusa (whose name I will use here for the sake of convenience) or some unidentified Tendai priest, as scholars now tend to believe—discusses where Tamekane falls short and gives examples of poetry he considers successful. Briefly, the six points, and a paraphrase of the arguments supporting them, are as follows:⁴⁶

1. “Poetry takes the heart as its seed, and it does not take the heart as its seed.” Arifusa argues that the human heart is really two: good and evil. Poetry should express the good heart by being “interesting and gentle, and staying away from the common.” Tamekane does not try to make his language beautiful; he just narrates.

2. “Poetry bares the heart, and it does not bare the heart.” Arifusa likens poetry to a painted screen. It is not enough merely to paint a scene faithfully; if the screen has no structure, it will not stand by itself. Tamekane's poetry merely “bares the heart,” without making it beautiful or giving it good structure.

3. “Poetry moves away from words, and it does not move away from words.” By this Arifusa means that poetry should avoid vulgar language and embrace traditional language. Tamekane does just the opposite.

4. “Poetry embraces classical beauty, and it does not embrace beauty.” Arifusa likens writing poetry to weaving a brocade. One interweaves classical beauty with a modern consciousness. Tamekane is concerned only with the modern consciousness; thus his poems lack classical beauty.

5. “The poet learns form, and he does not learn form.” All good poetry conforms to traditionally acceptable form, even though not all good poetry sounds alike. Tamekane does not even adhere to classical form.

6. “Poetry reflects the old styles, and it does not reflect the old styles.” Here Arifusa means that good poetry reflects the spirit of Kokinshū, but not the spirit of Man'yōshū. Tamekane is only enamored of the latter.

Nomori no Kagami is accurate to some degree in its analysis of the Kyōgoku style.⁴⁷ It does indeed describe the sharp differences in poetic practice between Tamekane and his more conservative contemporaries. Furthermore, the work is of particular significance as an indication of how great a threat Tamekane's opponents perceived him to be in the field of poetry.

But the Kyōgoku poets were not to be denied. In 1297 they gathered for a poetry contest that was to establish them once and for all as a distinct school. It is known as the Einin Gonen Hachigatsu Jūgoya Uta-awase (Poetry Contest on the Fifteenth Night of the Eighth Month of the Fifth Year of Einin). It is uncertain whether Tamekane participated, but Fushimi, Eifukumon-in, Tameko, and other Kyōgoku poets were among the contestants. If Tamekane did take part, it would not have been under his own name or title, since he was then in enforced seclusion.

In politics, too, Tamekane was having, if not making, problems. Time was nearing to look ahead to Go-Fushimi's accession and decide on the next Crown Prince. Tamekane lobbied for the Jimyō-in line. But Sanekane, despite his ties to that line, needed to improve relations with the Daikaku-ji line in his role as liaison between court and Bakufu. Indeed, his intervention eventually led to a compromise by which Go-Nijō was named Crown Prince in 1298. Naturally, this brought him into conflict with Tamekane's “resolve” and “devoted service to the throne.” Politically, Tamekane was no match; though the two men remained on the same side when it came to poetry, the relationship between them was seriously damaged.⁴⁸

On the seventh day of the first month of 1298, Tamekane and two others were arrested by the Bakufu authorities stationed at Rokuhara in Kyoto. The reason given in historical records is that the three were involved in a “plot” (inbō). Honchō Tsugan (An Almanac of Our Court), a history of Japan compiled in 1670, is more specific. It says that Fushimi secretly ordered Tamekane to help him overthrow the Bakufu,⁴⁹ but this work was compiled over 350 years after the fact and provides no proof for its claim. The explanation Hanazono gives in his obituary of Tamekane seems quite adequate: that Tamekane, carried away with his influence as a poet, began meddling in politics and made enemies. It is likely that whatever he had done two years earlier to cause his “house arrest” was enough to lead eventually to his outright arrest. Considering that the tide had turned toward the Daikaku-ji line, as evidenced by Go-Nijō's appointment as Crown Prince just a few months after the arrest, it is hardly surprising that Tamekane should end up in such deep trouble.

The question of whether Tamekane's interference caused the shift in favor of the Daikaku-ji line or whether the growing influence of the Daikaku-ji line caused Tamekane's downfall will probably never be answered, but given that even his strong partisan Hanazono recognized Tamekane's ability to alienate people, Tamekane probably brought much of this trouble on himself.

Whatever the truth of the matter, Tamekane was exiled to Sado Island two months later, in the third month of 1298,⁵⁰ and this punishment he endured for five years. The Nō dramatist Zeami, in his Kintōsho (Writings from the Isle of Gold), relates a touching story about a poem Tamekane is supposed to have composed when he heard the hototogisu (cuckoo) sing at Yahata Shrine on Sado Island. Zeami, himself in exile, asked the shrine attendant why the hototogisu did not sing at this particular shrine and was told that long ago Tamekane had composed a poem there asking the birds to leave because their song made him long for Kyoto:⁵¹

… When you call I hear you.
When I hear you I miss
The capital.
So please pass by this place,
O mountain cuckoo!

Charming as this story is, the poem is not found among Tamekane's works and is probably a local legend. Even so, the tale does relate a certain truth about the loneliness of exile.

There is also a collection of poems called Tamekanekyō Kashū (literally, Tamekane's House Collection) containing a number of poems on the subject of exile to Sado. Despite the title, this is not a collection Tamekane assembled, but a late-fifteenth-century compilation.⁵² Tamekane did, however, produce a few works of interest, if not surpassing literary merit, during or shortly after his exile. One was the Tamekanekyō Shika Hyakushu (Lord Tamekane's 100-Poem Sequence on Deer). This sequence consists of the standard categories of the four seasons, love, and miscellaneous poems,⁵³ but there is an added touch: each and every poem contains the word deer (shika) in it, hence the title. As might be expected, the novelty wears off rather quickly, yet the sequence is not without its successful verses. Two are given here, one from among the spring poems, and one from the love poems:⁵⁴

Cuckoo

… As I make my way along,
Hoping for a chance to hear
The cuckoo's voice,
There beneath my feet
Are tracks from a deer gone ahead.

Mountain Hut

… Wind through pines,
The sound of a deer's cry—
To hear them is to grieve.
As sad as this floating world
My hut in the mountain's shadow.

At least thirteen of the poems mention Kasuga in Nara, a natural enough association between the deer theme and the deer park at Kasuga. Tamekane notes in his diary that on the sixth day of the tenth month of 1303 (after his return to Kyoto), he dedicated the sequence to Kasuga Shrine. According to a marginal note in the Gunsho Ruijū text of the sequence, “Lord Tamekane had a dream about the Kasuga Shrine, whereupon he composed these hundred poems in one sitting and dedicated them to the Shrine.” Hamaguchi Muneaki and Ogawa Machiko dismiss this as “dramatization.” On the basis of the text of the diary, they argue that Tamekane composed the poems in Sado and then decided to dedicate them to the shrine as a result of a dream he had after he came back to Kyoto.⁵⁵ In any event 1301 is the most likely date of composition, since several of the poems make reference to three years having passed since the poet last saw the capital.

During his years in Sado Tamekane also produced several elaborate acrostics, of which three have survived. One is a set of thirty-one poems in which the initial syllables of the five lines make a thirty-second poem, and the final syllables make a thirty-third. Both of the poems so produced deal with the theme of exile:⁵⁶

“Sometime
We shall meet again,”
I pledged,
Donning the sacred mulberry sash.
Now it is up to the gods.
I've always relied
On the waters of the Kamo River,
But now …
If they should cease like this
Shall I then blame the gods?

“The waters of the Kamo River” in the second poem is presumably an allusion to Kamo no Wakeikazuchi no Mikoto, the main deity of the Upper Kamo Shrine in Kyoto and its branch on Sado Island. The Kamo Shrine had a long association with the capital and the imperial family, whose protection Tamekane had “always relied on.”⁵⁷

This set of poems has some other interesting features. To begin with, the poems are arranged like a proper anthology, moving through the four seasons, love, and finally, miscellaneous topics. In addition, Tamekane has linked each poem to the following one by using the first poem's last syllable as the first syllable in line five of the next, and so on through the set. And finally, the first four lines of each poem can be lined up to form a chōka.

Another acrostic is a set of twelve poems in which the initial sylables of the five lines spell out Amida Butsu (the Amitabha Budha). The poems can be laid out with five verses running vertically (top to bottom), five running horizontally (right to left), and the other two running diagnoally from right to left and left to right. The syllables at each intersection are shared by the poems that intersect there (see the accompanying diagram). Though the topics are mixed, some take the loneliness of separation as their theme, as in this poem (in which the B of “Butsu” is read in the voiced form F, so that the acrostic appears as “A-Mi-Ta-Fu-Tsu”):⁵⁸

… In my traveler's robes
I'm weary of this road
To the East.
I long now for my home;
How dear this moon to me!

The last of the known acrostics is, if anything, even more elaborate. Its twenty poems can be arranged in four groups of five poems to produce the twenty-five-syllable prayer “Namo Hakusamu Meuri Gomugemu omou koto kanaetamae yo” (Hail the felicitous manifestation of the god of Hakusan; grant me what I long for!). Here Tamekane used a double grid, with sets of five poems running top to bottom, bottom to top, left to right, and right to left, yielding twenty-five pivot syllables, each of which inhabits four intersecting poems. Again, the poems themselves are in no set topical order, though most have to do with loneliness, longing for home, or the search for spiritual comfort or divine intervention. Two examples:

… Those plum blossoms
That I had grown so used to
In my old garden—
I'd love to wander through them
Breaking off branches as before.
… Things from previous lives,
These, too, bring consequences,
So, jeweled drops of tears
That now come streaming out,
I beg you, please hold back!

Naturally, the poems in these acrostics are rather stilted, although some rise above their artificial context. Tamekane was undoubtedly aware of the tradition of exile poetry in China and drew on it for some of his Sado verses. Yet partly because they are in such tortured settings, and partly because the Japanese have generally not considered waka a suitable vehicle for exile poetry (with the possible exception of Sugawara Michizane's work), these verses have not received much attention.

It seems reasonable to surmise, as the disposition of the Shika Hyakushu indicates, that the purpose of these efforts, which Tamekane evidently undertook as a kind of religious exercise (call it penance), was to gain the aid of the gods in being allowed to return to the capital. Whether by divine intervention or not, Tamekane was pardoned in the intercalary fourth month of 1303 and came back to Kyoto. He was fifty years old.

Notes

1. “Legitimate” here is a translation of the Japanese term chakushi, which refers to the oldest son by the principal wife. The distinction was important and was often an issue in inheritance disputes, though in the polygamous society that was medieval Japan, it was not a question of morality.

2. See Ariyoshi, pp. 356-57.

3. Recognized in his youth as a potential poetic genius by Teika and Tameie, Genshō never participated in any public poetry gatherings, though in his middle years he did take part in a few poetry contests. Nonetheless, his Genshō Waka Kuden, written sometime in the late 1290's, stands as a noteworthy poetic treatise defending the orthodox Nijō approach to poetry. Tamemori was known as much for his renga (linked verse) and kyōka (a kind of comic waka) as for his waka. He seems to have been on good terms with his brother Tamesuke, and a few of his poems appear in the two Kyōgoku anthologies. Tameaki's dates are unknown. By 1278 he had taken the tonsure and was living in Kantō, where a poetry group had formed around him. He apparently had a good relationship with his two half-brothers, Tamesuke and Tamemori, though he seems to have spent much of his life in the Kantō area. He last appears in official records in 1295.

4. In a passage in Tamekanekyō Wakashō, Tamekane taunts his Nijō rivals by alluding to one such secret document, which appears to be a version of Teika's Kindai Shūka.

5. Brower and Miner, Japanese Court Poetry, p. 344.

6. Ishida, “Kyōgoku Tamekane,” p. 295.

7. See Ariyoshi, p. 418, and Ishida, p. 206, for the major recent arguments of the case.

8. See Ishida, p. 266.

9. Ikeda, “Kyōgoku Tamekane,” p. 89.

10. Tokieda, p. 410.

11. Hanazono Tennō Shinki, Genkō 2 (1332) iii 24. See also Ikeda, “Kyōgoku Tamekane,” p. 88, and Ishida, pp. 270-71, for a discussion of Tamekane's relationship to the Saionji house.

12. Toki, Kyōgoku Tamekane, pp. 254-55.

13. Tamekanekyōki, Kangen 2 (1303) viii 28, in Hamaguchi and Ogawa, p. 60.

14. Ishida, p. 283.

15. The word is kasen, or “poetic sage,” but it refers here to one who acts as an adviser on poetic matters at a poetry party. Tamekane's attendance at this party and his role are noted by Ishida, p. 284.

16. Kameyama called for 100-poem-sequences from all the major poets of the day, including all branches of the Mikohidari house. The event is now known as the Kōan Hyakushu (100-Poem Sequences of the Kōan Era). Inoue Muneo, pp. 6-7, notes that there exists a manuscript believed to be Sanekane's draft for this sequence, with marginal comments apparently by Tamekane. He also notes that 15th-century collections like the Meidai Waka Zenshū (Complete Collection of Poems That Clarify Topics) contain poems from these sequences not found elsewhere, including 8 poems by Tamekane.

17. See Ishida, p. 285; and Ariyoshi, pp. 551-52. For the text of the sequence, see Zoku Gunsho Ruijū, vol. 14, pp. 814-19.

18. Ikeda Tomizō, p. 84.

19. Inoue Muneo, p. 10.

20. Toki, Kyōgoku Tamekane, p. 228. Inoue Muneo, p. 6, notes that Tameuji started this as early as 1276.

21. See the Enkyō Ryōkyō Sochinjō, in Sasaki, vol. 4, pp. 134-35. Some scholars (see, for example, Ishida, p. 266) suggest that Tamenori died of anger, frustration, and disappointment over Kameyama's refusal to revise Shokushūishū despite his protests. One suspects the truth in this case is somewhat less dramatic than either claim.

22. Tokieda et al., p. 365.

23. Iwasa, Eifukumon-in, p. 22; Ishida, p. 285.

24. Nakatsukasa no Naishi's diary covers the years of Fushimi's reign as Crown Prince. The entry mentioned here is translated in full in Appendix B.

25. He was a Middle Captain of the Left and of the Senior Fourth Rank, Lower Grade.

26. Tamai and Ishida, pp. 284-85. In this text the first line of Abutsu's reply is given as Omoiyare. I have used the version found in Toki, Kyōgoku Tamekane, p. 121.

27. Quoted in Ishida, p. 295. See also Brower and Miner, Japanese Court Poetry, p. 351.

28. Quoted in Ishida, p. 295.

29. Inoue Muneo, p. 856.

30. Ibid., p. 9. The passage from Kitabatake Chikafusa on this issue is quoted at length in Brower and Miner, Japanese Court Poetry, p. 351. However, by the time he wrote about it (Kokinshūjōchū; Annotated Kokinshū Preface; ca. 1350), it was old history.

31. Tsunoda. See also Brower, “Reizei Family Documents.”

32. Shino, p. 226. Shino maintains, however, that the Kyōgoku style did not emerge in their poetry contests until their third contest, held 1297 viii 15. He further notes that no Kyōgoku poems from contests earlier than their fourth, the Shōan Gannen Goshu Uta-awase (Poetry Contest in Five Categories in the First Year of Shōan [1299]), held in the third month of 1299, were selected for Gyokuyōshū. The text of the contest and explanatory notes can be found in Taniyama, pp. 42-44, 153-67.

33. Iwasa, Kyōgokuha Kajin, p. 70.

34. Quoted in ibid., p. 83.

35. Ibid., pp. 70ff. This issue will be examined more thoroughly in Chap. 4.

36. The Kokka Taikan (The Great Canon of Japanese Poetry) reveals no similar first line in any of the 21 imperial anthologies.

37. Most scholars agree on the probable composition date of this treatise, based on the title given therein for the poet Sanjō Sanetō (see Ishida, p. 301, for the standard arguments). Toki, Kyōgoku Tamekane, pp. 184-85, suggests that it may have been written in parts and did not reach the form in which we know it today until up to 30 years later, but his evidence is slim.

38. Ishida, p. 301.

39. See Tsugita, “Tamekane”; and Iwasa, Kyōgokuha Kajin, pp. 98-100.

40. See Toki, Kyōgoku Tamekane, p. 257.

41. Ariyoshi, p. 429. Tameyo's promotions halted as soon as Fushimi became Emperor, further demonstration of the impact the split in the imperial line had on people's lives.

42. Iwasa, Eifukumon-in, pp. 19-20. This information comes from Fushimi Tennō Shinki, entries for Einin 1 (1293) vii, in Shiryō Taisei, vol. 34, pp. 321-25.

43. Shiryō Taisei, vol. 34, pp. 283, 307.

44. Tokieda Motoki et al., p. 410.

45. Ariyoshi, p. 520.

46. The text used for the points is Sasaki, vol. 4, pp. 68-81.

47. See Iwasa, Kyōgokuha Kajin, pp. 70-71.

48. See Appendix B for Hanazono's comments on the matter; and Ikeda Tomizō, p. 94.

49. See Ishida, p. 275.

50. Ishida, p. 276, mentions the possibility that he may have gone to Sado by way of Kamakura or been called there sometime during his exile based on evidence from the Honchō Tsugan and the Enkyō Ryōkyō Sochinjō, respectively.

51. See Matisoff, pp. 449-50. The Japanese text of the poem is from Toki, Shinshū, p. 262, and the translation is my own.

52. See Ariyoshi, p. 417, for information on the collection, which was evidently named by accident because it happened to appear next to some of Tamekane's draft poems in an 1818 compendium. But some of the exile poems may have been written by him (see Ishida, p. 276; and Toki, Kyōgoku Tamekane, pp. 179-81).

53. The work follows the 100 topics set by the Horikawa Hyakushū (1105-6), which became one standard for the sequential arrangement of poems. In fact Tamekane's sequence has only 98 poems, the summer and winter sections each being short a poem. See Ariyoshi, pp. 577-78, for a discussion of the Horikawa Hyakushū.

54. Toki, Shinshū, pp. 247, 252.

55. Hamaguchi and Ogawa, p. 64.

56. Toki, Shinshū, pp. 241-43, reproduces the poems and discusses their interrelationships. Toki, Kyōgoku Tamekane, pp. 167-69, discusses them without reproducing the full set.

57. Shintō Daijiten, vol. 1 (Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1937), pp. 363, 372.

58. Toki diagrams this poem and the second of the pair below in Kyōgoku Tamekane, pp. 172-73, and 169-72, respectively.

Works Cited

The place of publication for Japanese-language works is Tokyo unless otherwise noted. Takagi Ichinosuke et al., eds., Nihon Koten Bungaku Taikei, 102 vols. (Iwanami, 1957-68) is abbreviated as NKBT in this list.

Ariyoshi Tamotsu. Waka Bungaku Jiten. Ōfūsha, 1982.

Brower, Robert. “The Reizei Family Documents,” Monumenta Nipponica, 36.4 (Winter 1981), pp. 445-61.

Brower, Robert, and Earl Miner. Japanese Court Poetry. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1961.

Hamaguchi Muneaki and Ogawa Machiko, eds. “Tamekanekyōki Ryakuchū,” Kōnan Daigaku Kiyō, Bungakuhen 36, 1979, pp. 50-68.

Ikeda Tomizō. “Kyōgoku Tamekane no Ningenzō,” Nihon Bungaku Kenkyū, 17 (Nov. 1981; Baikō Jogakuin Daigaku Nihon Bungakukai).

Inoue Muneo. Chūsei Kadanshi no Kenkyū, Nambokuchōki. Meiji Shoin, 1965.

Inoue Yutaka. Gyokuyō to Fūga. Kōbundō, 1965.

Ishida Yoshisada. “Kyōgoku Tamekane,” in Hisamatsu Sen'ichi and Sanekata Kiyoshi, eds., Chūsei no Kajin II, vol. 4 of the Nihon Kajin Kōza series, pp. 263-317. 2d ed. Kōbundō, 1962.

Iwasa Miyoko. Eifukumon-in. Kasama Shoin, 1976.

———. Kyōgokuha Kajin no Kenkyū. Kasama Shoin, 1974.

Matisoff, Susan. “Kintōsho: Zeami's Song of Exile,” Monumenta Nipponica, 32.4 (Winter 1977), pp. 441-58.

Sasaki Nobutsuna, ed. Nihon Kagaku Taikei, vols. 4, 5. Kasama Shobō, 1956.

Shiryō Taisei, vols. 33, 34. Ed. Sasagawa Shurō and Yano Tarō. Naigai Shoseki Kabushiki Kaisha, 1938.

Tamai Kōsuke and Ishida Yoshisada, eds. Kaidōki, Tōkan Kikō, Izayoi Nikki, in Nihon Koten Zensho, vol. 106. Asahi Shimbunsha, 1958.

Toki Zenmaro. Kyōgoku Tamekane. Chikuma Shobō, 1971.

———. Shinshū Kyōgoku Tamekane. Kadokawa, 1968.

Tokieda Motoki et al., eds. Jinnō Shōtōki Masukagami, in NKBT, vol. 87. 1965.

Tsugita Kasumi. “Karonshijō no Tamekane to Hanazono-in,” Kokubungaku Kaishaku to Kanshō, 3.5 (1938), pp. 77-80.

———. “Tamekane no Bungaku no Mondaiten,” Bungaku, no. 8, 1963, pp. 15-30.

Tsugita Kasumi and Iwasa Miyoko, eds. Fūga Wakashū, in Chūsei no Bungaku, vol. 4. Miyai Shoten, 1974.

Tsunoda Bun'ei. “Reizeike to Shiguretei Bunkō,” Gakushikai Kaihō, Jan. 1981, pp. 57-63.