Princess Nukada, also known as Nukata Okimi, is
considered Japan’s first lyric poet. Like other members
of the Japanese cultural elite at this time, she
may have been of Korean origin. She was first the
consort of Emperor Kobun, to whom she bore
Prince Katsuragi; after the emperor’s death, she
married Emperor Temmu, to whom she bore
Princess Toichi. She also had a relationship with
Emperor Tenchi; in one poem she describes herself
as waiting for him, using an image of nature to express
her restlessness and longing:
Swaying the bamboo blinds of my house,
The autumn wind blew.
Emperor Tenchi, a great patron of the arts, encouraged
Nukada’s compositions. Princess Nukada’s
favored medium of poetic expression was the
TANKA, a traditional poetic form consisting of five
lines and 31 syllables. Her tanka were known for
their graceful symmetry and forceful rhythms. The
Princess’s poetry focused as frequently on political
issues as on her personal life. Indeed, her position
at court demanded that her life be political. But she
is at her best in evoking metaphors of nature to
portray a state of mind, as in one poem where she
compares picking flowers in spring to flowers in
autumn, and concludes simply: Akiyama ware wa
— “But the autumn hills are for me.”
Several of Princess Nukada’s poems were collected
in the Manyoshu, The Ten Thousand Leaves
(called by some The Ten Thousand Ages), a collection
of Japanese literature compiled by the poet
OTOMO YAKAMOCHI. This collection, like the folk
poems of the KOJIKI (compiled in 712), provides a
valuable record of life in Japan during the Heian era.
English Versions of Works by
Princess Nukada
The Penguin Book of Women Poets. Edited by Carol
Cosman. 72–73. New York: Viking Press, 1986.
The Ten Thousand Leaves. Translated by Ian Hideo
Levy. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press,
1981.
A Work about Princess Nukada
Singer, Kurt. “Asuka and Nara Periods (A.D.
592–794)” in The Life of Ancient Japan. New York:
Routledge, 2002.