The following texts are exact transliterations of the Kana yomi of the ManyÔshiu, and of the yomi of the mixed Japanese script of the Taketori Monogatari, the Preface to the Kokinwakashiu, and Takasago, according to the system devised by Sir Ernest Satow and adopted by Professor Chamberlain.

The translations of the texts are given in a companion volume, where full explanatory introductions and notes will be found.

The following abbreviations are employed: (K.) Professor Chamberlain’s translation of the Kojiki; (N.) Dr. Aston’s translation of the Nihongi; (Fl.) Professor Florenz’s part translation of the Nihongi; (Br.) Captain Brinkley’s Japanese-English Dictionary; (I.) Kotoba no Izumi; (T.A.S.J.) Transactions of the Asiatic Society of Japan.

The texts contained in the present volume are:—

1. The nagauta or chÔka (long lays) of the ManyÔshiu, the earliest of the Japanese Anthologies, compiled about 760 A.D., with their kaheshi uta or hanka (envoys). The text used is that of Kamochi Masazumi in his magnificent edition, ManyÔshiu Kogi, the Ancient Meaning of the ManyÔshiu, written during the first half of the nineteenth century but published in 1879.

2. The Taketori Monogatari, Story of the Old Wicker-worker. The text used is that of Tanaka Daishiu, published about 1838.

3. The Preface of Ki no Tsurayuki to his famous Anthology—the second of the old anthologies—known as Kokinwakashiu—Anthology of Japanese Verse Old and New—written about 922 A.D. The text is that of Kaneko Genshin in his edition of 1903.

4. The utahi of Takasago, perhaps the earliest of the medieval miracle-plays (NÔ), composed in the fifteenth century. The text used is that of the YÔkyoku TsÛge, edited by Ohowada Kenjiu, and published by the Hakubunkwan in 22 Meiji (1889).

Appended to 1. are some tanka from the Kokinshiu and the Hyakunin Isshiu (1214 A.D.), and in the volume of translations examples of hokku or the half-stanza, the so-called Japanese epigram, are given with their translations.

A careful perusal, twice or thrice repeated, of the short grammar and the following section on the Language of the ManyÔshiu comprised in the Introduction, with the aid of the List of Makura Kotoba, the Glossary, and the companion volume of translations, will meet nearly all the difficulties of the romanized texts, and enable the reader to appreciate sufficiently the charm of these ancient lays, of which the more unique elements escape translation.