Ariwara no Narihira

Ariwara no Narihira (825–880) served as a courtier and composed waka poetry during the early Heian period. He earned recognition as one of the Six Poetic Geniuses and later as one of the Thirty-Six Poetic Geniuses, with a single poem appearing in the Ogura Hyakunin Isshu. His alternative names include Zai Go-Chūjō, Zai Go, Zai Chūjō, and Mukashi-Otoko.

Court anthologies attribute 87 poems to Narihira, though some attributions are uncertain. His verses are notably ambiguous, prompting the compilers of the 10th-century Kokin Wakashū to provide unusually long headnotes for clarification. His many celebrated love affairs left a deep mark on later Japanese culture. Legends claim he had relationships with the high priestess of the Ise Grand Shrine and the poet Ono no Komachi, and that he fathered Emperor Yōzei. These romantic entanglements inspired *The Tales of Ise*, and he has since been idealized as the archetype of the handsome, amorous nobleman. He was also considered an avatar of a deity.

Narihira was born in 825, the grandson of two emperors: Emperor Heizei through his father, Prince Abo, and Emperor Kanmu through his mother, Princess Ito. He was the fifth child of Prince Abo but supposedly the only child of Princess Ito, who lived in the former capital at Nagaoka. Some of his poems reference his mother. Prince Abo was banished from Heijō-kyō (modern Nara) to Tsukushi Province (modern Fukuoka) in 824 for his role in the failed Kusuko Incident, and Narihira was born during this exile. After Abo’s return to Heijō in 826, Narihira and his brothers Yukihira, Nakahira, and another were made commoners and granted the surname Ariwara. The scholar Ōe no Otondo was also a brother.

Though remembered primarily for poetry, Narihira held high birth and served at court. In 841, he became Lieutenant of the Right Division of Inner Palace Guards, later promoted to Lieutenant of the Left Division and then Chamberlain. By 849, he held Junior Fifth Rank, Lower Grade. He rose to positions including Provisional Assistant Master of the Left Military Guard, Assistant Chamberlain, Provisional Minor Captain of the Left Division of Inner Palace Guards, Captain of the Right Division of the Bureau of Horses, Provisional Middle Captain of the Right Division of Inner Palace Guards, and Provisional Governor of Sagami, reaching Junior Fourth Rank, Upper Grade. By his death, he had attained Chamberlain and Provisional Governor of Mino.

Narihira was renowned as a great lover; a third of his poems in the Kokin Wakashū describe romantic affairs. The national history *Nihon Sandai Jitsuroku* (compiled 901) noted: "Narihira was elegant and of handsome appearance, but he was unrestrained in his self-indulgence." *The Tales of Ise* portrays him falling in love with Fujiwara no Takaiko, a consort of Emperor Seiwa, suggesting this prompted his journey east. Some speculate this affair caused his rank to drop from Junior Fifth Rank, Lower Grade to Senior Sixth Rank, Upper Grade before rising again, though this may be a textual error. Takaiko also reputedly had an affair with a monk, which may have inspired the fictional legend of her involvement with Narihira. The Reizei family’s commentary on *The Tales of Ise* speculates Emperor Yōzei was Narihira’s son, not the previous emperor’s.

Another famous affair—giving *The Tales of Ise* its name—involved the high priestess of the Ise Grand Shrine, Yasuko, daughter of Emperor Montoku. The tale describes Narihira visiting Ise on a hunt and sleeping with her, but a Kokinshū passage implies he instead slept with another woman in her service. Later works like the 12th-century *Ōkagami* and 13th-century *Kojidan* claim this union produced a child later adopted. Japanologist Helen Craig McCullough found no evidence the affair was more than a romantic myth.

A headnote to Kokinshū poems 784 and 785 links Narihira to the daughter of Ki no Aritsune. Medieval commentaries call her his wife, and some modern scholars agree, though the only early source naming her is that note. In the Noh play *Izutsu*, adapted by Zeami Motokiyo from *The Tales of Ise*, Narihira and Ki no Aritsune’s daughter are childhood playmates who marry; his infidelity causes her pining spirit to appear after death. Speculation that Narihira and Ono no Komachi were lovers, based on their reputations as the era’s most beautiful man and woman, has little evidence but dates back at least to the 14th-century historian Kitabatake Chikafusa.