Having sung thus, she returned and entered for some time into the house of a person from Kara[1] named Nurinomi[2] at Tsutsuki.[3]
[Sect. CXXIV.—Emperor Nin-toku (Part VI.—He Follows the Empress Into Yamashiro).]
The Heavenly Sovereign, having heard that the Empress had made a progress up by Yamashiro, made a person,—a retainer called by the name of Toriyama,[4]—give an august Song,[5] which said:
“Reach [her] in Yamashiro, Toriyama! Reach [her]! reach [her]! Ah! wilt thou reach and meet my beloved spouse?”[6]
Again he continued by despatching Kuchiko, Grandee of Wani,[7] and sang, saying:
- ↑ 韓, i.e., Korea.
- ↑ For Nuri no omi, i.e., “the Grandee of Nuri.” Nuri is probably a corrupt form of some Korean name.
- ↑ Or Tsudzuki, in Yamashiro. Etymology obscure.
- ↑ This name signifies “bird-mountain.” The commentators presume that it contains an allusion to the fact of its bearer being an Imperial courier.
- ↑ This is the actual sense conveyed by the original 使舎人名謂鳥山人送御歌, and we naturally infer that Toriyama was made the bearer to the Empress of the following Song. The Song itself, however, is addressed not to her, but to Toriyama on his departure. On the other hand, the two poems which follow are evidently for the Empress, and it is impossible to suppose that the first messenger was not likewise intended to convey to her some poetic missive. All that we can do is to render the text as it stands, and to suppose it corrupt.
- ↑ The meaning of this Song is: “Oh Toriyama! pursue her into Yamashiro! I tremble at the thought of the possibility of thy not finding her.”
- ↑ Wani no omi Kuchiko (further on he is mentioned as Kuchiko no omi, i.e. “the Grandee [of] Kuchiko”). Kuchi-ko may be interpreted to mean “mouth-child,” and Moribe thinks that this personage was so called on account of the
circle of mountains that guard the approach to the province of Yamato, and it has been rendered accordingly. The great difficulty of the Song lies in the line rendered “ascend to Miya,” and the commentators from Keichiū downwards make all sorts of efforts to explain it. Moribe’s view, according to which the word should be regarded as a familiar abbreviation of Takamiya, naturally used by one whose native place it was, seems the most acceptable. Motowori takes the line to signify: “When I ascend past the palace [of Naniha].”
