Lastly, there are abbreviated characters—a full list of which is given in the Kogi, together with a few characters peculiar to the Anthology and contracted expressions such as amori for ame ori, Yamato naru for Y. ni aru, haru sareba for haru shi areba, chifu for to ifu (modern tefu = chō of Kyôto), and so forth.

The above system of scripts is known as Manyôgaki and is sometimes imitated in modern productions as in a recently published play now before me.

Texts preserved in such scripts could not fail to be corrupt or obscure in parts. Not only from the difficulty of reading the ideographs when these came to be translated into kana, but from the fact that the manuscripts were often in cursive character, easily misread and miswritten by the copyists. The text of the Manyôshiu I have used is throughout that of the Kogi, but I have not omitted in the notes to the translations to give some attention to the various readings cited in that work. By far the best discussion of these seems to be that of Keichiu which with the Kogi is much superior in my opinion to the commentary of either Mabuchi or Motowori[6]—the latter especially appears to be lacking in critical acumen.

The following additional remarks on the script are important. According to Amano Nobukage (died 1734), in the Manyô script the Chinese characters are read japonicé in four ways:—

1. mana, as [心] kokoro (heart, mind, &c.), where single characters are read as true Japanese words.

2. Where combined characters are read true, as [春霞] harukasumi (spring-mist); [秋風] aki-kaze (autumn-wind).

3. Where combined characters are read in full, but the meaning of the whole is not the sum of the meanings of the parts, as [垣津{旗}] kakitsubata (Iris laevigata)—the characters separately mean—kaki (fence), tsu (place), hata (flag).

4. Where combined characters are read together as a whole, as [春鳥] uguhisu (Cettia cantans), lit. spring-bird; [三五夜] mochidzuki (full-moon), lit. three-five-night = fifteenth night of a lunar month, when the moon is full.

To these categories must be added that of humorous combinations, thus [十六] (sixteen) = shi shi (4 × 4), and is used for shishi (flesh); [靑頭鷄] kamo (wild-duck), lit. green-head-fowl.

In the Kogi text the characters are used in the following modes, all of which are fully illustrated by examples in a section of the sōron or General Introduction to the Edition.