Name
昭和万葉の森
しょうわまんようのもり
Shōwa man’yō no mori
Shōwa Man’yō Forest
Location
Ōhira in Miyagi Prefecture, near Sendai.
Address
〒９８１−３６０２宮城県黒川郡大衡村大衡字平林１１７
117 Tairabayashi, Ōhira-aza, Ōhira-mura, Kurokawa-gun, Miyaki-ken, 981-3602
Contact
TEL: 022-345-4623 (Japanese only)
Email: info@ohira-manyo.co.jp (Japanese only)
Website
http://ohira-manyo.co.jp/mori.html
The website (Japanese) provides brief information about the forest’s history and contents, opening hours and transport links.
Opening hours
The forest is open seven days a week, during the following times:
April-October
9:00 a.m. – 4:30 p.m.
November-March
9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.
It is closed every year for the New Year Holiday (28 December-4 January).
Access
The forest is most conveniently reached by car.
Visitors wishing to use public transport should take the Miyakō Bus (ミアコーバス) from Sendai station (either the Sendai-Kami Express Line (高速仙台加美線), or the Sendai-Ōhira Express Line (高速仙台大衡線)) and get off at Ōhira-mura Yakuba-mae (大衡村役場前). The journey takes about 50 minutes each way, depending upon traffic.
On descending from the bus, you will have the Ōhira Village Office (ōhira yakuba 大衡村役場) on your right, on the opposite side of the road. Turn around, and cross over the road, so that the Village Office is on your left. Walk to the end of the road, and turn left, so that the Village Office remains on your left, and walk along the road, past the Ōhira Regional Comprehensive Support Centre (ōhira-mura chi’iki hōkatsu shien sentā 大衡村地域包括支援センター) until you come to an elevated pedestrian bridge over National Route 57. Cross the bridge, and follow the road on the far side round to the left, and you will shortly walk into the Forest. The total distance from the bus stop to the forest is about 350 metres.
Description
As its name suggests, Shōwa Man’yō Forest is a forest, where a major concern has been to leave the environment as untouched as possible, while still providing a space for walking and enjoying the environment. As a result a series of paths of varying widths, named for a variety of poetic epithets from the Man’yōshū, meander through the 23 hectares of the site – some are quite level, wide and easy going, while others are both narrow and steep. As one walks the paths one is surrounded by the Japanese red pines that make up the forest, extensive undergrowth and, of course, the Man’yō plants themselves. While the majority of Man’yō species are present and represented, only about forty are marked with plaques and poems, making it a botanical challenge to locate and identify the remainder. As well as a wide variety of bird and insect life, one may also encounter wild boar, or deer, although both of these are only likely to be found early in the morning when the park is quiet. To do a full circuit of all the forest’s paths will take between 2-3 hours, depending upon your walking speed.
A separate section is devoted to Man’yō trees, accompanied by poems carved, in the calligraphy of an eminent scholar from Miyagi University, onto low, grey stone plaques. These are accompanied, as all the poems are, with versions written in a script more accessible to the general Japanese reader, and a summary of the poem’s meaning, in modern Japanese.
For further information, there is a small display of local plants, animals and seasonal activities in the garden offices, and refreshments can be obtained at the Man’yō Chaya 万葉茶屋 next to the car park. In addition, Ōhira Village Art Museum is within easy walking distance, and the Forest is neighboured by Man’yō Create Park (万葉クリエートパーク) which offers a variety of sporting and other activities.
History
The forest began in 1955 on the occasion of the Sixth National Tree Planting Festival (Dai rokkai zenkoku shokuju sai 第6回全国植樹祭). As part of these events, Emperor Shōwa [Hirohito] (1901-1989; r. 1926-1989) visited Ōhira accompanied by Empress Nagako, and planted the first of what were to become 6000 Japanese red pines making up the forest. Thirty years later in 1985, the year marking the 60th Anniversary of Hirohito’s accession to the throne, a decision was taken to mark the event with the creation of a Man’yō garden. The creation of this took some four years, with the result that the Man’yō Forest only opened in 1989, the year of Emperor Shōwa’s death.
At this time, there were already about thirty Man’yō Botanical Gardens throughout Japan, but none in the Tōhoku region, and the creation of the Shōwa Man’yō Forest was intended to remedy this lack. All of the 160 odd plants mentioned in the Man’yōshū were collected for the forest but, in keeping with the desire to interfere with nature as little as possible, it was decided that only some would be marked with poems, with the choice of which poems to use delegated to a committee of Man’yō experts at Miyagi University. When I visited this summer [2015], I was told that about 120 plants survive and remain in the forest.
The prefecture enjoys a number of Man’yō links: Ōtomo no Yakamochi, the anthology’s principal compiler died in the region, and the most northerly identifiable location lies there, too. In addition, many of the plants mentioned as foodstuffs in the collection originated from the region, and it was also memorialised by Emperor Shōmu (701-756; r. 724-749), in gratitude for supplying gold which was used for the construction of the Great Buddha of the Tōdaiji in Nara. For all these reasons, it was felt that Miyagi needed a Man’yō facility, and it continues to attact approximately 40,000 visitors a year – mostly in the summer.
Poems
The following Man’yō poems can be found on plaques in the forest:
| MYS I: 1 MYS I: 20 MYS I: 21 MYS I: 28 MYS I: 63 MYS II: 90 MYS II: 107 MYS II: 108 MYS II: 142 MYS II: 158 MYS III: 289 MYS III: 434 |
MYX IV: 632 MYS V: 798 MYS V: 822 MYS VI: 1042 MYS VIII: 1461 MYS VIII: 1418 MYS VIII: 1424 MYS VIII: 1444 MYS VIII: 1448 MYS VIII: 1490 MYS VIII: 1500 MYS VIII: 1537 |
MYS VIII: 1538 MYS VIII: 1623 MYS X: 1814 MYS X: 1821 MYS X: 1872 MYS X: 1895 MYS X: 1903 MYS X: 1953 MYS X: 2103 MYS X: 2115 MYS X: 2225 MYS X: 2233 |
MYS X: 2315 MYS XI: 2656 MYS XII: 2968 MYS XVII: 3921 MYS XVIII: 4109 MYS XIX: 4139 MYS XIX: 4143 MYS XIX: 4159 MYS XIX: 4193 MYS XIX: 4204 MYS XIX: 4278 MYS XX: 4493 |
[