2015 Volume 2015 Issue 25 Pages 85-94,177-176
In this article, I present a report on a bibliographic investigation of a manuscript of the Kokin wakashū 古今和歌集 said to have been copied by Fujiwara no Toshinari (Shunzei) 藤原俊成 and held by the Imperial Household Agency's Sannomaru Shōzōkan 三の丸尚藏館 (Museum of the Imperial Collections), and through an analysis of the text I also examine the copyist and the textual lineage of this manuscript. As a result of my investigations, the following facts have come to light.
First, with regard to the bibliographic investigation, starting from the first leaf of part 1, one finds that the order of the second and third bundles has been reversed, resulting in incorrect collation. Further, when one carefully examines the incorrectly collated leaves, one finds that the break between the two bundles coincides with the break between the upper stanza of a poem in three lines of 5, 7, and 5 syllables and the lower stanza in two 7-syllable lines, and it is to be surmised that the error in order may have been overlooked for this reason.
Next, I consider the copyist through an analysis of the usage of Chinese characters and variant kana characters. In view of the fact that there are considerable differences in this regard with other works in Shunzei's own hand, it is to be surmised that this manuscript was not copied by Shunzei. In addition, there are also copying errors here and there that Shunzei would have been most unlikely to make. In view of these facts it may be assumed that the Sannomaru Shōzōkan's manuscript of the Kokin wakashū attributed to Shunzei was copied by someone who did not have a very good understanding of the meaning of the text.
Thirdly, I examine the textual lineage of the manuscript since this had not previously been clarified. Following an analysis of differences and similarities with texts deriving from Shunzei's version and Fujiwara no Teika's 藤原定家 version of the Kokin wakashū, it was found that the manuscript does not match the text of Shunzei's version and instead tallies with Teika's version, in particular that dating from Jōō 貞應 2 (1223). I therefore reached the conclusion that the text of the Sannomaru Shōzōkan's manuscript of the Kokin wakashū attributed to Shunzei belongs to the line of texts deriving from Teika's 1223 version of the Kokin wakashū.
