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<p>[QUOTE=&quot;hontonai, post: 382787, member: 4703&quot;]Where on earth did you pick up that bit of misinformation?</p><p><br /></p><p>Murasaki Shikibu&#039;s <i>Genji Monogatari</i> (&quot;<i>Tale of Genji</i>&quot;) published between 1008-21 C.E., at least four and one-half decades before the Battle of Hastings, is not only the <u>real</u> &quot;first significant work by a female in Japanese literature&quot;; it is also believed by many to be the world&#039;s <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tale_of_Genji" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tale_of_Genji" rel="nofollow">first novel</a>!</p><p><br /></p><p>She was a member of the powerful Fujiwara family, but her real personal name is lost in the mists of time.&nbsp; The dates of both her birth (973? 978?) and death (1014? between 1025-1031?) vary according to the resource you consult.</p><p><br /></p><p>Quite properly in terms of literary rank, her 2002 appearance on a Japanese bank note pre-dated that of Higuchi Ichiyo.</p><p><br /></p><p>The <u>first</u> woman to appear on a Japanese note, the legendary <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empress_Jing%C5%AB" target="_blank" class="externalLink ProxyLink" data-proxy-href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empress_Jing%C5%AB" rel="nofollow">Empress Jingu</a>, is said to have been the first woman ruler of Japan.&nbsp; One version of her life holds that she served as Regent from the death of her husband in 209 C.E. until her son formally ascended the throne 60 years later.&nbsp; Other historians believe that she was the Empress Himiko referred to in Chinese historical documents as the ruler of a substantial portion of what is now Japan, in the late 1st Century or early 2nd Century C.E.&nbsp; She is credited with personally leading a successful invading army to Korea in the first of many invasions of that country by the Japanese over the centuries.&nbsp; (It is hard to find anyone today who believes the story that her son, later Emperor Ojin, was conceived before her husband&#039;s death, and her Korean adventure, but born after she returned to Japan three years later.)</p><p><br /></p><p>This ¥5 note was in circulation between July 15, 1882 and December 31, 1899, with a &quot;portait&quot; of Empress Jingu painted from imagination by Italian artist Edoardo Chiossone, an Italian sculptor who worked for the Japanese Paper Currency Bureau.&nbsp; The same portrait was used on a ¥1 note from February, 1881-December 10, 1899, and on a ¥10 note from September 9, 1883 to December 31, 1899.[/QUOTE]</p><p><br /></p>

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