Hanami - A Very Short Overview

 The season of hanami has begun in parts of Japan and, as such, I thought it appropriate to look at the history of flower viewing.

While primarily focused on cherry blossoms nowadays, the activity - or dare I say tradition - of hanami seemed to have started with my favourite flowers: plum blossoms. 8th-century aristocrats followed the lead of their Chinese neighbours and started going on flower appreciation trips. It seems like Mt-Yoshino in Nara prefecture, was already a nerve centre for cherry blossoms (sakura) at this point. One of my favourite books, Sei Shonagon's Pillow Book (late 10th century), makes plenty of poetic references to flowers and their contemplation. Eventually, the term hanami came to be analogous to cherry blossom viewing as first recorded in the Tale of Genji, another Heian period classic (early 11th century).

From plum blossoms, wisteria and many others, to cherry blossoms, appreciating flowers became widespread amongst the elite, then the samurai, and by the Edo period, the commoners as well.

Hanami during the Edo period was encouraged by Tokugawa Yoshimune (1684-1751) who had whole areas of Edo planted with cherry trees for impoverished commoners and samurai alike. Then and today, everyone is welcome to enjoy the beauty of early spring days with a few cups of nihonshu (sake) under the flowers.

Edinburgh has beautiful cherry trees that seem to be kanzan cultivars (developed during the Edo period!) in the Meadows. Unfortunately, we will have to wait for at least another month to have a Scottish hanami here.

 

Read about cherry trees here: Abe Naoko, 'Cherry' Ingram: The Englishman Who Saved Japan’s Blossoms (2019). It recounts the role of cherries in Japanese history and culture, and Ingram’s contribution in re-introducing a species of sakura that had disappeared from Japan.