Ō no Yasumaro

Who was Ō no Yasumaro?

Ō no Yasumaro was a Japanese nobleman, bureaucrat, and chronicler. He may have been the son of Ō no Honji, a participant in the Jinshin War of 672.

He is most famous for compiling and editing, with the assistance of Hieda no Are, the Kojiki, the oldest extant Japanese history. Empress Genmei charged Yasumaro with the duty of writing the Kojiki in 711 using the differing clan chronicles and native myths. It was finished the following year in 712.

Yasumaro most probably also played an active role in compiling the Nihon Shoki, which was finished in 720.

Yasumaro became clan head in 716, and died in 723.