The 41st sovereign of Japan, daughter of Emperor Tenji and consort of Emperor Tenmu. After Tenmu's death she governed and then reigned in her own right from 690, promulgating the Asuka Kiyomihara Code and moving the capital to Fujiwara-kyō in 694. She abdicated in favor of her grandson, becoming the first retired sovereign. Her poem on the coming of summer at Mount Kagu appears in the Man'yōshū and, in revised form, in the Hyakunin Isshu.
春過ぎて 夏来にけらし 白妙の
衣ほすてふ 天の香具山
Haru sugite natsu kinikerashi shirotae no / koromo hosu chō Ama no Kaguyama
Spring has passed and summer seems to have come — for there on heavenly Mount Kagu, they say, pure white robes are hung out to dry when summer arrives.