mid-Heian period · 921–991Ōnakatomi no Yoshinobu

A mid-Heian poet born into the Ōnakatomi family, hereditary chief priests of the Ise Shrine, an office he himself held. In 951 he was one of the five scholars of the Pear Chamber who compiled the Gosenshū and deciphered the Man'yōshū. One of the Thirty-Six Immortals, he has about 120 poems in imperial anthologies, many of them screen poems and congratulatory verses. He was the grandfather of the poet Ise no Taifu. His Hyakunin Isshu poem compares love that flares by night and smolders by day to the watch-fires of the palace guards.