小野道風は平安時代の貴族、書家の１人で、ここで生まれたとされています。
従前の中国風の書風から脱皮して和風書道の基礎を築き上げた人物で、源氏物語の中でも「今風で美しく目にまばゆく見える」と評されています。
自分の書の才能に悩んでいたある雨の日のこと。散歩に出かけると、一匹のカエルが柳の葉につかまろうと必死に飛び跳ねている姿を見ました。柳は地面から離れたところにあったので、「カエルは柳に飛びつけるわけがない」と思っていましたが、たまたま風が吹いて柳の枝が大きくしなり、カエルはうまく飛び移ることに成功しました。
道風はこれを見てハッとして「自分はこのカエルの努力はしていない」と目を覚まし、書をやり直すきっかけとなったということです。
この逸話は花札の「柳に小野道風」の絵柄にもなりました。
Ono Tofu was an aristocrat and calligrapher of the Heian period (794-1185), and is said to have been born here.
He is said to have broken away from the traditional Chinese style of calligraphy and laid the foundation for Japanese calligraphy, which is described in the Tale of Genji as "modern, beautiful, and dazzling to the eye.
One rainy day, when he was worried that he had no talent for calligraphy, he went out for a walk and saw a frog repeatedly hopping around trying to jump onto a willow leaf. Since the willow was far away from the ground, he thought that the frog could not jump onto the willow, but the wind happened to blow, causing the willow branch to bend, and the frog successfully jumped over.
He saw this and thought to himself, "I didn't make the same effort as this frog," and this is what inspired him to start calligraphy again.
This anecdote became the design for the Hanafuda (Japanese playing cards) game "Willow and Frog.
