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The history and cultivation of the Japanese morning glory The flower does not open, but instead takes the shape of a ball. It is therefore called a balloon. This is one of the morning glory mutants, too.

The seeds, when spread over a corner of a garden, germinate and bloom like wildflowers. At the end of August, small flowers bloom. Like the cherry tree and chrysanthemum, the morning glory is a representative flower of Japan. The morning glory has been indispensable in Japanese summers ever since the old days because the flower blooms in the cool air of early morning, so it. Then is the morning glory native to Japan?

It is said that the morning glory came from China in the Nara era (710-784). In China, the seeds of the morning glory have been called Qian Niu Zi ("Kenigoshi" or"Kengoshi") and used as a medicine. After it was introduced to Japan, it was cultivated as a medicinal herb for long time. The oil of the seed contains a laxative, and it is still used for this purpose as a Chinese medicine.

Let's make a wall of the morning glory by using a porch or a garden fence to support the vines.

Because the plant called Kengoshi has a beautiful flower that opens in the early morning, it gradually became known as the morning glory ("Asagao�V). It seems that the plant had a small round flower with an ordinary leaf when it was first imported from China. The flowers were blue. The morning glory with dark blue flowers is drawn in "Heike Nokyo". These are scrolls of the Sutra produced by the Taira family and dedicated to Ituskushima Shrine at Hiroshima (1164).

Hence the morning glory came to be used as a subject of drawings in a picture scroll and a fusuma picture. So we know that the plant was used not only as a medicinal herb but also, eventually, as an enjoyable flower.

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