As G.G. Rowley notes in the preface to her lovingly researched, elegantly written study of Imperial concubine Nakanoin Nakako, the history of her subject's period, the late 16th and early 17th centuries, "has traditionally been written as the history of men." In addition to the greater importance historians focusing on Japan have traditionally attached to the lives of powerful men — emperors ranking higher on the scale than their wives and mistresses — there is another, more practical reason, as Rowley admits: With men "there is so much more material to go on."
Her own subject is a case in point. Despite living a long and eventful life, Nakako left behind no literary remains, not even a letter. "This makes difficulties," Rowley notes, "though they are not insurmountable."