I like watching noh, Japanese traditional mask play. I would like to talk about my favorite noh program, Koi-no-omo-ni [A heavy load/burden of love].

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This expression appears in the title of of a noh program, Koi-no-omo-ni (A heavy load/burden of love, around in 1423), which was made by Zeami, who was a famous noh composer and player in the 15th century.

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When I heard this expression for the first time, I felt like this, "Oh, this expression sounds cool!"

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I imagined that koi-no-omo-ni, heavy burden of love, indicated a person's struggle in love, such as a situation in which the person felt exhausted from the relationship between his/her romantic partner. I expected this expression had abstract meaning.

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In this noh program, however, this omo-ni appears as a real, heavy load.

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An old man who was in lower social status fell in love with a noble woman. One day, an attendant of the noble woman said to him, "if you lift up this heavy load and walk around again and again, you can meet her. " In reality, however, the load was prepared as an extremely heavy box on purpose. Without knowing the fact, the old man was willing to try to lift up the box in order to meet her. He could not lift it up and finally knew that he was teased by the noble woman and her attendant.

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After that, the old man died of indignation and appeared in front of the noble woman as a ghost. The ghost heavily blamed her.

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In this program, it is interesting that omo-ni indicates a real heavy load. I think it is easier for the modern Japanese-speaking people to imagine the metaphor, heavy burden first, rather than to find the original meaning, heavy load.

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In the modern Japanese, the word omo-ni mainly represents the metaphor of a heavy load, "burden". When we want to express a heavy load, we can say omo-i nimotsu.**

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** Omo-ni consists of one word,

omo         - ni

adj (root) - noun

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while omo-i + nimotsu consists of two words.

omo           - i                                               + nimotsu

adj (root)   - inflectional suffix, modifying the next noun  + noun

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Interestingly, however, according to the largest Japanese dictionary, Nihon-kokugo-dai-jiten [Shogakukan Unabridged Dictionary of the Japanese Language], koi-no-"omo-ni" is shown as the first example of representing the meaning, burden, in the word, omo-ni. 

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In sum, the expression, koi-no-omo-ni has double meanings, that is, a real heavy load that the old man tried to lift up to meet her and the old man's struggle (burden) in love. In addition, according to the dictionary, we can consider that the metaphor of a heavy load, "burden" in the word omoni has been used at least for six hundred years in Japan!

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