The book has a selection of 191 poems from the Manyoshu (Collection of Ten Thousand Leaves), and 395 poems (398 poems in the revised edition) from Imperial waka poem anthologies up to the Senzai Wakashu (Collection of Japanese Poems of a Thousand Years), with a history of waka poems.
万葉集から191首、千載和歌集までの勅撰和歌集から395首（再撰本では398種）を抄出している。