Several writers have noted the strong historical tradition of open bisexuality and homosexuality among male Buddhist institutions in Japan. Despite the fact that isolated reports of homosexual cases date back to the earliest period of written history in Japan (the eighth century AD), Buddhists were the first to engage in public rationalization of pederasty, and it is due to them, therefore, that a homosexual culture emerged in Japan in subsequent centuries. When the Tendai priest Genshin harshly criticised homosexuality as immoral, others mistook his criticism as having been because the acolyte wasn't one's own. "Chigo Monogatari", "acolyte stories" of love between monks and their "chigo" were popular, and such relationships appear to have been commonplace, alongside sex with women.