Hiragana
In the past, hiragana was considered women's writing, while men wrote in kanji. Since kanji are convenient for writing in Chinese but not as convenient for Japanese, it was women, such as Murasaki Shikibu, who wrote the first hiragana books, poems and songs. Later the Buddhist clerics, such as Rennyo (d. 1498), wrote in hiragana to make their religious messages easier to read, so more people could read them.