Жапон тіліндегі манъёгана жазу жүйесі

System of writing Japanese based solely on Chinese characters

is an ancient writing system that uses Chinese characters to represent the Japanese language. It was the first known kana system to be developed as a means to represent the Japanese language phonetically. The date of the earliest usage of this type of kana is not clear, but it was in use since at least the mid 7th century. The name "man'yōgana" derives from the Man'yōshū, a Japanese poetry anthology from the Nara period written with man'yōgana. Texts using the system also often use Chinese characters for their meaning, but man'yōgana refers to such characters only when they are used to represent a phonetic value. The values were derived from the contemporary Chinese pronunciation, but native Japanese readings of the character were also sometimes used. For example, 木 (whose character means 'tree') could represent (based on Middle Chinese ), , or (meaning 'tree' in Old Japanese). Simplified versions of man'yōgana eventually gave rise to both the hiragana and katakana scripts, which are used in Modern Japanese.

Scholars from the Korean kingdom of Baekje are believed to have introduced the man'yōgana writing system to the Japanese archipelago. The chronicles Kojiki and the Nihon shoki both state so; though direct evidence is hard to come by, scholars tend to accept the idea. A possible oldest example of man'yōgana is the iron Inariyama Sword, which was excavated at the Inariyama Kofun in 1968. In 1978, X ray analysis revealed a gold inlaid inscription consisting of at least 115 Chinese characters, and this text, written in Chinese, included Japanese personal names, which were written for names in a phonetic language. This sword is thought to have been made in the year 辛亥年 (471 AD in the commonly accepted theory). There is a strong possibility that the inscription of the Inariyama Sword may be written in a version of the Chinese language used in Baekje.