752

Biology

The earliest known reference to a plant virus is made in a poem included in the Man'yoshu ("collection of ten thousand leaves"). The poem, written by the Japanese empress Koken in this year, mentions the unusual summer appearance of leaves on a plant called eupatorium, which is caused by the eupatorium yellow-vein geminivirus. The yellow leaf veins give the plant an autumnal appearance that catches the empress's eye.

After gold is discovered in Japan in 749, work is completed this year on casting and gilding a 16-m- (53-ft-) tall statue of Buddha in Nara, Japan. Cast in bronze in 40 sections, the statue contains more than 450,000 kg (1,000,000 lb) of the alloy of copper, tin, and lead along with several hundred kg of pure gold. See also 494 ce Archaeology; 793 Construction.

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