Where does “書き下し文” come from?

書き下し文 (Japanese) comes from Japanese 文, from Middle Chinese 文.

書き下し文 (Japanese): Kanbun texts rewritten to add kana and show the intended kundoku reading

Definitions

  1. Kanbun texts rewritten to add kana and show the intended kundoku reading

Ancestry of “書き下し文”, step by step

書き下し文 traces back through two separate lines of ancestry.

via Japanese

StepLanguageWordMeaning
1Japanesethe mon, an old currency; a unit of length for...
2Middle Chinese

via Japanese 書き下し

StepLanguageWordMeaning
1Japanese書き下し
Every word from Middle Chinese Every word from Japanese