These lights are different from the typical Japanese kaika (怪火; strange lights), in that the floating fires are said to contain what looks to be small children running around inside of them. This phenomenon is particularly associated with Tsushima city, Nagasaki. Some of these ayakashi no kai...
Neither word has quite the same meaning in Chinese as it does in Japanese. Chinese uses the kanji 鬼 (gui) to mean ghost, which was imported into Japanese as the word “oni.” And the Chinese usage of 妖怪 (yokai) refers specifically to human beings under some sort of supernatural influ...
Guhin is made up of two kanji.狗(gu) meaning “dog” and賓(in) meaning “guest” or “visitor from afar.” These seem innocuous enough, however both have deeper associations. 狗is the kanji used in the name tengu (天狗), which translates literally as “heavenly dog.” Tengu originally ...
According to Japanese legend, baku are the eaters of bad dreams. They are a talismanic figure, that people pray to at night to come and suck away nightmares so that they may never be seen again. But there is a darker side to the baku; some say that baku eat all dreams, not only ni...
the name for the grudge-bearing spirit popular in Japanese horror films. Raigo wouldn’t be seen as an onryo nowadays—his transformation into a rat makes him more of a monster than a ghost. But in the Heian period the word onryo had a more specific meaning, being something with a grudge...
As I have said before, Japanese folklore runs the gambit from funny, to strange, to terrifying. After doing Eyeball Butt, I was in the mood for a monster that was honestly scary. Well, except for looking between a cow’s legs … that’s just weird. ...
and terrible Japanese curse-ritual. It has been performed for millennia—some sources trace it back as far as the Kofun period (250 – 538 CE), although in a different form. While the costume and ritual have changed over the centuries, the basic rite of pounding nails into dolls remains ...
The Taiko of Tsugaru, Tsugaru no Taiko (津軽の太鼓), is one of the Honjo Nana Fushigi (本所七不思議) meaning one of theSeven Wonders of Honjo. Translated and adapted from Japanese Wikipedia and other sources This is a story from the Edo period. ...
Translated and Sourced from Mizuki Shigeru’s Mujyara, Kaii Yokai Densho Database, Japanese Wikipedia, and Other Sources Legends of a Great White Whale usually bring to mind Moby Dick, but the white of this whale is the color of its bones. For bones are
Inen – The Possessing Japanese Ghost Funa Yurei Enju no Jashin – The Evil God in the Pagoda Tree Translated from Edo Tokyo Kaii Hyakumonogatari In July 28th, in the seventh year of Kaei (1854), a sake seller plied his trade between the Kamakura riverbanks and the lower valley. On th...