The Yokai – Mythical creatures of Japan

Mythical creatures of Japan folklore never fails to fascinate me. I used to browse at the asian section of the library and browse through the Ukiyo-e Japanese woodprints books. I wish that Japanese would make more folklore based horror films instead of the generic cheesy shock films. Here are the list of Japanese ghosts and monsters.

tanuki Tanuki
The mischievous shape shifting Japanese racoon dog. They are often seen with a cone shaped hats, sake bottles and empty purse. Also they are commonly identified with extemely large testicles that they used it as drums or flung it over their backs like knapsack.

Traits
Tanuki rarely harms humans except few stories where a tanuki kills an old lady and serves her as soup to her husband. Often times the Tanuki loves to play tricks on people by transforming into an object.
kappa Kappa
Water diety with an ape-like appearance and thick scaly shell on the back. Sometimes they have duck like beaks. The Kappa dwells in the ponds and rivers. Their strength comes from the water inside the hole on the top of their head. To weaken the Kappa, one should trick them into spilling the water on their head. It can be achieved by making the Kappa give a courtesy bow.

Traits
Not only the Kappa are mischievous but they are also malicious as well. They are known to kidnap children and adults then eat them. However, they befriend humans in return for gifts and offerings.
tengu Tengu
Anthromorphic bird-like creature with unusualy large nose. They are also known as the harbingers of war. Tengu are also spirits that protect the mountains and forest. One of their main accessory is a feathered fan that has the ability to make one’s nose grow or shrink. Pride and arrogance are often associated with Tengu.

Traits
Tengu are known to cause trouble to pious priests and those devoted to Buddhism. By possesing a woman, they seduce the priest to make them stumble. They sometimes give the unholy powers to Buddhist devotees. Boys and priests are often abducted by Tengu but they’re usually unharmed.
oni Oni
The demons and ogres of Japanese folklore. One of their recognizable feature are the tiger print loin-cloth and large club. Besides having two horns on their heads, they have irregular number of eyes.

Traits
The Oni are associated with bad omens and disasters. Not only they play mischievous tricks on humans, they devour them as well.

Nukekubi Nukekubi
They may look like ordinary humans by day but by night they are capable of detaching their heads from their body. The heads can fly on it’s own, but the body is immobile.

Traits
As soon as their head detaches from the body, they fly in search for possible human victims. They attack by screaming at their victims and bites them.
kitsune Kitsune
The fox in Japanese folklore. The western counterpart of the fox are portrayed as the cunning tricksters, the oriental fox are depicted as wise, intelligent and loyal. It is believed that the intelligence of the Kitsune are measured according to the number of their tails.

Traits
The Kitsune are the messengers of the Kami due to their high intelligence. Sometimes they take the form of a woman and be a wife to a human. While they rarely cause harm to humans, there are cases where they feed on the life essense of human beings through sexual intercourse.
shinigami Shinigami
They are known as the god of death or the grim reaper. Not much folklore stories depicted the presence shinigami since they derived from europe. But they are getting more exposure in modern pop culture such as manga, movies and anime.

Traits
The shinigami usually appears to the dying person and brings them to the land of the dead or a chance to be reincarnated.
wanyudo Wanyudo
This strange looking spirit is known as the guardian of the gates of hell. He takes on the appearance of a burning wheel with a detached head.

Traits
Once in a while he travels from hell to earth with the intention of scaring people and stealing souls when some people gets close to him.
ningyo Ningyo
Known as the mermaid of Japan. Far from looking glamorous, these creatures have fish scales, have apelike face and fish teeth.

Traits
Despite their strange looking appearance they’re more or less harmless. However, if fisherman happens to catch a Ningyo, they must toss it back to the sea or else calamities will strike their village. It is believed that if one will consume a ningyo flesh, they will retain their youthful appearance for eternity and will live longer.
rokurokubi Rokurokubi
While the Rokurokubi may look like a common human being by day but at night they are able to stretch their necks at great length. They are also capable of changing their faces.

Traits
The Rokurokubi used to be normal human beings but were cursed for breaking the Buddhism code of conduct. Despite trying to live a normal life, the Rokurokubi loves to play tricks with the mortals by scaring them at night. But their usual prank victims are limited to drunkards and visually impaired humans. One of their malicious traits are eating and drinking blood of humans.
akaname Akaname
These hideous looking creatures look like frog and have very long tongue. A single claw protrudes on each of the foot.

Traits
Despite having monstrous appearance, the akaname are harmless. They are bound to show up on filthy bathrooms at night and lick off the dirt. Makes me kinda wish the Akaname’s exist for real since my room and bathroom could use some cleaning.
yuki onna Yuki-Onna
She’s a beautiful spirit with long raven hair and porcelain white skin. Legend has it that she appears on winter nights and sometimes naked. Travellers would tremble in fear if they happened to cross the path of Yuki Onna. It could mean death to them.

Traits
It is said that she kills her victims by freezing them with her icy breath. If she happens to fancy the victim, she will drain his life essence by having intercourse with him or with a kiss.
nurikabe Nurikabe
The spirit is takes in the shape of a wall. They have the ability to stretch themselves endlessly.

Traits
The nurikabe is usually harmless but they love to play tricks on travellers. They block the roads to prevent the travellers from going through. The only way travellers can go through the way is to kick the lower area of Nurikabe to make it disappear.

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Wednesday, April 15th, 2009 at 3:14 amand is filed under Urban Legends. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

2 Responses to “The Yokai – Mythical creatures of Japan”

  1. casey vasquez Says:
    May 6th, 2011 at 1:14 pm

    this website is the bomb! Yo

  2. Itachi Says:
    November 1st, 2011 at 5:53 pm

    O.o

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