Greetings yokai fans! It’s the final hours of January, so I’m glad I could get this to you before the month ticks over.
While writing this guys name out, it reminds me of how much I hate writing yokai names in English. There are so many different styles of transcribing Japanese into English, and none of them are perfect. Some people would spell this yokai en-en-ra, some would write en’enra or en’en’ra. And then of course there are long yokai names like rokujounomiyasundokoro who need plenty of spaces and macrons to make their names legible in English, but where do you put the spaces?
I use modified Hepburn to write yokai names, which is the most common form of Romanization used today. It is the best version out there, in my opinion, but it still has a few flaws. For example, there’s no way to tell if the name is written えんえんら or えねんら by looking at the English, unless of course you use hyphens, spaces, or apostrophes, which usually ends up looking ridiculous.
I try only to use spaces when 1) it’s necessary to make the name actually legible in English letters, and 2) there is a natural, logical word break where I can insert the spaces. There aren’t really established rules for spacing words out, so it’s a bit of a personal preference thing. But I can tell you this: because of all the potential spelling variants, it’s a nightmare for SEO and blog rankings!
Anyway, today’s yokai:
煙々羅
えんえんら
TRANSLATION: smokey fabric
ALTERNATE NAMES: enra enra
HABITAT: chimneys, bonfires
DIET: combustible materials
APPEARANCE: Enenra is a yōkai made up of wisps of smoke, which rise up into the sky from a fires, such as the takibi bonfires which farmers light to dispose of the remains of their harvests. As the smoke rises, human-like faces appear and disappear in its form.
BEHAVIOR: Enenra is essentially just a personification of smoke. It floats about as it climbs into the air, billowing in the wind, and appearing as fragile as a piece of delicate silk dancing in the breeze. It is mesmerizing and relaxing to watch.
ORIGIN: Enenra was invented by Toriyama Sekien for his book Konjaku hyakki shūi. It seems to be loosely based on a passage in Tsurezure gusa which describes the smoke rising from fires burned in the summer to keep mosquitoes away. Contemporary yokai scholars have also pointed out that this yōkai’s name sounds similar to the name Enma, the lord of hell and judge of the dead. As hell is a place of fire and smoke, it has been suggested that instead of the spirit of smoke itself, enenra may actually be the spirits of the dead rising up along with the smoke. For that reason, enenra only appears before those who are calm and pure of heart and mind.