Greeting yokai fans!
Today’s yokai is chochinbi, or lantern fire.
Although it’s a relatively simple yokai, I like it because it exemplifies a number of key yokai traits.
Firstly, it is a common occurrence, but mysterious and unknowable. People see bizarre lights on the horizon in all cultures all over the world, so this story is not unique to any one location. But, when you try to get close to examine what it is, it vanishes! People explain mysterious fires as swamp gas, or refraction of light, or bio-luminescence, but with all of our knowledge we just simply can’t observe them properly.
Secondly, it’s used by other yokai as a light. So it has a strong connection to the spirit world. It’s not so much a strange effect on its own, but it signifies that something even stranger is going on. It also shows how similar to us yokai are; with all their monstrous strangeness, even spirits need to light their way at night so they don’t trip! It keeps yokai from becoming too alien and too unknowable.
Thirdly, it appears on the borders between rice fields; fields of course being the borders between the town and the wild lands; and rice fields being flooded while the footpaths are try makes another sort of border. So this fire exemplifies the way that yokai are creatures of the borderlands. They don’t appear deep in the wilderness away from our eyes, they appear just at the extent of our vision, where we’re a bit too afraid to go, but not so far away that we feel safe from it. It may be a simple observation, but the location where these fires appear is a perfect example of the heart of “yokai-ness.”
Anyway, on to the yokai!
Chōchinbi
提灯火
TRANSLATION: lantern fire
ALTERNATE NAMES: tanukibi, kōemonbi
HABITAT: rural farmlands
APPEARANCE: Chōchinbi are strange orbs of fire which appear on the footpaths separating rice paddies in rural Japanese farmlands. They appear at about the same brightness and height as a handheld paper lantern, or chōchin, which they are named after. The presence of chōchinbi signals that other yōkai may be close by.
BEHAVIOR: Chōchinbi float about in the air a few feet above the paths formed along the borders of paddies. They drift about lazily, but if a human gets too close to them they vanish. They often appear in long rows of dozens of chōchinbi one after another, resembling a string of lanterns.
ORIGIN: Chōchinbi is most frequently said to be the work of kitsune, although it is sometimes attributed to other magical animals. In many places, chōchinbi is said to be the work of tanuki. Occasionally other yōkai are said to use magical fire to light their way in the dark. While chōchinbi is more or less identical to other types of magical fireballs, its distinguishing feature is that it is used as a light source by other spirits.