Tonight’s story came to Negishi Yasumori from Andō Sōtai, who told him the story a few days back about the mysterious grave with a posthumous Buddhist name already written on it. The theme in both of these stories is similar, so I wonder of he had a particular fondness for this kind of name-related kidan, or if one story happened to job his memory about the other.

The idea of children writing or drawing premonitions of death has become such a trope in Hollywood these days that it can feel stale—but here we can see that this has been a thing for much longer, before Hollywood even existed!

I guess “creepy children” is a universal horror theme that crosses both time and cultures.

A Matter Difficult to Determine as Not Being Supernatural

Among the retainers of Andō Sōtai was a man named Kōemon—I forget his surname. This Kōemon initially had two sons. One of them was, by the age of five or six, exceptionally intelligent, and could read and write and write at a level that was remarkable for a child of his age. This boy died at the age of seven.

Shortly before his death, claiming he had been given a posthumous Buddhist name, he wrote the two characters for “Rōkyū” on several sheets of paper. His parents considered this to be ominous and scolded him, trying to stop him—but he paid them no need and continued to write them.

Since he died shortly after, they sent word to their family temple and made arrangements for the funeral. When the temple assigned the boy a posthumous Buddhist name, however, they bestowed upon him the name Ryōkyū. The family asked the temple priest if he had heard this name from them, the priest replied that he knew not the slightest thing about it.

Everybody sighed in wonder at this strange coincidence, so the story goes.