Today I am sharing another preview of a creature from Echizen-Wakasa Kidan. Tonight’s story comes from Wakasa, the southern part of Fukui Prefecture. Wakasa is home to several famous mermaid myths, and this is one of my favorite ones. I like it for several reasons — the first being that the mermaid is so pathetic and the way she dies is so miserable that I feel bad for her. The second is that there actually was a massive earthquake that happened during the timeline of this story. The 1707 Hōei earthquake was, until March 2011, the most powerful earthquake in Japan’s history. It’s entirely possible that an entire village did in fact sink into the sea during this this event. Could this be the earthquake referenced in the story? It sure seems possible. Hopefully that disastrous quake was not all the responsibility of this one stupid fisherman!

The Emissary of Mizen Myōjin
from Shokoku rijin dan

Mount Mizen (today Mount Aoba) in Wakasa Province was said to be a place where evil spirits dwell, and people would not climb higher up the mountain than the eighth station. According to legend, the emissary of Mizen Myōjin is a mermaid.

This took place during the Hōei era (1704-11). A fisherman from the village of Otomi went out to sea when he saw what looked like a person lying down on top of a rock. Its head was like a human, with a flapping red thing like a chicken’s comb wrapped around its neck, and everything beneath that was fish. The fisherman lightly tapped it with his oar, and it instantly died. The fisherman threw the carcass into the sea and returned to his village, after which a typhoon blew in, and a rumbling noise from the sea was heard non-stop for seven days. Then, about thirty days later, a great earthquake struck, the earth split wide open from the base of Mount Mizen to the seashore, and the entire village of Otomi fell into the chasm. People said that this was the curse of Mizen Myōjin.