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A-Yokai-A-Day: The Woman’s Ikiryō; or, The Divine Power of a Yoritsuke

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For those of you keeping count, today’s story is number 99 in Shokoku hyakumonogatari! That is a big deal. Not just because, wow, it’s been a lot of work and a long journey, but also because the penultimate episode has to carry the weight of everything that came before it, and set up for the final story coming next.

I think today’s story manages to do that.

Today’s story deals with another ikiryō, which for a long period was one of the scariest types of ghosts Japanese believed in. Just imagine if someone you wronged — or not even that you wrong but someone who was just jealous of you — had the power to curse you to death, with or without being aware of it! Even in the Edo period, when a lot of people no longer believed in ghosts or yokai, belief in curses remained fairly strong. An ikiyrō was a lot more believable than many types of monsters.

This story features a lot of really cool imagery. It’s downright cinematic, I will say. It has the fire altar, the young shrine maiden painted with calligraphy, a magic talisman and gohei. Then there’s the chanting priest, the exorcism, the 120 candles… and the climax scene right out of a movie when (spoiler alert) the ghost flaps her sleeves, extinguishing the candles and the life of the wife. WOW! And then the brutally violent ending. Phew!

Unfortunately the story is not written very well. This is one where I think Lafcadio Hearn’s flowery touch would do a lot more for the story than the simple way it’s written. I’ve translated it in my usual style — staying as true to the original text as possible — but boy did I fight the temptation to elaborate and expand certain areas where it just felt… not written well.

Here’s one example: 120 candles. Why not 99 candles? It’s the 99th story… And that would also evoke the ao andon, the ghost who appears at the end of the ghost story telling party (and my favorite yokai). Also, the author names Tokiwa before the priest’s epic line: “REVEAL YOUR TRUE FORM!” spoiling the big reveal.

Honestly this is one of my favorite stories in the book. It just needs to be written better.

Oh, and one last thing before getting to today’s story: As of today, we received the OK from Japan Post to resume shipping parcels to the US from our webstore. US readers can now place orders once again on the yokai.com web shop.

Okay, on to #99!

The Woman’s Ikiryō; or, The Divine Power of a Yoritsuke

In Sagami Province there was a man named Nobuhisa who came from a high-ranking family. His wife was the daughter of a man named Toki Genshun. She was a woman of renowned beauty, and Nobuhisa’s love for her had no bounds. She had a maidservant named Tokiwa. Tokiwa was no less beautiful than Nobuhisa’s wife, and Nobuhisa visited her bed frequently. After that, Tokiwa served her mistress with utter devotion.

One day the wife fell ill, and her condition gradually grew worse and worse. Nobuhisa grew suspicious and thought, “Perhaps this is due to some person’s jealousy.”

He hired a renowned priest to perform an exorcism for her. The priest brought his scriptures and pondered her condition.

“This illness is caused by a person’s ikiryō possessing her. If I use a yoritsuke on her, it should reveal the person whose spirit is possessing her,” said the priest.

Nobuhisa replied, “I beg you to do what is best.”

The priest had a girl of twelve or thirteen stripped naked, then he painted the Lotus Sutra on her body and placed gohei in both of her hands. He gathered one hundred and twenty priests and had them recite the Lotus Sutra, and he set up an altar at the bedside of the sick woman. He lit one hundred and twenty candles and burned various fine incenses, and chanted the sutra without pause. As expected, the twelve or thirteen year old girl used as the yoritsuke began to babble. The priest chanted the sutra with even more intensity, and Tokiwa appeared above the altar.

The priest said, “Reveal your true form!”

At this, Tokiwa’s clothing transformed into an elegant uchikake kimono, and, with one flap of her sleeve, all one hundred and twenty candles blew out. At the same moment the fires were extinguished, the wife passed away.

Nobuhisa was incensed. He had Tokiwa brought forth and, as an offering to his wife’s soul, executed her by quartering.

A-Yokai-A-Day: How Ōmori Hikogorō’s Wife Died and then Came Back to Play Sugoroku

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I think tonight’s ghost story is a sweet one. I like it especially because this ghost is exactly the kind of ghost I would hope to become: one that comes back only to play board games.

Sugoroku is a famous Japanese board and dice game that originated in ancient China and came to Japan in the 8th century. It has evolved several variations; the one being discussed in this story is called “ban-sugoroku,” which is a game similar to backgammon. The best known variation is called “e-sugoroku” and is popular with young children today, although this is a different game than ban-sugoroku and more resembles games like Snakes and Ladders, where you throw dice and progress along a board track. This version became popular in the Edo period due to the printing press, and countless variations were created based on any theme you could imagine — novels, travel spots, even yokai!

Here’s an example of a yokai sugoroku game from the Edo period. How many yokai can you identify?

Meanwhile, ban-sugoroku also appears in lots of artwork and looks like this:

So how about it — would you play board games with a ghost?

How Ōmori Hikogorō’s Wife Died and then Came Back to Play Sugoroku

In Kameyama, Tanba Province, there lived a retainer named Ōmori Hikogorō, with a fief of 300 koku. His wife was famed for her beauty, however she died in childbirth. Hikogorō grieved deeply, but there was nothing else he could do.

His wife had an attendant who had served them since the age of seven. This girl grieved so bitterly that she attempted to kill herself fourteen or fifteen times within seven days. They somehow managed to calm her down, and eventually three years passed.

Hikogorō’s family members pressured him into once again taking a wife. His second wife was highly versed in propriety for a woman, and kept the first wife in her thoughts by performing daily prayers for her at the family altar, so that everybody said that surely the first wife rejoiced beneath the soil.

While the first wife was alive she loved sugoroku, and she was always playing with her attendant. Even after she died, perhaps due to her attachment to the game, she appeared every night for those three years to play sugoroku with her attendant.

One night the attendant said, “It has been three years that you’ve come here nightly to play with me. Ever since I was seven you’ve cared for me, and now I have grown into an adult. No matter how long I remain a servant, I could never repay your kindness. However, now I have a new mistress, and if it was ever discovered that you were visiting me every night, it might seem as though you came to bear a grudge against her. From now on, please do not come anymore.”

The dead wife replied, “Truly as you say, nobody would guess that I was actually attached to this sugoroku game. From this day forward, I will not come here.”

Saying this, she left. However, afterward, when the attendant told this story to Hikogorō and his wife, they said, “So that’s what it was?” And they had a sugoroku board made and placed before the first wife’s grave as an offering, and prayed for her with deep affection.

A-Yokai-A-Day: The Ugume of Tsuru-no-hayashi

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Comedy and horror go together like pizza and beer, and tonight’s story mixes the two together very well (comedy and horror, that is).

The story references a creature called an ugume, which is just a corruption of the yokai known as ubume. This is a complex yokai with a long history. While ubume is usually thought of as a ghostly woman (thanks to Toriyama Sekien’s illustration), it has a complex history and was originally depicted as a bird that screams like a human baby. In the end, however, the monster in this story turned out not to be an ugume, but something more mundane like aosagibi.

Now, there is some kind of bird living in the mountain just outside my studio that calls several times per day. It repeats three or four times in a row and it sounds like a screaming child. The call travels really far, so I can never see just what type of bird this is. I have no idea what it could be, but it’s got such a unique cry that I really want to figure it out. Listening to this bird so often yet never seeing it, it’s not hard for me to imagine the fear that people centuries ago might have felt at hearing unfamiliar, eerie cries coming from the forests.

The Ugume of Tsuru-no-hayashi

Around the first year of Kan’ei (1624), there was a mausoleum called Tsuru-no-hayashi in the eastern part of Kyōto. Every night a monster called an ugume would come here and wail like a crying infant. Nobody dared pass by after dark, and the back gate was locked up tight so that nobody could enter.
One person heard about this and said, “I will go see this for myself.”

So, one rainy night when there was a sense of dread in the air, he went to Tsuru-no-hayashi and waited for the ugume. Sure enough, at the fifth hour (around 8pm), a blue flame about the size of a parasol floated up from the direction of the Shirakawa River. As it drew near, just as people described, there was the sound of a crying infant. The man drew his sword and leaped at it, cutting it in two. The pieces fell with a thud, and he stabbed them again, shouting in a loud voice, “I killed the monster! Come here! Come here!”

The people nearby lit torches and gathered to see. It turned out to be a large night heron. Everyone burst into laughter and went home, saying that it was a silly thing to be frightened of.

A-Yokai-A-Day: The Hazing of Matsuzakaya Jindayū’s Wife

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Tonight’s story is rather creepy, for more than one reason. The obvious reason is the creepy ikiryō smiling at Jindayū’s wife Oichi. Yikes! But the other reason is this hazing ritual described in the story.

The term “hazing” is the closest way I could translate this strange tradition/ritual that I only learned about after reading this story. The tradition is called “uwanari uchi” and it means “beating the second wife.” This custom went on from the Heian period through the early Edo period, and it occurred when a husband divorced his first wife and married another. The former wife would send notice to the house of the new wife, and then she would come over and beat her up. The notice would say something like “Prepare yourself accordingly; we shall arrive on such-and-such date to carry out the beating.” Then, on the appointed day, a group of attendants, guards, maidservants, etc. would arrive at the new wife’s residence armed with bamboo swords, burst in through the kitchen, and start beating people, breaking items, damaging property, and so on.

That alone is pretty terrifying, but made even worse when the one doing the beating is a spirit who can curse you with a touch!

The Hazing of Matsuzakaya Jindayū’s Wife

In the Nakadachiuri area of Kyōto’s Muromachi lived a rich widow. She had no children, so she had adopted her younger sister’s daughter and raised her. The child grew into a woman of beautiful features, and men from all over fell in love with her.

In that neighborhood lived a man named Matsuzakaya Jindayū. His wife was a deeply jealous woman, and whenever Jindayū went out she had someone follow him. Jindayū found this so bothersome that he divorced her. After that, he called for the widow’s daughter, and before long she became pregnant. When she was staying in the maternity house, on the seventh night after her child was born, she heard the door to the maternity house slide open and shut twice. The wife, whose name was Oichi, was puzzled by this and went to see. There stood a woman of eighteen or nineteen years, wearing a white kimono with a white obi, her hair loose and disheveled, with thin eyebrows. The woman seemed to be grinning at Oichi, but it was most certainly a hate-filled glare.

Oichi was startled. She screamed and fainted. The others were alarmed and called out to her, trying to wake her, and she gradually came to her senses.

Thirty days passed and the woman again came to Oichi’s bedside and said, “That day we met for the first time. Truly you are a despicable person, and I have come to express my resentment.”

Then she struck Oichi on the back hard and disappeared. From that moment Oichi fell ill, and she eventually passed away. This was a manifestation of the first wife’s jealousy.

A-Yokai-A-Day: How Attachment to Money Became a Strange Light in Tsu, Ise Province

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Today’s story exemplifies some of Edo period Japan’s cherished ideals. The character is a poor peddler, yet he shows both bravery and filial piety — two traits usually considered to be very “samurai” in spirit. As a reward, he becomes rich and gets to care for his beloved parents in the best way possible. Not all yokai stories are as moralizing as this one, although plenty are. But it is nice to have a happy ending once in a while, and not just tragic death like last night’s story!

How Attachment to Money Became a Strange Light in Tsu, Ise Province

In a place called Ieshiro Village in Tsu, Ise Province, there was a house in which a monster lived, and which had stood vacant for some thirty years. Long ago, the couple who lived in this house both died from a sudden illness, and because they had no children, their family died out.

Sometimes strange lights would appear, while sometimes fires would ignite. And other times male and female voices could be heard saying, “This is your fault!” and “No, this is your fault, and I am suffering for it!” and things like that.

One time a peddler from Kyōto, around twenty years old, came to this place. When the locals told him about the apparitions, the peddler said, “Tonight I will go and see this monster for myself.”

The locals told him, “That’s pointless. Even the samurai from here could not endure a single night there and fled.”

The peddler’s parents were both still living. He was a pious son who had been supporting them as a traveling merchant since the age of eleven, yet he was poor and things did not usually go the way he wished. However, he was an experienced man, and so he said, “In any case, I will go and see this monster. In this world, there are no monsters except those in our hearts.”

That night he went to the house and, as expected, right at the hour of the rat (around midnight) two balls of fire arose out of the well and lit up the inside of the house. It was too terrifying to describe in words. After that, an elderly couple with snow-white hair appeared and said to the peddler:

“We are the masters of this house. We died together, due to a sudden illness, but we stashed a great amount of gold and silver in this well. Our souls are attached to this money, and so we cannot float up to heaven but have been trapped in the space between worlds for over thirty years. If someone were to live in this house, we would tell this to them, and ask them to perform our funeral; however, everyone is too scared to come close. You have a brave heart, and on top of that you love your parents, so we give this money to you. Take good care of your parents, and also perform a funeral for us. This coming August 5th will be the 33rd anniversary of our deaths.”

Then they vanished into thin air.

The peddler rejoiced, and when he looked inside the well he saw countless gold and silver coins. He drew it all up, and with that money he built a temple on the house’s estate, hired a priest, and held a splendid funeral. From then on, the strange lights never appeared again.

Afterwards, the peddler returned to his parents in Kyōto with the remainder of the money, and cared for them as his heart desired.

Everybody was moved by the peddler’s actions, and said that this was all possible thanks to his filial piety.

A-Yokai-A-Day: How Kurita Saemon-no-suke’s Wife Died and Came Back to Wrestle

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Hello readers!

Today is October 1st, and that means two things:

1) My Kickstarter is live! Check it out here, and remember that if you pledge today you get a free metal yokai pin badge as an early bird reward! We’ve already had an amazing launch day so far, so thank you to everyone who has already joined!

2) It’s time for A-Yokai-A-Day, my annual tradition going back to 2009, where I paint and introduce one yokai every day to celebrate Halloween month (the best month of the year)!

If you’re new to A-Yokai-A-Day, you can read the archives here on my blog. For the past three years, I have been translating Shokoku hyakumonogatari (One Hundred Stories from Various Provinces), an edo period collection of 100 ghost stories, during A-Yokai-A-Day. You can catch yourself up and read the first 93 stories here: part 1, part 2, part 3.

If you did the math, you’ll know that there are only 7 stories left in Shokoku hyakumonogatari. Once those are done, I will move on to sharing selected stories from Mimibukuro (Ear Bag). Mimibukuro is a collection of stories from all around Japan heard by a samurai who was working on Sado Island in the Edo period. He collected 1000 stories in many volumes. Not all of them are ghost/yokai stories, but many are, and I will be picking out tales from those. If you enjoy these stories, remember there are years of A-Yokai-A-Day to comb through, so please check them out!

So! Before we move on to today’s story and the start of A-Yokai-A-Day, I will do one last Kickstarter plug! If you like the style of stories found in A-Yokai-A-Day, then you will absolutely want to check out my Kickstarter! Unlike my previous 5 books, which are all encyclopedic in style, Echizen-Wakasa Kidan is a collection of translated tales, just like Shokoku hyakumonogatari. Backers will get to have their name printed in the book as a thank you for making this project come to life. And we have some amazing and unique traditional Japanese crafts on offer as well. I hope you’ll join!

Ok, now on to today’s story!

How Kurita Saemon-no-suke’s Wife Died and Came Back to Wrestle

In the household of the lord of Kaga lived a samurai named Kurita Saemon-no-suke who held a fief of 800 koku. His wife was the daughter of another retainer within the same household and renowned for her beauty, however, she suffered from tuberculosis and died. Saemon-no-suke was overcome with grief, and lived for three years without taking a new wife, but then his relatives came by and strongly pressured him to remarry. They introduced him to the seventeen year old daughter of Nitta Rokurōbei from Owari, a samurai of 500 koku.

Thirty days passed, and Saemon-no-suke was placed on watch duty at the castle. His new wife was reclining by the kotatsu when an eighteen or nineteen year old girl wearing a white kimono with circular patterns on it and a silk kerchief approached her bed. The girl said to the wife, “You there, what are you doing here?”

The wife was surprised, and she replied, “Who are you to speak to me in such a manner?”

“I am the lady of this house,” replied the girl.

Hearing this, the wife replied, “I know nothing about that, for I was only recently married into this house. Your anger is quite justified. However, Lord Saemon-no-suke’s actions are unbecoming of a samurai. To have a wife as beautiful as you and then to take another wife is extremely infuriating. I believe Lord Saemon-no-suke will return early tomorrow morning, however, as we are both women, please allow me enough time to speak with him on this matter.”

“Take as much time as you need, and then return to your family. Well now, I am satisfied,” said the woman. Then she turned to leave and vanished into thin air.

When Saemon-no-suke returned from the castle, his wife said, “Please grant me a divorce.”

“What would make you say this all of a sudden! Tell me what happened,” he said.

“My lord, you have done something unbecoming of a samurai. You married me while you already had a lawful wife. It is such a dirty thing to do! Please grant me a divorce this instant,” she begged.

Saemon-no-suke replied, “I have no idea what you are talking about. As I told you when we first met, my wife died three years ago, and since then I have had no other wife except for you!”

He swore to this firmly. Then, his wife told him everything about the woman who appeared the previous night.

Hearing this, Saemon-no-suke said, “Well now, that must have been the ghost of my wife who died three years ago. There can be no other explanation. Upon this I will stake my life. Therefore, you must stay here. I will not grant you a divorce.”

His word was final, and the wife had no choice but to stay.

Later, on a night when Saemon-no-suke was watching the castle again, the first wife returned and said, “Well, well. Even though you made a firm promise before, you have not returned to your family. How bitterly I resent you!”

The wife replied, “My lady, you are no longer part of this world. Why do you remain so deeply attached to this world? You must return to your own world.”

The first wife replied, “If you refuse to go back to your family, then let us wrestle for it. If you lose, you will return to your family. If I lose, I will never come here again.”

No sooner had she spoken than she leapt forward. The wife said, “I’m ready!” and met her challenge. As they wrestled, pushing and shoving, Saemon-no-suke returned, and the ghost vanished into thin air.

After that, when Saemon-no-suke was on watch duty, the ghost came to wrestle the wife five times. The wife was deeply distressed by this. She began to lose weight and grew thin, then she fell ill and before long she died.

In her final moments she turned to Saemon-no-suke and said, “The ghost who first came to me in secret, and then appeared over and over again to torment me… I was so afraid of it, but I resolved to endure, because I pledged my life to you upon our marriage. Now I die like this. Please give me a nice funeral. Don’t tell my parents about this.”

Saying this, she passed away. Saemon-no-suke grieved for her, and held a funeral. He wrote a farewell letter and sent it to her parents, then he became a monk, and traveled throughout the country practicing Buddhist teachings.

Count Down to Launch!

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Hey everyone! We’re just over two weeks away from the launch of my next Kickstarter. How exciting!

This October, in addition to A-Yokai-A-Day, I will be running a Kickstarter to launch my newest book Echizen-Wakasa Kidan – a book of yokai, ghosts, and strange tales from Fukui Prefecture.

What’s even cooler is that we have special rewards for return backers and for early bird backers: a free yokai metal pin badge! If you back during the first day of the campaign (October 1st), you will get a free pin badge of either a hajikkaki or a rokurokubi! And, if you have backed one of my previous Kickstarters, you’ll also get a pin badge! (If you are a return backer AND and early bird backer, you will get both!)

But perhaps most exciting of all, I will be also offering unique add-on rewards only available during this Kickstarter. These rewards are made by local artisans here in Fukui who are experts in the ancient, traditional crafts produced in this prefecture for centuries.

This is the first time I’ve collaborated with local craftspeople to produce traditional, artisanal goods, but it is something I have wanted to do for many years. Here’s a sampling of the rare goods I will be offering during the Kickstarter:

washi art prints of my yokai paintings

a lacquered wash art book with 10 large format prints on washi paper

traditional warōsoku candles with yokai on them

a hand-carved lacquerware dish with a bakeneko

a set of two embossed washi bookmarks featuring yokai from the book

the reverse side of the bookmarks is designed in the style of a protective amule

And these are all in addition to the book, of course, which will be available in ebook, paperback, and a special artisanal hardcover using the finest materials available.

So don’t miss your chance! Sign up for a notification and be ready on October 1st when the campaign launches!