Ayakashi (yōkai): Demonic Ghosts of Japan

Ayakashi is the collective name for yōkai that appear on the surface of bodies of water. In Nagasaki Prefecture, the atmospheric ghost lights that appear on the water are called ayakashi, and the funayūrei in Yamaguchi Prefecture and Saga Prefecture are also called ayakashi. In western Japan, ayakashi are said to be the vengeful spirits of those who died at sea and try to capture more people to join them.

On Tsushima Island, they are also called “ayakashi atmospheric ghost lights (ayakashi no kaika),” and they appear on beaches at night, looking as if a child is walking in the middle of a fire. On the coast of Japan, atmospheric ghost lights appear as mountains and block the way, and it is said that they disappear if one does not avoid the mountain and tries to crash into it with intensity.

There is also a popular belief that if a live shark gets stuck at the bottom of a boat, it cannot move, so ayakashi is a synonym for this type of fish. In Sekien Toriyama’s Konjaku Hyakki Shūi, ayakashi are depicted as a large sea serpent, but in reality, they may be ikuchi.

In Kaidanoi no Tsue, a collection of ghost stories from the Edo period, the following story was presented. A long time ago, there was someone who needed water and went to the land in the same way and disappeared. That woman was the ayakashi. “When the boatman put the boat into the sea in a hurry, the woman chased after him and bit the hull of the boat. Without delay, they drove her out by hitting her with the oar and were able to escape.

2. Yōkai as part of Ayakashi

Ayakashi (ghost, phantom, strange apparition) is a class of supernatural monsters, spirits, and demons in Japanese folklore. The word yōkai for the singular of ayakashi is composed of the kanji for “bewitch,” “attractive,” “calamity,” and “specter; apparition; mystery; suspicious.” They can also be called ayakashi, mononoke, or mamono.

Ayakashi often possess animal characteristics (such as the kappa, which resembles a turtle, or the tengu, which has wings), but others appear mostly human. Some ayakashi resemble inanimate objects (such as the tsukumogami), while others have no discernible form.

Ayakashi usually have spiritual or supernaturalabilities, with shape-shifting being the most common. Ayakashi with this shape-shifting ability are called bakemono and obake. Japanese folklorists and historians explain ayakashi as personifications of “supernatural phenomena or irresponsible people.”

In the Edo period, many artists, such as Toriyama Sekien, invented new ayakashi inspired by folk tales or simply their own imagination. Today, many of these fabricated ayakashi are commonly confused with more traditional folklore. Yurei are called yuree in Okinawa, yokai are called majimun, and evil spirits are called yanamun.

3. Concept

What is considered “supernatural” depends on the time period; but in general, the longer the time period, the greater the number of phenomena that were considered supernatural in character or cause. According to Japanese ideas of animism, spirit-like entities called (among other things) mononoke were believed to reside in all things.

Such spirits possessed emotions and personalities. If the spirit was peaceful, it was a nigi-mitama, which brought good fortune, such as abundant harvests. Violent spirits, ara-mitama, brought bad fortune, including disease and natural disasters. One’s ancestors and particularly respected deceased elders could be considered nigi-mitama, accumulating status as protective gods and receiving worship.

Animals, objects, natural features, and phenomena were also venerated as nigi-mitama or propitiated as ara-mitama, depending on the area. The ritual to convert ara-mitama into nigi-mitama was called chinkon (“the calming of spirits”). Chinkon rituals were performed to quell evil spirits, prevent misfortune, and alleviate fear of events and circumstances that could not otherwise be explained.

Ara-mitama that failed to achieve deification due to a lack of sufficient veneration, or that lost its divinity after the wear and tear of worshippers, became ayakashi.

Over time, things that were considered supernatural became fewer and fewer. Meanwhile, depictions of ayakashi in emaki and paintings began to standardize, becoming caricatures and softening their fearsome natures. Elements of yōkai tales were increasingly exploited for public entertainment. The use of yōkai in popular media began in the Middle Ages. However, the mythology and tradition of ayakashi became more defined and formalized during the Edo period and thereafter.

4. Types of Ayakashi

Folklorist Tsutomu Ema studied literature and paintings depicting ayakashi and henge (mutants) and divided them into categories, as presented in Nihon Yōkai Henge Shi and Obake no Rekishi.

Five categories based on the “true form” of ayakashi: human, animal, plant, object, or natural phenomenon.

Four categories based on the source of mutation: related to this world, related to the spiritual and mental, related to reincarnation and the next world, or related to the material.

Seven categories based on external appearance: human, animal, plant, artifact, structure and construction, natural object or phenomenon, and miscellaneous, as well as composite classifications for ayakashi that fall into more than one category.

In traditional Japanese folklore, ayakashi are classified (not unlike nymphs in Greek mythology) by location or phenomenon associated with their manifestation. Ayakashi are indexed in the book Sogo Nihon Minzoku Goi, “A Comprehensive Dictionary of Japanese Folklore,” as follows:

“They are from the mountains, michi to the roads, to the mountains, to the water, to the sea, to the sea, to the snow, to the sound, Dudesutsu for no (animals, real or imaginary).”

5. History

Ancient times were a period rich in literature and folk tales that mentioned and explained ayakashi. Literature such as Kojiki, Nihon Shoki, and various Fudoki, which recount legends from the ancient past, and mentions of oni, orochi, and other types of mysterious phenomena, can already be seen in them, as in the following:

• The first question: he is the book of error. He gave a recommendation to empty the imperial hall “(There is a (monster called ayakashi charming in the palace of long time. The king asks that there be a large hall of concern will be empty), so a “kanji” is used to mean “phenomenon that exceeds human knowledge.”
• The Book of Houki 8: In the Shoku Nihongi, there is a statement: “Shinto purification is performed because ayakashi appear very often in the imperial court.” This does not mean anything in particular, but rather strange phenomena in general.
• Mid-Heian period: In Sei Shōnagon’s The Pillow Book, there is the statement “There are tenacious mononoke,” as well as a statement by Murasaki Shikibu that “mononoke have become quite terrible,” which are the first appearances of the word “mononoke.”

In the Heian period, collections of stories about ayakashi and other supernatural phenomena were published in multiple volumes, beginning with publications such as Nihon Ryōiki and Konjaku Monogatarishū. In these publications, mentions of phenomena such as Hyakki Yagyō can be seen.

The ayakashi that appear in this literature were passed down to later generations. However, despite the fact that the literature mentions and explains these ayakashi, they were never given visual representations. In Buddhist paintings, such as The Hell Scroll (Nara National Museum), which originated in the late Heian period, there are visual expressions of the idea of oni, but actual visual representations would only come later in the Middle Ages, from the Kamakura period onwards.

Yamata no Orochi was originally a local god but became an ayakashi who was killed by Susanoo. Yasaburo was originally a bandit whose vengeful spirit (onryo) became a poisonous snake in death and plagued the water in a rice paddy, but eventually became deified as the “god of well wisdom.”

Kappa and inugami are sometimes treated as gods in one area and ayakashi in other areas. From these examples, it can be seen that among Japanese gods, there are some beings that can go from god to ayakashi and vice versa.

Post-classical history

Medieval Japan was a period of time when publications such as Emakimono, Otogizōshi, and other visual representations of ayakashi began to appear. While there were religious publications such as the Jisha Engi, others, such as the Otogizōshi, were intended more for entertainment, starting the trend in which ayakashi increasingly became subjects of entertainment.

For example, it could be said that stories of the extermination of ayakashi are the result of emphasizing the superior status of human society over ayakashi. Publications included:

• The Ooe-yama Shuten-doji Emaki (about an oni), the Zegaibou Emaki (about a tengu), the Tawara no Touta Emaki (about a giant snake and a centipede), the Tsuchigumo Zoshi (about tsuchigumo), and the Dojo-ji Engi Emaki (about a giant snake). These emaki were about ayakashi from even earlier times.
• The Kitano Tenjin Engi Emaki, in which Sugawara no Michizane was a lightning god who took the form of an oni, and despite attacking people after doing so, was ultimately deified as a god.
• The Junirui Emaki, the Tamamono Soshi (both about Tamamo-no-Mae), and the Fujibukuro Soushi Emaki (about a monkey). These emaki spoke of the mutations of ayakashi from animals.
• The Tsukumogami Emaki, which told stories of discarded objects that came to have a spirit residing in them, planning evil acts against humans, and were eventually exorcised and sent to peace.
• The Hyakki Yagyō Emaki, which shows different types of yōkai marching together.

In this way, ayakashi, which were only mentioned in writing, took on a visual appearance in the Middle Ages. In Otogizoshi, familiar tales such as Urashima Tarō and Issun-bōshi also appeared. The next major change in ayakashi came after the period of warring states, in the Edo period.

Modern history

Other modern stories also deal with Japanese folklore about ayakashi, including :

• “The Heavy Basket” from Shinkei Sanjurokkei Sen by Tsukioka Yoshitoshi (Meiji 25)
• Enpō 6 (1677): Publication of Shokoku Hyakumonogatari, a collection of tales of various monsters.
• Hōei 6 (1706): Publication of Otogi Hyakumonogatari. In volumes such as “Miyazu no Ayakashi” (volume 1) and “Unpin no Ayakashi” (volume 4), collections of tales that appear to originate from China were adapted to a Japanese setting.
• Shōtoku 2 (1712): Publication of Wakan Sansai Zue by Terajima Ryōan, a collection of stories based on the Chinese Sancai Tuhui.
• Shōtoku 6 (1716): In the specialized dictionary Sesetsu Kojien, there is an entry on ayakashi that reads, “Among the commoners of my society, there are many types of kaiji (mysterious phenomena), often mispronounced by commoners as ‘kechi’.
• Tenmei 8 (1788): Publication of the Bakemono Chakutocho by Masayoshi Kitao. This was a Kibyoshi Diagram book of ayakashi, but it was preceded by the phrase “It can be said that the Yokai So-Called in our society is a representation of our feelings that arise from fear,” and already in this era, while it was being investigated and be kai, it indicated that there were people who asked whether yokai really existed or not.

It was in this era that printing and publishing technology began to be widely used, a publishing culture developed, and ayakashi frequently became the subject of kibyoshi and other publications.

As a result, kashi-hon shops that handled such books spread and were widely used, which caused the general public’s impression of each ayakashi to be corrected throughout Japan. For example, before the Edo period, there were many interpretations of what ayakashi classified as kappa were , but due to books and publishing, the notion of kappa became unified into what is now the modern notion of kappa.

Furthermore, including other types of publications, apart from ayakashi born from folk legends, there were also many invented ayakashi that were created through wordplay or puns, and the Gazu Hyakki Hagyopor Sekien Toriyama is an example of that.

Furthermore, when the Hyakumonogatari Kaidankai became popular in the Edo period, it is thought that one of the reasons for the appearance of new yōkai was the demand for entertaining ghost stories about ayakashi that no one had heard of before, which resulted in some ō that were simply made for the purpose of telling an entertaining story, and the kasa-obake and tōfu-kozō are well-known examples of these.

During this period, toys and games such as karuta and sugoroku frequently used ayakashi as characters. Therefore, with the development of a publishing culture, depictions of yōkai that were treasured in temples and shrines were able to become more familiar to people, and it is thought that this is why, although yōkai were originally things to be feared, they have since become characters that people feel close to.

On the other hand, ayakashi introduced through the media are not limited to those that come from classical sources such as folklore, and just as in the Edo period, new fictional ayakashi continue to be invented, such as scary school stories and other urban legends.

As recounted in the book about kuchisake-onna and Hanako-san, giving birth to a new Ayakashi. Starting in 1975, with the popularity of kuchisake-onna, these urban legends began to be referred to in the mass media as “modern ayakashi.” This terminology was also used in recent publications dealing with urban legends, and Ayakashi researcher Bintarō Yamaguchi used it especially frequently.

6. In the media

There are several types of Ayakashi found in folklore and in art and literature inspired by folklore.

Famous works and authors

• The Gazu Hyakki Ayakashi by ukiyo-e artist Toriyama is all (1712-1788)
• The Ugetsu Monogatari by author Ueda Akinari (1734-1809)
• Kwaidan: Stories and Studies of Strange Things, a collection of Japanese ghost stories by Lafcadio Hearn (1850-1904) includes stories of yūrei and Ayakashi such as Yuki-onna, and is one of the first Western publications of its kind.
• The Castle Tower by author Kyōka Izumi (1873-1939)
• GeGeGe no Kitaro and Kappa no Sanpei, among other works by manga artist Shigeru Mizuki (1922-2015), keep ykai in the popular imagination.
• Shabake by author Megumi Hatakenaka (1959)
• The Wicked and the Damned: One Hundred Tales of Karma by Natsuhiko Kyogoku (1963-)

Other popular works that focus on Ayakashi include the Nurarihyon no Mago series, Ayakashi Watch, and the 1960s Ayakashi monster film cycle, which was loosely remade in 2005 as Takashi Miike’s The Great Ayakashi War. They often play important roles in Japanese fiction.