Yokai of Edo

A female yokai illustrated by Toriyama Sekien in Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki, depicted with countless eyes embedded along her arms. She is said to have been a woman with a habit of stealing coins; because she constantly pilfered holed copper cash (torime), the spirits of those coins manifested as eyes on her limbs. Sekien cites a source titled Kankangai-shi, but that work is unverified and likely a playful pseudobibliographic joke. The name Dodomeki may be a wordplay tied to old nicknames for copper coins and to place-name spellings.

Bone Woman is a skeletal female yokai depicted by Toriyama Sekien in Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki. In his notes, Sekien cites otogizōshi-style ghost tales in which a woman bearing a peony-patterned lantern visits her lover, drawing on the female specter from Asai Ryōi’s Otogibōko story “Botan Dōrō.” The image embodies a beauty who approaches a man but is in truth bare bones—a visualization of the uncanny where desire and death intersect.

Ceiling Licker is a yokai depicted by Toriyama Sekien in his Hyakki Tsurezure Bukuro: a creature that extends an unnaturally long tongue to lick ceilings. Sekien hints that it brings winter chill and dim light, quoting a line from Essays in Idleness (section 55) in his gloss. The image draws on Muromachi-era Night Parade scrolls showing a figure lying on its back with a protruding tongue. In later times, stains and discolorations on ceilings or pillars were often explained as its lick marks.

The Ao-andon (Blue Paper Lantern) is an extremely unique "ritualistic and psychological yokai" said to appear at the climax of the "Hyakumonogatari" (100 Ghost Stories), a ghost story gathering highly popular during the Edo period. A lantern covered in blue paper is lit with one hundred wicks (or candles), and one is extinguished after each ghost story is told. It refers to the general term for the bizarre phenomena, or the apparition itself, that emerges the moment the 100th and final light is extinguished, plunging the room into total darkness. Its visual image was solidified in Toriyama Sekien's yokai illustration collection *Konjaku Hyakki Shui*, where it was depicted as a ghastly demoness with black hair, horns, and blackened teeth. Unlike naturally occurring yokai living in specific mountains or rivers, it can be considered a pioneer of "urban legend-style meta-yokai," incarnated as the physical manifestation of kotodama (the spirit of words) created by the accumulation of human words (ghost stories) and fear.

A yokai depicted by Toriyama Sekien in Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki: an old woman who blows out lights. She is said to snuff lanterns, andon lamps, and candle flames from a distance with a single puff, interpreted as an ominous, yin presence that abhors the cheerful, yang nature of fire. Oral accounts are scarce, and scholars often view the figure as largely Sekien’s invention. Later books and picture chapbooks show name variants (“Fukkeshi Baba,” “Fukikeshi Baba”) and link her to tales of lamps going out at parties or on night roads.

Mino-waraji is a tsukumogami—an animated household object—depicted by the Edo-period artist Toriyama Sekien in Hyakki Tsurezure Bukuro. It appears as a composite creature with a straw raincoat (mino) for a torso and straw sandals (waraji) for legs, shouldering a hoe and emerging in a snow-laden bamboo grove. Rooted in the belief that old tools and rain gear can gain spirits over time, the image blends earlier portrayals of mino and waraji yokai found in Hyakki Yagyō picture scrolls and Tsukumogami emaki. Little is recorded about its behavior; it survives mainly as a symbolic figure.

A yokai depicted by the Edo-period artist Toriyama Sekien in his Hyakki Tsurezure Bukuro. It appears as a female badger (mujina) carrying a night-duty bag, but given the book’s focus on tool-spirits, many read the bag itself as the true body. The design satirizes the saying “ana no mujina no nao o suru,” which warns that judging what you haven’t seen is difficult, and likely reworks a court-lady figure carrying a bag found in earlier night-parade scrolls.

A haunt linked to a “ni-hachi” soba night stall said to appear near Minami-Warigesui in Edo’s Honjo district. The proprietor never showed himself, and the shop’s andon lantern stayed dark—yet anyone who lit it was later struck by misfortune. In other tellings the oil never ran out and the lantern burned all night. Rumored to be a tanuki’s trick, it survives as one of the Seven Wonders of Honjo.

Kuro-bōzu, literally “black monk,” is a catch-all name for yokai that appear as a dark-robed priest. Accounts vary widely by region: in Meiji-era Tokyo it visited bedrooms to sip women’s breath; in the mountains of Kumano it grew to colossal height; in Kaga it showed up by rivers as a fleeing shadow. The term sometimes overlaps with giants like Ōnyūdō or sea spirits like Umibōzu, so no single fixed form exists.

Mugidono Daimyōjin is a deified guardian venerated in the Edo period as a protector who repels measles. He appears frequently in measles talismans and prints, typically shown trampling a demon that embodies the disease. Such images were posted in homes as protective charms. Prints circulated with prayers for warding off illness alongside convalescence advice and dietary taboos, offering reassurance against a feared epidemic. No specific shrine lineage is certain, and depictions vary by publisher.

A spectral creature depicted in Edo-period yokai picture scrolls. It wears garments, spreads its forelegs wide, and has a horse’s face with bulging, upward-thrust eyes and cloven deer-like hooves. Identical images appear in late-18th-century works such as the Hyakumonogatari Kae Emaki, Oda Gyochō’s Night Parade of One Hundred Demons, and Bakemono-zukushi emaki. No period captions explain its behavior or origin. The imagery likely plays on the word baka (“fool”), but its function—harmful or helpful—remains unknown in the sources.

A house-dwelling yokai depicted by Toriyama Sekien in Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki: an ugly old woman with disheveled hair hanging upside down from the ceiling. She appears late at night, startling people but generally causing no direct harm. Some see her as a liminal being moving through the boundary of the ceiling; others view her as Sekien’s wordplay, riffing on the period phrase “to show the ceiling.”

A monk-shaped yokai tied to toilet taboos. In Toriyama Sekien’s Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki it is shown spewing a bird from its mouth, with the note that chanting “Gambari Nyūdō, hototogisu” on New Year’s Eve keeps it away. The belief links ominous cuckoo calls heard in the privy to the characters for kokkō (cuckoo) and the Chinese latrine deity Guo Deng. Local versions vary in name and behavior.

A water-born anomaly said to haunt the moats and canals around Edo’s Honjo. When anglers tried to take home their catch, a voice rose from the water—“Leave it behind!”—and the fish in their creels vanished or were stolen. Counted among the Seven Wonders of Honjo, the tale appears in rakugo and picture books. Explanations vary: kappa, tanuki, mujina, otters, or softshell turtles. Sites named include Kinshi-bori, Sendai-bori, and the area near Genmori Bridge. The phrase oitekebori (“left behind”) is sometimes linked to this legend.

A will-o’-the-wisp-like light that appears before travelers without a lantern on night roads, gliding ahead as if to lead them on. When approached it snuffs out; when distance grows it reappears, always just out of reach. Counted among the Seven Wonders of Honjo in Edo, it’s akin to the “Guiding Clappers” and to Odawara lanterns that mislead people, and is related to the trickster lantern spirit known as Chōchin Kozō. It seldom harms; its nature is to toy with people and throw their journey into confusion.

One of the “Seven Mysteries of Honjo” told around Edo’s Honjo district. When night watchmen struck their wooden clappers (hyōshigi) while calling “Beware of fire,” the same cadence would continue behind them even after they stopped, as if an unseen presence were escorting them. Some say it was simple echoing in the quiet streets, but accounts tell of the sound on rainy nights even without clappers being struck, so the tale endured as a mystery.

One of the Honjo Seven Wonders told in Edo. A giant, bristly foot bursts through a hatamoto mansion’s ceiling as a voice commands, “Wash the foot.” If obeyed, the foot withdraws quietly; if ignored, it stomps through the ceiling in a violent rampage. Its identity is unknown. In some versions the haunting ceases when the mansion changes owners; in others, only a woman’s washing can appease it. Besides causing harm, it is also said to have restrained thieves, giving it a protective aspect.

One of the “Seven Wonders of Honjo” from Edo. After a certain incident, the reeds growing along the canal were said to sprout only a single blade, a strange botanical sign taken as proof of a curse or lingering grudge. Some versions name a culprit or victim, but details vary by period and source, and the cause is usually left unexplained.

In the Edo period, a venerable chinquapin/oak tree in the garden of the Matsuura clan’s upper residence at Hirado Shinden, Honjo, was said never to drop a single leaf throughout the year. Counted among the “Seven Wonders of Honjo,” it was viewed as ominous because even evergreens shed leaves. Household members kept their distance, feeling it foretold misfortune. Accounts differ on the exact site and the identity of the actual tree, and details remain uncertain.

A nocturnal sound phenomenon: flutes, drums, and festival music seem to rise from nowhere. When pursued, the music recedes, making its source impossible to pin down. In Edo’s Honjo district it was called the “Fool’s Festival Music” and counted among the Seven Wonders of Honjo. Often blamed on mischievous tanuki, though no physical cause was confirmed. Some attributed it to windborne echoes and overlapping festival music. The name survives in the legend and children’s song of Shōjōji Temple in Chiba.

A curious tale from the fire watchtower of the Tsugaru Etchū-no-kami residence in Edo’s Honjo district: instead of the standard wooden clapper used to signal fires, a drum was hung and struck. The reason was never recorded. Another version claims that even when the clapper was hit, a drum’s booming sounded. Sometimes counted among the Seven Wonders of Honjo, it is occasionally omitted due to its faintly supernatural nature.