Heian Palace (Dairi)へいあんきょうだいり

This version turns to the events leading up to Tamamo-no-Mae’s unmasking and defeat. When the retired Emperor Toba’s illness grew at last grave, the onmyōji Abe no Yasunari (modeled on the historical Abe no Yasuchika), ordered to divine the cause, named Tamamo-no-Mae herself as its source. As Yasunari performed rites at court and cornered her, Tamamo-no-Mae could no longer hold her human shape; revealing her fox form, she fled eastward from the capital. The place she fled to was the Nasu Plain in Shimotsuke Province (the area around present-day Nasu in Tochigi Prefecture). To subdue the spirit-fox lurking in the wilds and harming people and livestock, the court dispatched warriors of the eastern provinces, Kazusa-no-suke Hirotsune and Miura-no-suke Yoshiaki. The warriors surrounded the plain, drove the fox out, and at last brought it down with arrows, so the tradition runs. The names of these warriors who slew Tamamo-no-Mae overlap with those of real Bandō warriors of the Genpei era—an intriguing case of legend and history told as one. In the story, Tamamo-no-Mae has usually been drawn as the very type of the “beauty who topples nations”—one who, through her beauty and wit, works her way to the summit of the realm and brings it down from within. Yet at the same time, once slain, she was enshrined in a small sanctuary and worshipped as a deity. Dreadful spirit-fox though she is, one cannot help being drawn to her. It is precisely this duality that keeps Tamamo-no-Mae from ending as a mere villain and makes her a figure beloved for ages.

Manifesting above the imperial court with a black cloud, it unsettles hearts with uncanny cries. Though often depicted as a chimera with a monkey’s face, badger’s body, tiger’s limbs, and a snake’s tail, it ultimately symbolizes an unknown terror whose sound and presence arrive before any form. It is easily shot down, yet vanishes into cloud and darkness without a trace, matching its folk image. The composite-animal iconography spread mainly through later paintings.

Itsumaden slips into the night as if dissolving into darkness, flying while wreathed in black and violet miasma. Its wings are unnaturally large, its eyes gleam eerily, and its gaze instills a crushing sense of dread. Its voice rings out like human speech, whispering “itsu made…”—how long remains—foretelling the listener’s lifespan. It is said to appear before calamities and wars, inspiring both fear and reverence among the people.