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Bakezōri (Haunted Straw Sandal Tsukumogami)

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Bakezōri (Haunted Straw Sandal Tsukumogami)

Bakezōri (Haunted Straw Sandal Tsukumogami)

Their soul is listening — speak, and they will answer.

Basic Description

A tsukumogami said to arise when an old straw sandal gains a spirit. In folk belief it serves as a warning not to mistreat footwear. Early-modern images show sandals with arms and legs; in oral lore it is often confused with geta clogs. Yokai handbooks describe it making noises at night or singing, but regional encounter tales are scarce, and the stories tend to be didactic.

Folklore & Legends

A straw-sandal tsukumogami appears in Muromachi-period Hyakki Yagyō picture scrolls, and footwear monsters show up in Edo-period toy prints and sugoroku. Modern summaries portray it as a clamorous night-haunter, yet collections such as an Iwate “footwear monster” likely stem from geta, not specifically straw sandals. Overall it is told within the moral frame of “don’t waste or neglect things,” with few concrete locales or individualized hauntings.

Yokai Cards1

Bakezōri (Haunted Straw Sandal Tsukumogami) across multiple art-style decks

Card gallery
Tsukumogami
Centennial tools possessed by spirits ── the artifact yokai depicted in Sekien's Hyakki Tsurezure Bukuro

Tsukumogami

Tools and vessels used over long years are said to acquire spiritual life and transform when discarded and neglected, becoming beings known as tsukumogami. In the Muromachi-period "Tsukumogami Emaki", it was preached that tools transformed after a hundred years; the scroll depicted old implements, thrown away during house-cleaning, marching in a procession on the night of Setsubun holding grudges against humans. In the Edo period, Toriyama Sekien synthesized this worldview in his "Hyakki Tsurezure Bukuro" (The Illustrated Bag of One Hundred Random Demons), bestowing charming yokai forms upon individual objects such as biwa lutes, shamisen, koto, tea kettles, sutra scrolls, masks, and book carts, woven together with wordplay and historical anecdotes. Gathered here are the souls inhabiting tools, reflecting human sentiments—used, forgotten, yet impossible to fully discard.

Detailed Analysis

Character Profile

This section is our own creative profile for storytelling. It is not historical fact or scholarship.

Rarity
Uncommon

For more detailed information and diagnosis results about 夜跳ねる古草履・化け草履, please click here.

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