BakotsuThe Walking Bakotsu of Tosa

Bakotsu

Tsukumogami / Skeletal Yokai🏞️ Along old post roads, rural intersections, around ruined shrines

Detailed Description

The visual depiction of Bakotsu in the *Tosa Obake Zoshi* adopts an extremely unique and theatrical narrative composition among Japanese yokai art. In a dimly lit room, separated by a torn and sagging old mosquito net, the bipedal, skeletal "Bakotsu" and a giant toad yokai named "Yadomori" are seated facing each other, as if quietly recounting their respective life stories. Though Bakotsu is a complete skeleton with its ribcage and skull entirely exposed, it wears a crude cloth wrapped around its waist, displaying remarkably human-like gestures.

This bizarre confrontation hides deep folkloric roots specific to the Tosa region. "Yadomori" is the regional Shikoku dialect for a toad, which was originally revered as a beneficial creature and a "guardian deity of the house" that ate pests, and thus was strictly forbidden to kill. However, the scroll's explanatory text establishes that this particular toad was cruelly killed by humans and turned into a yokai out of sheer resentment. In other words, both the "Bakotsu" (burned to death in a fire and left on the roadside) and the "Yadomori" (unreasonably murdered by human hands) share a common background: they are "the grudges of animals that lost their lives due to the selfish convenience of humans and were denied proper burial." Their conversing within the boundaries of a mosquito net—a symbol of human daily life—can be deeply interpreted as expressing the tragic solidarity of "beasts" cast aside into the dark corners of human society.

Additionally, in the Edo period, there was a custom of extracting fat (bone fat) by boiling horse bones to make extremely cheap, poor-quality candles, which were referred to in slang as "horse bones" [2]. The coincidence between the remains of a horse used as a cheap candle to light the dark, and a yokai born from being burned to death in the disaster of a "fire," is by no means accidental. The practical wisdom of the people at the time and the dark underbelly of a society that thoroughly exploited life are sharply projected onto the visual design of the Bakotsu yokai. Standing up not to curse humans, but simply to assert its existence, its figure is the very embodiment of the anguished cries of voiceless animals.

Source Information

種類全体の出典primary

異界談義

著者: 国立歴史民俗博物館（編）小松和彦ほか

年代: 2002

出版社: 角川書店

信頼度: A関連度: 高

種類全体の出典primary

土佐お化け草紙

著者: （作者未詳）

年代: 江戸時代中期〜後期

出版社: 高知県立歴史民俗資料館等（複製・原本所蔵）

信頼度: B関連度: 高

種類全体の出典primary

異界談義

著者: 国立歴史民俗博物館編池上良正, 内田順子, 京極夏彦, 小松和彦, 島村恭則, 鈴木一馨, 常光徹, 山田慎也著

年代: 2008年8月20日

出版社: 光文社

参照: pp.21-26

信頼度: A関連度: 高

備考: 常光徹「妖怪絵巻と民間説話――「土佐お化け草紙」の民俗的背景」

異界談義（オンライン）

Personality

Harboring quiet regret and sorrow

Compatibility

Harmonizes with those who value mourning and memorials for the dead

Abilities & Skills

⚡ Extremely difficult to see in the dark⚡ Approaches without making footsteps⚡ Emanates an eerie aura that reminds humans to mourn animals⚡ Can make small pebbles and fallen leaves rustle