A yokai covered with innumerable eyes. It shuns bright daylight and is said to appear mainly at night. Some accounts claim that when it reveals itself, one of its eyes detaches and trails the witness. Illustrations sometimes show eyes covering the mouth; its diet is unknown. The name and image became standardized through late Edo to Meiji-era paintings of “Hyakume” and later modern yokai encyclopedias.
Folklore & Legends
No clear citation in classical texts; it is chiefly known from modern-era imagery and yokai compendiums. Popular descriptions say it avoids sunlight, wanders at night, and that a single eye may pop out to stalk those who see it, but specific regional oral traditions are largely unrecorded. Paintings labeled “Hyakume” or “Hyakumegan-ki/Hyakudomeki” from late Edo–Meiji likely served as prototypes, with later writers adding traits.
Yokai Cards1
Hyakume (Hundred-Eyed Demon) across multiple art-style decks
Rooted in multi-eyed demon images circulated from late Edo to Meiji, this form was given traits by modern yokai compendia. It shuns bright light and hides in night’s cover, avoiding notice. When it senses people, it is said to detach a single eye to probe its surroundings, while the indeterminate mouth only heightens its eeriness. With no fixed locale of tradition, it is treated as a conceptual being known nationwide through the spread of its imagery.
Character Profile
This section is our own creative profile for storytelling. It is not historical fact or scholarship.
The diagram below is a diagnostic evaluation chart for Iconographic Origin, Modern Interpretation. The higher the value of each item, the stronger that characteristic is expressed.
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