Chochin-obake

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Chōchin-obake O-Iwa-san ( お 岩 さ ん ) from Katsushika Hokusai's Hyakumonogatari (1826–1837)
The Burabura as it appears in Toriyama Sekien in Fig. 20.

The Chōchin-obake ( Japanese 提 灯 お 化 け ; to dt. "Paper lantern spirit") is a fictional being of the Japanese folk belief . He is a yōkai who is said to have an ambivalent character.

description

The Chōchin-obake is described as a Chōchin - lantern , which is attached to the tip of a more or less long bamboo stick. This lantern has a single eye, later woodblock prints also show the Chōchin-obake with two eyes. He also has a nose and a large mouth with a long tongue or a candle poking out. Some chōchin-obake have a single foot at the bottom of their pole that allows them to hop around.

In his work Gazu Hyakki Tsurezure Bukuro ( 百 器 ​​徒然 袋 ) (to German "Scroll of the One Hundred Yōkai"), published around 1805, Toriyama Sekien describes a special form of Chōchin-obake: the Burabura ( Japanese 不 落 不 落 / 不 落々々 ; to German "dangling" or "rocking"). Sekien writes that this is a kitsunebi (will- o'-the-wisp ) in the shape of a lantern and that the Burabura lives near mountain fields. Afterwards, Sekien notes that he invented the Burabura himself.

background

The shape of the Chōchin-obake goes back to the Chōchin , a traditional folding lantern made of paper or silk. They are cylindrical or balloon-shaped and have a candle inside. Chochin were introduced in the late 16th century ; In the Edo period , everyone was required to carry a lantern when it was dusk. Larger specimens stood or hung in front of inns , theaters as well as tea and bathhouses, particularly large specimens illuminated paths and entrances in front of temples and shrines .

The being Chōchin-obake belongs to a special group of yōkai, the tsukumogami ( 付 喪 神 , dt. "Artifact spirits"): According to Japanese popular belief, household appliances and musical instruments of all kinds can turn into yōkai after 100 years, because too they have a soul. Chōchin-obake also develop a life of their own when they make their “100. Birthday ”, during this time it was too often ignored and felt useless. According to folklore, their character depends on how they were treated as objects of use: if the former owner was always good to them, the Burabura remains loyal to it and lights the way for it, wherever its owner goes. However, if it has been neglected or even treated badly, it simply hops away and scares unsuspecting hikers.

folklore

A well-known special form of Chōchin-obake, Chōchin O-Iwa , can be traced back to the Kabuki piece Tōkaidō Yotsuya Kaidan ("Ghost stories in Yotsuya on Tōkai Street"). A woman named O-Iwa nyōbō Iemon is driven to death by her husband, his family and her rival. In the final scene of the play, her ghost first appears as a paper lantern, emerges from it, kills her mother-in-law and drives her husband, Tamiya Iemon , to his death. The most famous representation from this scene comes from Hokusai , but also representations z. B. Kunisada , Kuniyoshi and Kunichika are known.

Chōchin-obake in modern subcultures

In Japan, many parents still tell their children today that a chochin-obake would lure them out of their beds and kidnap them at night. Presumably, the children with such horror stories should be weaned off the nocturnal roaming around and not wanting to sleep. The figure of Chōchin-obake is also known from the Game Boy game Super Mario Land 2 . There the creature appears in the so-called Pumpkin Zone , where it hovers in the air and tries to hit Mario with its long tongue.

literature

  • Samuel L. Leader: New Kabuki Encyclopedia. A Revised Adaptation of Kabuki-Jiten . Greenwood Press, Westport CT 1997, ISBN 0-313-29288-4 .
  • Friedrich B. Schwan: Handbook of Japanese woodcut. Munich 2003, ISBN 3-8912-9749-1 .
  • Kenji Murakami: 妖怪 事 典 . Mainichi Shinbunsha, Tokyo 2000, ISBN 9784620314280 .
  • Michaela Haustein: Mythologies of the World: Japan, Ainu, Korea. ePubli, Berlin 2011, ISBN 3844214070 .
  • Tagami Kenichi, Nakamura Okutsu, Keisuke Tsusuna: ア ニ メ 版 ゲ ゲ ゲ の 鬼 太郎 完全 読 本 , Kodansha, Tokyo 2006, ISBN 4062137429 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Sekien Toriyama: 百 器 徒然 袋 (1805), fig. 20. compare: Sekien Toriyama; Mamoru Takada; Atsunobu Inada; Naohi Tanaka: 画 図 百 鬼 夜行, Kokusho Kankokai, Tokyo 1992, ISBN 9784336033864 , p. 22.
  2. ↑ a b Tagami Kenichi, Nakamura Okutsu, Keisuke Tsusuna: ア ニ メ 版 ゲ ゲ ゲ の 鬼 太郎 完全 読 本 . Pp. 117-118.
  3. ^ Friedrich B. Schwan: Handbook of Japanese woodcut. P. 759 f.
  4. ↑ Michaela Haustein: Mythologies of the world . P. 53.
  5. ↑ Kenji Murakami: 妖怪 事 典 . P. 47.
  6. ^ Samuel L. Leader: New Kabuki Encyclopedia . P. 651 ff.
  7. ↑ Presentation of various yōkai in Super Mario Land 2 . (English); last accessed on May 13, 2014