INTRO:

Hello and welcome to Myth Monsters, my name is Erin and I’ll be your host for these little snack bite size podcasts on folklore and mythical monsters from around the world. 

These podcasts focus on the actual cryptids, folklore and mythic monsters from global mythology, rather than focusing on full stories of heroes and their big adventures.

I’ll also be dropping in some references that they have to recent culture and where you can see these represented in modern day content so you can learn more, and get as obsessed as I am about these absolute legends of the mythological world.

This week we’re veering away from our sweet week with the Moon Rabbit and onto a much darker monster from slightly across the pond from China, in Japan!

DESCRIPTION:

We’re looking at possibly one of the best and most iconic monsters from Japanese myth - the Oni. 

Oni are generally depicted as ogre-like monsters who come in a variety of different colours like red, blue or sometimes green and no, we’re not talking about Shrek here. They have gross sharp claws, long wild hair, and two horns emerging from their noggins. They tend to have extra toes, eyes, fingers or limbs, but generally look quite human, bar the crazy colours. They are considered giants, and can be up to 9ft tall and are ravenous enough to cause trouble and eat anything in their path. They’re very strong, and some can even be intelligent enough to learn magic, and become mages and sorcerers. However, most of them are quite stupid, much like a traditional ogre or giant and are considered demons and would punish anyone who went to hell, or managed to find them in the wilderness - which lets be honest, probably is like being in hell too if you bump into one of these in the night. They are also predominantly male, had a love of cannibalism, and generally are considered to be pretty damn evil.

Now thankfully, they did have enough brain power to wear something to cover their nasty bits, and would wear loincloths made of the most ferocious beasts - usually tigers or lions from other bits of mythology, and they would wield an iron club known as a kanabō. Once they had this bat, they would be considered invincible and extremely strong - leading to an expression to kick off in Japan, ‘oni with an iron club’ - so you would say, mate, you’re acting like an oni with an iron club - meaning that you were acting invincible and probably stupid. 

Another weapon they would wield is actually the ability to manipulate humans - they are able to shapeshift from one form to another, although preferring their monstrous body. They would transform into beautiful women or men and gain the trust of their victims before taking them back to their lair, where they would eat them whole.

So what makes an Oni? So Oni are actually technically a product of the idea of reincarnation as Japan is considered a mostly Buddhist country - this is important. It is believed that when an evil person dies, they get transported to the Buddhist hell and turned into Oni to torment the other souls for eternity. 

Buddhist hell is ruled over by the Great Lord Enma, who uses the Oni as their minions to deliver the hellish punishments to humans. They are used as the generals of Hell, and would often be the highest up in the roster of demons managing over the legions of hellish creatures in this terrible place. They would generally be used to skin, break bones or cannibalise live humans, and these were humans who had died, but not been evil enough to come back as an Oni, just a little bit bad I suppose. 

So how do they get into the human world if they’re demons from hell? Well, if a human is terrible enough before they’ve died, they can be transformed into an Oni like a curse for being terrible. These are the ones that we know of, and how we’ve come to know of their existence - and are of the most threat to people. 

However, is there a way to kill an Oni? Well, not really - during the Setsubun festival in Spring, people will throw soybeans out of their windows with the phrase, "Oni wa soto! Fuku wa uchi!" which means Oni go out! Blessings come in!

ORIGIN:

Onto my favourite topic though - it’s etymology and we’ve actually got once this week too - Oni literally means "to hide or conceal", as their original MO as monsters were to hide and jump out on their prey, they could also in some myths be considered invisible or have the ability to shapeshift. Therefore in Chinese language, the word Oni means ghost - implying that they are some formless monster, designed to deceive, kill and eat people. 

Although this is not very specific, I found that this monster goes back to the Japanese medieval times from 1165 - 1603, and made its way into art and culture, and realistically folklore in the Early Modern period, which is 1550 to 1850 AD. This is important because the way Oni is linked in culture is really fascinating because it’s also linked to another country.

In Chinese culture, they believe in the ways of yin and yang, which most people know - but this means they also believe that the northeast direction being called kimon, meaning demon gate and being considered incredibly unlucky and generally had evil spirits pass through. How does this relate to the Oni I hear you say? Well because in the Chinese zodiac calendar, if you go in a northeast direction you will land between the Ox and the Tiger. If you think of the Oni now, with its sharp claws and stealth like the tiger and the huge bovine style horns like the Ox - it’s a really cool visual representation from actually, a completely separate culture. 

Also another cool fact about the kimon - temples in China are all built facing the northeastern direction so as to act as protection against the evil spirits and buildings in Japan have L shaped indentations and Oni shaped roof tiles called onigawara which act like gargoyles built into the buildings to keep Oni away. You can also keep them away by using holly - the plant, not just a random girl, monkey statues, as the word for leaving in Japanese is saru.

But things have changed in more modern times, and they are generally considered to be more of a protective spirit, with people in Oni costumes attending festivals to ward away bad luck and these roof tiles to scare other spirits too. 

There’s a really great and famous story about two Onis - get your hankies ready because I actually found this one really sad, and you can find some beautiful videos and animations on this online too.

So the story goes that a red Oni tries to become friends with humans, and makes tea and sweets in his house for them. However, as Oni are known for being monsters, everyone stayed away, which really upset the Oni. Eventually, he asks his friend the blue oni for help and asks him what he could do to let the humans know that he wants to be friends.

So the blue Oni comes up with a plan, that he would pretend to be an evil oni and attack the village, and the red oni could come in and save the humans by defeating the blue oni. 

They go ahead with the plan and it all works but he realises that the blue Oni can now not go into the village and be friends with them too, and he finds shortly after that the Blue Oni has left, leaving him a note saying that he will stay away so that the Red Oni can be friends with them.

The story ends with the red Oni crying for having lost his old friend - and this is what the story is called, The Red Oni who cried. 

Fun modern fact though - children in Japan play a game called Ni, which means hidden oni, and it’s like tag or it, and the person who is it, is an oni, which is so so cute.

CULTURAL SIGNIFICANCE: 

Onto cultural significance, for this week - we have a couple of pieces of art such as Sessen Doji Offering His Life to an Ogre from 1764, no artist credited here I’m afraid, same with Oni in pilgrim's clothing from the Edo period, which was 1603 til 1867. There’s also Oni by Toriyama Sekien from 1779 and some independent stuff too - Matthew Meyer’s works are really good for this stuff actually!

We’ve only got a real few for films this week, but we have the legendary Spirited Away, Onigamiden, Shogun Warriors, The Demon and Oni. 

For TV and anime, we have One Piece, Kamisama Hajimemashita, Inuyasha, Ayo No Exorcist, Demon Slayer, Teen Wolf, Ultraman Ace, Super Sentai, Kamen Rider, Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z, Jackie Chan adventures, Samurai Jack and Hellboy: Sword of Storms.

For video games, we have loads actually - such as Arknights, Touhou Project, Dead by Daylight, Wizard 101, Ao Oni, Legend of Zelda, Mortal Kombat, Guild Wars, Fire Emblem, Megaman, Nioh, Smite, Yo-Kai Watch, Tomb Raider, Street Fighter, Sonic Lost World and Muramasa: The Demon Blade, just to name a few!

My book recommendations this week are actually the same as some of my other Japanese creature episodes and I’m going to suggest the wonderful Yokai series by Hiroka Yoda including, Yokai Attack!: The Japanese Monster Survival Guide and Yurei Attack!: The Japanese Ghost Survival Guide. They are fantastic books and they’re where I get most of my Japanese mythology information from when I research these - so I do highly recommend them if you’re interested in the ghosts and ghouls from this mythos.

DO I THINK THEY EXISTED? 

Now it’s time for, do I think they existed? Honestly, it’s a no from me this time. However, these are featured in so many modern cultural things that it makes sense that these are so prevalent in Japanese folklore study. That also makes sense in regards to how often they’re seen in art work and in statues within Japan - they were considered to be quite common, so it makes sense with how popular they are to have a bigger following of ‘I believe this’ so there’s that too. 

But my only reasonable explanation is that people used to wear masks to commit evil deeds and attempt to blame them on a supernatural being - however, I’m not a detective, I’m certainly not 100% sure. I wish things were as simple as yes or no sometimes though!

OUTRO: 

I think that’s a pretty cool monster to be honest - and as I said, one of the more famous ones too! It was great to cover, and a real contrast in regards to our monster last week who was super cute, but ya know - gotta spice things up from time to time.

Next week, we’ve got our Holiday special! How exciting, I’ve really been looking forward to this one with my family’s Germanic roots! We’re going to be looking at the legendary Christmas demon - the Krampus! This will be our last episode before the holidays, and we’ll be back after this on the 6th January. Are you on the naughty or nice list this year? Find out next Thursday!

For now, thank you so much for listening, it’s been an absolute pleasure. If you enjoyed this podcast, please give it a rating on the service you’re listening on - I’ve got the twitter for any questions, or suggestions on what monsters to cover next and I’d love to hear from you. The social media handles for Tiktok and Instagram are mythmonsterspodcast, and twitter is mythmonsterspod. But all of our content can be found at mythmonsters.co.uk - you can also find us on Goodpods and Patreon if you want to help me fund the podcast, ya know if you feel like it.

Come join the fun and share this with your pals, they might love me as much as you do.

But for now, stay spooky and I’ll see you later babes.