The character for "oni" first appeared in literature in the "Izumo Fudoki", a book written in the Nara period (710-794), but it is said that the reading of "oni" had not yet been used at that time.
In Japan, the character for "oni" was read as "mono", and was thought to be the root of evil, bringing misfortune to all things.
It is said that the Chinese character for "oni" originally meant something like the soul of a human being who had died but could not attain Buddhahood, it acquired the reading "oni" because it was confused with an unseen evil force called "on", as in "hidden" or "shadow".
In a short story titled "The Lady Who Loved Insects" in "Tales of the Riverside Middle Counselor", written in the Heian period, the character for "oni" was read either as "mono" or "oni," and in any case, it seemed to refer to such invisible evil forces.
For a while after that, onis were depicted as something that left footprints but never could be seen, however, with the eventual spread of Buddhism, they became mixed with the evil spirits depicted therein, and then with the rumors of those who were against the status quo, such as the villainous people hiding in the mountains near the capital, thus being seen as terrifying, man-eating beings.
This is only a myth, but it is said that oni came to have horns like oxen and wear tiger-skin clothing as they do today because of the belief that invisible evil spirits, or "oni" in the original sense of the word, come from the northeast. The northeast is the direction of the Chinese zodiac sign for the Ox and Tiger and was also called the "oni gate", which is why oni took on the appearance they have today.
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