56 - Kurozuka

【黒塚、kuro'dzuka】

[Lit. Black mound. The 'zu' is read a little weirdly, but unless you want to speak Japanese, it can be read as normal.]

Also known as "Adachigahara", this legend has been told since ancient times, and one of the most famous Noh plays is based on it.

A monk, on his journey, arrived at Adachigahara, where he sought lodging at the only house nearby as the sun had set.

The proprietress had forbidden him to look into her bedchamber, but the suspicious monk peeked inside and found a pile of corpses. Frightened, he ran away. but was pursued by the woman, who had transformed into an oni.

However, due to the monk's power of Dharma, the oni woman disappeared into the darkness of the night.

The above was a rough description of the Noh play "Kurozuka".

Legend has it that this oni woman was the nanny of a certain noblewoman of Kyoto. The nanny knew that the raw liver of a pregnant woman was necessary to cure the ailing noblewoman, so she set off in search of such a liver, eventually arriving at a place called Adachigahara. After spending several years there, the nanny was visited by a young couple seeking a place to stay.

The couple's wife was pregnant, so the nanny, seeing an opportunity to harvest the raw liver, tore open the woman's belly and removed her liver. Only then did she realize that the woman was the noblewoman she had nursed, who had come to look for her after she was abandoned in Kyoto as an infant.

In her grief, the nurse became an oni, attacking and devouring travelers.

In the Noh play "Kurozuka", the oni woman addresses the monk, expressing her sorrow and shame at having to live in solitude for so long, even after being transformed into an oni.

In "Kurozuka", both the legendary and Noh onis are portrayed as not only frightening but also sorrowful, as they are burdened with great grief and lamentation.

In the "Tales of Yamato" of the Heian period (794-1185), there is a poem by Taira no Kanemori, one of the Thirty-six Immortal Poets, entitled, "Is it true what they say about the oni confined to Kurozuka in Adachigahara, Michinoku?"

One theory suggests that this poem gave rise to the legend of Kurozuka, but another theory points to there also being an earlier legend of a monk encountering an oni in Adachigahara.

While it is unclear which theory is true, it is certain that this story has existed for a very long time.

Kurozuka is the mound where the oni woman is said to have been buried, and even today, in Adachigahara in Nihonmatsu, Fukushima Prefecture, the mound remains, as well as a grotto where the oni is said to have lived, and a carving knife that is said to have been used by her.