Ningyo

The earliest records of the ningyo attested in written Japanese sources are freshwater beings allegedly captured in the 7th century (§Asuka period), documented later in the Nihon Shoki.

[3][b] In later medieval times (§Kamakura and Muromachi periods)), it was held to be a sign of ill omen, and its beaching (§Omens in Michinoku) was blamed for subsequent bloody battles or calamity.

The notion that eating its flesh imparts longevity is attached to the legend of the Yao Bikuni [ja] ('eight hundred [year old] Buddhist priestess',[5][6] cf.

[49] But it is not clear whether such "Dutch" (Rangaku, Western learning) images got widely disseminated in Japan before Ōtsuki Gentaku [ja]'s Rokumotsu shinshi (六物新志, 'New Treatise on Six Things', 1786), which digested this and other works on the topic of mermaid, with reproduced illustrations.

[76][77] Crown Prince Shōtoku at age 48 was allegedly presented with a ningyo from Settsu Province, but he abhorred the unlucky gift and ordered it to be discarded immediately.

[82] When the prince was alarmed by the ill omen of a ningyo appearing in Ōmi Province, he had a statue of the Kannon goddess placed in the vicinity, according to document preserved at Ganjō-ji [ja] temple.

[90][91] An anecdote of three presumed "ningyo" caught in a net in Beppo (別保) in Ise Province,[o] is found in the Kokon Chomonjū ("Collection of Tales Heard, Present and Past", 1254) from the mid-Kamakura Period.

[96][97] The event dates a century earlier than the anthology: when Taira no Tadamori (d. 1153; father of Kiyomori) had moved his residence[p] to this place, populated by "bayside villagers" (fishermen)[98][96].

[101] There had been frequent beachings of ningyo in Mutsu or Dewa Province (Michinoku region) according to the Hōjō godai ki [ja] (printed 1641),[20], and each sighting is treated as an omen, associated with some armed conflict or ill fortune which struck afterwards:[20][90] Actually all these cases, culminating in the Hōji 1 event, were recorded in much older Azuma kagami (chronicle up to year 1266) and the Hōjō kudai ki (aka Kamakura nendai ki [ja], 1331)[19] except that the creature is not called a "ningyo" but rather a "large fish" (which was human cadaver-like with "four limbs"),[17][18] or a creature "having hands and feet, covered in overlapping scales, and a head no different than a fish's".

[128] Since the beast was considered ill omen, the Buddhist priest (also illustrated on the tablet) probably made offering in the form of prayer, "sowaka" being a Sanskrit word often chanted at the end of the mantra.

It occurred in the early part of the Enkyō era (1744–1748), and his named sources were his own uncle Hongaku-in (本学院, Matsura Kunishi [ja]) and aunt Kōshō-in (光照院).

It surfaced more than 10 ken (≈20 meters) ahead of the vessel, and at first, its lower half could not be seen, but its "guise was woman-like, with pale bluish hue, and light red hair which was long"; then it smiled and dove down, at which point the fish-like tail-end made its appearance, allowing the witnesses to determine it was a ningyo.

[z], according to the Tsugaru ittōshi (津軽一統志)[146] Then in Hōreki 9 (1759),[aa] on the 3rd month [ab] at the port of Ishizaki village[ac], a fish of "this shape" (i.e., as depicted in the fig.

[ad][144] About a hundred years before the capture, when a certain apprentice monk from Tōkō-ji (藤光寺) temple in Tsugaru was faring across the sea towards Matsumae Domain, and fell off the boat.

[144] A similar account with illustration is found in the Mitsuhashi nikki (三橋日記, 'Mitsuhashi diary') in the entry for Hōreki 7 (1757), later part of the 3rd month,[ae] and the creature drawn is observed to be wearing a wagesa [ja] or "ring surplice", and the text describes it as a "Light-black strange formed fish (薄黒い異形の魚)"[147][145] The Hirayama nikki (平山日記, 'Hirayama diary') is yet another source, stating that in Hōreki 8, "a human-faced fish (人面魚, jinmengyo) appeared in the sea of Ishizaki village, and all manners of people went to spectate".

[150][10][16][ag] This ningyo was a creature with head of a long-haired young woman's, a pair of golden horns, a red belly, three eyes on each side of its torso, and a carp-like tail end, according to the text of the flier.

[153] The feature of eyes on the torso is shared by the prediction beast kudan, also known to have appeared in Etchū Province, and the hakutaku (or baize, of Chinese origin), as scholars have pointed out.

[149] Yet the flier also states that "A person who views this fish once will enjoy great longevity, avoid bad turns of events and disasters, and gain luck and virtue".

[155][157] The newspaper described the creature as having "hair that was redhaired, hand like a monkey with webbings, and shaped like a snake," and purported that eating its flesh imparts longevity of 100 years, and even looking at it had the effect of warding sickness and extending lifespan.

[158][155] The ningyo according to Saikaku's reckoning was first washed ashore during Emperor Go-Fukakusa's first era year (1247),[aj] and he claims it was remembered as having "a scarlet cockscomb on its head, and a face of a beautiful woman.

Four limbs like they were wrought out of jewels, golden-gleaming scales, the flesh most fragrant, and serene voice like the skylark-whistle" according to Ihara Saikaku's Budō denraiki [en] ("Exemplary Tales of the Way of the Warrior", 1674), which features a ningyo as noted above.

[161][162] The text describes the ningyo as being equipped with four limbs but the illustration draws a mermaid without legs, and having a tail-fin instead; she also is drawn without any cockscomb-like appendage on the head.

[168] It is an example of work in the genre of kibyōshi or "yellow jacket",[al] and a humorous, satirical piece, whose cast of characters include Urashima Tarō, who has an affair with a carp mistress producing a mermaid daughter in the process.

[171] One example is the Tatsu no miyako namagusa hachi no ki (竜宮羶鉢木, "The Flowerpot in the Sea-Queen's Palace", 1793), co-authored by Santō Kyōden and Takizawa Bakin and illustrated by Kitao Shigemasa.

[36][37] However this formulation for explaining Chinese origin does not quite succeed, since, as its proponent[an] points out, the Chinese lingyu is actually four-legged,[175][176] as is the renyu (人魚, "human fish"[177]) aka tiyu (䱱魚; Japanese:teigyo)[179] and it was the Japanese Wakan sansai zue ("Illustrated Sino-Japanese [Encyclopedia] of the Three Realms", 1712) which for some reason altered the image of the ningyo/renyu 人魚 (aka ryōgyo/lingyu 鯪魚) into a two-armed but legless mermaid.

[186] The influential Wakan sansai zue was modeled after the Three Realms encyclopedia (Sancai Tuhui, 1609) of China, and also drew from such Chinese material on the topic of ningyo.

[33][189] The popular encyclopedia Wakan sansai zue also describes the medical use of peixe muller (in Spanish or Portuguese; Japanese transliteration: heishmure[ru], "woman fish").

Thus Ferdinand Verbiest (aka Nan Huairen) in 1672[aq] wrote in Chinese that for the siren,[ar] "The female bones work even better (to stem [the bleeding of] blood diseases)".

who wrote in Chinese, cited Ono Ranzan (1803), and possibly even used earlier by Kaibara Ekiken (1709), to describe the effects of the peixe muller medicine.

1593), and François Valentyn (1724–26, in Dutch), thanks to the efforts of Ōtsuki Gentaku [ja]'s Rokumotsu shinshi (六物新志, 'New Treatise on Six Things', 1786), who gave translated digests from these works, accompanied by reproductions of siren-mermaid illustrations.