Nurarihyon
The Kōshoku Haidokusan (好色敗毒散), a ukiyo-zōshi published in the Edo Period gives the example, "its form was nurarihyon, like a catfish without eyes or mouth, the very spirit of lies," so it is known that it is word used with a meaning similar to noppera-bō but as an adjective.
Like the emakimono, this one has no explanatory text, so not many details are known, but the act of disembarking from a vehicle was called "nurarin," so it is thought that nurarihyon was a name given to a depiction of this.
[6] In the Gazu Hyakkai Yagyō, its name is written as "nūrihyon" but considering all the literature and emakimono before it, it is generally thought that this is simply a mistake.
"[11] However, folk legends that mention these characteristics cannot be found in any examples or references, so the yōkai researchers, Kenji Murakami and Katsumi Tada posit that the thought of them coming into houses comes from the following passage in the Yōkai Gadan Zenshū Nihonhen Jō (妖怪画談全集 日本篇 上, "Discussion on Yōkai Pictures, Japan Volume, First Half") by Morihiko Fujisawa, where the following is written below Toriyama Sekien's illustration of the nurarihyon in that book: While night is still approaching, the nurarihyon comes to visit as the chief monster.
[12]Those two yōkai researchers posit that this caption resulted in the proliferation of this thought in later years, and that this was actually a made-up idea that came from an interpretation of Toriyama Sekien's picture.
[6][2] Murakami and Tada posit that in fact, Fujisawa's assertion that the "nurarihyon comes to visit as the chief monster" is nothing more than a big guess.
[6] Toward the end of the Shōwa period, on the basis of Fujisawa's interpretation given by the caption, the thought that they "come into one's home" or that they are a "supreme commander of yōkai" took a life of its own after Mizuki Shigeru and Arifumi Satō spread them through their own illustrated yōkai reference books,[3] and in the animated television series, the 3rd "GeGeGe no Kitarō" (starting in 1985), a nurarihyon was the antagonist and arch-enemy of the main character Kitarō, and was a self-proclaimed "supreme commander," which altogether can be seen as things that made their perception as being "supreme commanders" even more famous.
[16] Natsuhiko Kyōgoku participated in the animated television series, the 4th "Gegege no Kitarō" as a guest writer for the 101st episode, but here, the nurarihyon would be in its original form, as an octopus.
