Welcome back to Myth Perceptions.
As promised last month,
I'm continuing my research into shapeshifters around the world. This month's
stop is Asia as I began researching the kitsune, or Japanese fox spirit.
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| Image from Fox Spirits Website |
Kitsune are magical beings who appear as foxes but can also
assume human form. These fox spirits are highly intelligent, playful, and have
up to nine tails. The more tails, the more intelligent or powerful the kitsune.
The fox spirit is a bit of a trickster, reminding me of Coyote of Native
American culture. However, I might add that since we are dealing with spirits,
their concept of fair may not parallel ours.
Though kitsune also take the form of elderly men, they most
often appear in Japanese folklore as a beautiful young woman. She marries a
human male who often is unaware of her true form. The least dangerous of
motives is pure seduction; the most dangerous is to teach an overbearing or
arrogant male a lesson. When her true form is discovered, the kitsune traditionally
abandons the human, leaving them a humbler though wiser person. A kitsune is
often discovered in a variety of ways – they cast a fox-shaped shadow even in
their human form, they possess distinctly fox-like features, they are very
afraid of dogs and might turn back into their fox form to escape, and finally all
those tails can be hard to hide in human form.
The fox spirit/shapeshifter also appears in Chinese mythology
as the huli jing. Their intent is less clearly defined by my research, ranging
from seductress to scholar, female and male forms. They seem to be the most benevolent of the Asian fox spirits though the habit of shapeshifting into the form of beautiful women to seduce and/or wed human men
continues in Chinese mythology.
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| Image from Kumiho Wiki |
In Korean mythology, these spirits, called kumiho, are far
less benevolent and again frequently assume the form of beautiful women. A
commonly held belief is that they do this for the most gruesome of reasons—to
feast on human flesh, taking a particular interest in human livers. The purpose
of consuming human livers was to become human, and the required number appears
to be 100, gullible human males the most common unwitting and unwilling donors.
Denise Golinowski is a reader and writer of fantasy and romance. Her first enovella, The Festival of the Flowers: The Courtesan and the Scholar is also available through the Wild Rose Press. You can visit her blog at Golinowski's Gambol.
