Nue

Origin

The iconographic origin is the Onmyodo (Yin-Yang Way) belief of the Heian period (794-1185) and the gunki-mono (military-tale) tradition. The etymology of nue is the archaic Japanese name of the indigenous bird White's thrush (Zoothera dauma, in Japanese tora-tsugumi), whose sad and uncanny cry, heard in autumn and spring, was the canonical bird portending disaster in the Heian-period Onmyodo belief. The decisive textual source is the early-thirteenth-century (c. 1218) canon of Japanese gunki-mono, the Heike Monogatari, Book 4, Chapter Nue. The plot is: in the spring of 1153 (Ninpyo 3) a black cloud appeared every dawn over the Heian-kyo Imperial Court from the eastern mountains and disturbed the sleep of Emperor Konoe (reigned 1139-1155), causing his illness; the Minister of the Left Fujiwara no Yorinaga ordered Minamoto no Yorimasa (1104-1180), the greatest archer of the Heian period, to subdue it, and Yorimasa, with his attendant Ino Hayata, shot the nue down from within the black cloud — the decisive canon. The corpse of the Nue — the composite yokai with a monkey's face, tanuki's body, tiger's legs, and snake's tail — was placed in a hollow log and floated down the Kamogawa river, and at the places where it washed ashore — Miyakojima in Osaka and Ashiya in Hyogo — Nue-zuka (Nue mounds) and the cult of Nue settled. The early-fourteenth-century Genpei Seisuiki extended the Heike Monogatari Nue canon, and Toriyama Sekien's 1779 yokai catalogue Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki established the visual canon of the Nue.

Features

• Face of a monkey
• Body of a raccoon dog (tanuki) or wildcat
• Legs of a tiger
• Tail of a snake
• Sad cry like the White's thrush (tora-tsugumi)
• Appearance at night accompanied by black cloud

Stories

The chapter Nue in Book 4 of the early-thirteenth-century Heike Monogatari is the decisive textual source of the Nue canon, the early-fourteenth-century Genpei Seisuiki extended the canon, and Toriyama Sekien's 1779 yokai catalogue Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki established the visual canon of the Nue. The decisive Noh play Nue by the Muromachi-period (1336-1573) Konparu Zenchiku (1405-1471) — in which the wraith of the Nue drifts along the river — is the canon of the tragic Noh Nue, and the Kabuki play Tokaido Yotsuya Kaidan of 1825 by Tsuruya Nanboku and the contemporary Kabuki play Nue Heike Monogatari established the Edo Kabuki Nue canon. The short story Nue (1921) by the Japanese writer Ryunosuke Akutagawa (1892-1927) — a modern adaptation of the Heike Monogatari Nue canon — is the canon of Taisho-period Japanese literature on the Nue. The novel Shin Heike Monogatari (1968) by the Japanese writer Eiji Yoshikawa (1892-1962) is the decisive modern Japanese novelistic adaptation of the Nue canon, and the Nue character of Hiroyuki Takei's (b. 1972) 1998 manga Shaman King is the twenty-first-century Japanese-manga Nue canon. The Houju Nue character of the 2010 Japanese doujin game Touhou Seirensen (Undefined Fantastic Object) is the twenty-first-century Japanese-game Nue canon, and the Nue character in the 2013 Japanese animation Yo-kai Watch is the twenty-first-century Japanese children's animation canon.

Weakness

The Nue's weaknesses are: (1) arrows — the decisive weakness in the thirteenth-century Heike Monogatari canon, in which the greatest archer of the Heian period Minamoto no Yorimasa (1104-1180) shoots down the Nue from within the black cloud, the decisive canon of Japanese warrior-hero narrative; (2) the tiger-tracks and pursuit — the canon in the Heike Monogatari that Yorimasa's attendant Ino Hayata finishes the fallen Nue with a sword; (3) the sacred bow and arrow — the bow Yorimasa used in the Heike Monogatari is said to be Raikomaru, the heirloom bow of the Minamoto clan, the canonical weapon of the warrior; (4) the warrior's courage and decisiveness — the canon in the Heike Monogatari that, when the Nue was hidden in the black cloud, Yorimasa drew his bowstring only once, the canon of one-shot-one-kill (ippatsu-hicchu); (5) Shinto purification rite — the canon that the Nue's corpse was purified by being floated down the Kamogawa river; (6) Onmyodo rite — the canon that the Heian-period Onmyoji Abe no Seimei (921-1005) and the Onmyodo rite seal composite yokai like the Nue; (7) dawn cry of the White's thrush (tora-tsugumi) — the Japanese folk canon that when the dawn cry of the White's thrush, the etymological source of the Nue, is heard, the Nue vanishes; (8) the Emperor's legitimacy — in the Heike Monogatari canon, the appearance of the Nue is the canonical portent of the decline of the late-Heian Imperial house and the arrival of the warrior age, and the restoration of the Emperor's legitimacy is the weakness of Nue pacification.

Cultural Significance

The Nue is not merely a horror yokai but the canonical iconographic figure of the Heian Onmyodo belief, the late-Heian Imperial decline, and the late-twelfth-century arrival of the Genpei (Minamoto-Taira) Civil War — the decisive iconographic figure. The Nue canon of the early-thirteenth-century Heike Monogatari is analysed as the canonical interpretation of the socio-historical event of Emperor Konoe's illness in 1153 and his death in 1155 (at age 17), the late-Heian Imperial decline, and Minamoto no Yorimasa (1104-1180) — who committed suicide at the Battle of Uji River in 1180, the decisive origin of the Minamoto clan uprising — is the warrior-hero whose Nue subjugation became the decisive scene of his heroic narrative. The Nue-zuka (Nue Mound) of Miyakojima ward, Osaka, and the Nue-zuka shrine of Ashiya, Hyogo Prefecture — preserving the tradition that the Nue's corpse was floated down the Kamogawa and washed ashore — are the decisive sacred sites of the Japanese folkloristic Nue cult, where the Nue placation rite is performed every May. The Nue iconography in Toriyama Sekien's 1779 Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki — the canon of the Edo yokai catalogue — was modernised in the 1968 Nue character of Shigeru Mizuki's (1922-2015) manga GeGeGe no Kitaro, and the Houju Nue of the 2010 doujin game Touhou Seirensen settled the twenty-first-century global Nue canon. Eiji Yoshikawa's 1968 Shin Heike Monogatari is the Japanese national-novel adaptation of the Nue canon, and Ryunosuke Akutagawa's 1921 short story Nue is the decisive work of Taisho-period Japanese literature on the Nue.

In Popular Culture

Heike Monogatari, Book 4, Nue (early thirteenth century) — decisive textual source of the Nue canonGenpei Seisuiki (early fourteenth century) — extension of the Nue canonKonparu Zenchiku, Noh play Nue (fifteenth century) — Muromachi Noh Nue canonToriyama Sekien, Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki (1779) — Edo visual canon of the NueRyunosuke Akutagawa, short story Nue (1921) — Taisho Japanese literary Nue canonEiji Yoshikawa, Shin Heike Monogatari (1968) — modern Japanese novel Nue canonShigeru Mizuki, GeGeGe no Kitaro, Nue (1968) — Japanese manga Nue canonHiroyuki Takei, Shaman King, Nue (1998) — twenty-first-century Japanese manga Nue canonDoujin game Touhou Seirensen, Houju Nue (2010) — twenty-first-century Japanese game Nue canonOsaka Nue-zuka, Hyogo Nue-zuka shrine — decisive sacred sites of the Japanese folkloristic Nue cult