Hukumusume fairy tale collection > Japanese classical stories > March


illustrator　緑風 ひお

Yaobikuni

・Japanese  ・English　・Chinese

・Japanese＆English　・Japanese＆Chinese

　 Legend has it in Wakasa region (as Fukui prefecture now) that a woman ate mermaid flesh lived to 800 years old and she hid herself in an old cave.

　The woman became a nun and traveled around several regions, so at some point, people started calling her “Yaobikuni” that means a 800-year-old nun.

　Anyway, when Yaobikuni was still a little girl, wealthy men in neighborhood villages got together to compete on their treasures.

　Among these wealthy men, there was an elegant old man with white beard. No one had ever seen him before. When everyone had shown off their own treasures, the old man invited them all to his house.

　On the beach, a beautiful boat was ready for them.When they were all aboard, a white silk-like cloth covered them as if they were blindfolded.

　When the boat docked, they saw a gorgeous mansion.
　The old man guided them into a lot of rooms that are full of treasures when

　a wealthy man happened to look into the kitchen.

　It was when a creature that looks like a girl was being cooked.
“What, what is that!? She looks like a human child but the lower part of her body is a fishtail.”

　The wealthy man was so surprised, he told everyone about this.

　Therefore, none of them ever touched feast dinner.
　The old man noticed this.
He said, “what a pity, I tried to treat them to a feast with mermaid flesh but they left it all.”

　So, when the wealthy men left, he gave them the leftovers as takeaway.
　On their way back, they were covered with the white cloth again, so they had no idea where the boat was sailing until they came back to the beach.

　When the boat disappeared somewhere, the wealthy men threw away the eerie mermaid flesh into sea.

　However, a wealthy man, Mr. Takahashi, was very fond of rare things. He was the only man who did not throw away the mermaid flesh and secretly took it back home. He hid it in a cupboard just for the time being.

　The wealthy man, Mr. Takahashi, has a 15-year-old daughter. She happened to eat the meat secretly when the wealthy man has fallen asleep.

　The daughter who ate the mermaid flesh reached puberty, and she turned a beautiful fair-skinned girl.

　Before long, she married and time passed. Her husband was becoming an old man, but for some reason, his wife stayed young and beautiful.

　Even after her husband died, one after another proposed to her, and eventually, she married as many as 39 men.
　In the meantime, her husbands and other people in the village died one after another. Still, she never got old or died.

　People thought
“she never gets old because she ate mermaid flesh. She ate mermaid flesh to turn a monster.”
　 It was rumored.

　Then, no one spoke to the woman. She was so lonely, she became a nun and went on a pilgrimage to several regions.

　She did good deeds and plant white camellias wherever she visited on foot. When she eventually came back to her hometown,

　she planted a white camellia tree near a cave around the beach. She went into the cave and never came out of it again.

The End

→　Yaobikuni

(Click here to return)