Popular Tales of Tanuki in Japan

Bunbuku Chagama 文福茶釜・分福茶釜, Lucky Tea Kettle Story

Bunbuku Chagama 分福茶釜 by Katsushika Hokusai 葛飾北斎 (1760 to 1849). Dated to 1794-1804, when Hokusai was named Sōri Tawaraya 宗理俵屋. Photo J-site This extremely popular tale may have emerged in the 16th or 17th century, but in extant artwork it does not appear until the 18th century. It comes in many versions, and initially featured a shapeshifting Fox, not a Tanuki ( REFERENCES:

BELOW QUOTE FROM: Bathgate, Michael. The Fox's Craft in Japanese Religion and Folklore: Shapeshifters, Transformations, and Duplicities. Ed. Reynolds, Frank and Winnifred Fallers Sullivan, New York: Routledge, 2003, 190 pages.



During the Edo period (1603-1867), the repertoires of popular printing houses and professional raconteurs (rakugoka) alike regularly featured a story that would later be collected by the folklorist Seki Keigo under the title of "The Lucky Tea Kettle" (bunbuku chagama ). It tells of a fox saved from certain death by the mercy of a human being, and the marvelous exploits by which it repays that kindness. Using its shapeshifting powers, the fox assumes a variety of different forms, each of which the man is able to sell for a tidy sum. After each sale, the fox eventually returns to the man, to assume a new form and be sold again.



Each transaction earns the man more than the one before, and he is soon able to take his place among the prosperous elites of village society.1 Even as the man grows ever more wealthy, however, it is the fox who pays the price. In the episode from which the tale takes its name, for example, the fox assumes the form of a teakettle, in order to be sold to a local priest. Not realizing the true nature of his new acquisition, the priest places the fox-kettle over a fire. Badly burned, the fox reverts to its original form and races away, yelping in pain. In another episode, the fox assumes the form of a horse, a handsome animal that is sold to a nearby feudal lord. Once again, the buyer uses his purchase in a fashion appropriate to its outward form, but disastrous for the fox. Unable to bear a human rider like a genuine horse, the fox quickly succumbs to exhaustion and collapses under its load, and is unceremoniously dumped into a muddy ditch at the orders of its angry rider.



In its basic outline, the story of the Lucky Teakettle can be read as part of an enduring theme in Japanese popular literature, of a man who is able to rise above the circumstances of his birth through a combination of good-heartedness, guile and supernatural assistance. The success of the human protagonist in this story, however, is intimately linked to the repeated punishment of the shapeshifter responsible-even as the reader is encouraged to view the wealth attained by the human protagonist as a happy ending, the tale remains ambivalent regarding the means by which that wealth was achieved. Indeed, the widespread popularity of this tale, from the Edo period to the modern era, might be attributed precisely to this basic sense of ambivalence, an attitude that reflects the changing nature of wealth and society during that time. In this context, the story of 1. Seki (1953, 2:1081-1100) records 42 variants of the tale in folklore from across Japan. Most variants describe the shapeshifter as a fox, although a few portray it as a tanuki or even a cat.



FOOTNOTE. Seki (1963:106) notes that the tale continues to be a prominent theme in children's literature, a fact which has no doubt played an important part in making it what Ikeda (1971:81) describes as one of the best known folk tales in modem Japan. Seki follows his predecessor Yanagita Kunio (1986:69-70) in categorizing the tale as a subtype of the larger theme in which an animal repays a kindness to a human being, though-as I will argue here-it is less the kindness itself than the way in which that kindness is expressed that lends the story its significance as well as its popularity in the pre- and early modern periods. (end quote) ). In one popular variant, a poor woodsman saves the life of a Tanuki. In thanks, the Tanuki transforms itself into a chagama (tea kettle) that the poor man sells to the priest of Morinji Temple 茂林寺 (in the town of Tatebayashi, Gunma, near Tokyo). The priest takes it back to his temple, where he orders his staff to clean it and make some tea. As you might imagine, the Tanuki was very unhappy with his role as a cooking utensil, for it hurt to be polished and used on the fire. After a time, the Tanuki escapes the temple and returns to the woodsman, and thereafter makes money for the woodsman by dancing as a kettle on a tightrope. In another version, a priest tries to catch a Tanuki to eat for dinner, but the Tanuki escapes by changing itself into a tea kettle, which the priest takes back to the temple. But when the priest places the kettle on the fire to make some tea, the kettle sprouts limbs and soon resumes its true Tanuki form. In other versions, the Tanuki transforms into a teapot that never runs out of tea, thereby becoming the favorite of the temple monk, but the Tanuki eventually makes his escape. In the 1994 hit movie Continued Illustrations of Many Demons Past and Present); Curiously, in his lengthy 1908 article on fox-tanuki lore in China and Japan, M.W. De Visser says nothing whatsoever about this legend. This extremely popular tale may have emerged in the 16th or 17th century, but in extant artwork it does not appear until the 18th century. It comes in many versions, and initially featured a shapeshifting Fox, not a Tanuki ( read historical references to this story ). In one popular variant, a poor woodsman saves the life of a Tanuki. In thanks, the Tanuki transforms itself into a chagama (tea kettle) that the poor man sells to the priest of Morinji Temple 茂林寺 (in the town of Tatebayashi, Gunma, near Tokyo). The priest takes it back to his temple, where he orders his staff to clean it and make some tea. As you might imagine, the Tanuki was very unhappy with his role as a cooking utensil, for it hurt to be polished and used on the fire. After a time, the Tanuki escapes the temple and returns to the woodsman, and thereafter makes money for the woodsman by dancing as a kettle on a tightrope. In another version, a priest tries to catch a Tanuki to eat for dinner, but the Tanuki escapes by changing itself into a tea kettle, which the priest takes back to the temple. But when the priest places the kettle on the fire to make some tea, the kettle sprouts limbs and soon resumes its true Tanuki form. In other versions, the Tanuki transforms into a teapot that never runs out of tea, thereby becoming the favorite of the temple monk, but the Tanuki eventually makes his escape. In the 1994 hit movie Heisei Tanuki Gassen Ponpoko , the chagama is the black round thing the Tanuki children are trying to change into when they are training. Morinji Temple claims the Bunbuku Chagama story originated in the late 16th century, but the earliest extant artwork of the theme (to my knowledge) is a drawing of a mujina making tea in the 1781 Konjaku Gazuzoku Hyakki ( see photo here. Curiously, in his lengthy 1908 article on fox-tanuki lore in China and Japan, M.W. De Visser says nothing whatsoever about this legend. click to enlarge

click to enlarge click to enlarge Bunbuku Chagama 狸狐図, by Katsushika Hokusai 葛飾北斎 (1760 to 1849). Painted in the last year of his life. Source Tokyo Nat’l Museum.

Also this J-site Lucky Tea Pot of Morinji Temple. Here Tanuki assumes his animal form. By Yoshitoshi Tsukioka 月岡芳年 (1839-1892) from New Forms of 36 Apparitions. Photo this J-site. Tanuki transforming into (or out of) the shape of a chagama 茶釜 (tea kettle). Artist unknown, but attributed to the Katsushika Hokusai School , c. 1840s. Photo Library of Congress.

Iron Tanuki Kettle

(Tanuki Tetsubin 狸鉄瓶).

Meiji Era. Sold at Kyoto-based shop called 難波美術道具店.

See links 1 & 2 Tea Kettle Tanuki

Modern Ceramic from Shigaraki.



Available for online

purchase at this J-store. Bunbuku Chagama Tanuki

20th century, ceramic, located at

Morinji Temple, but photo from

Japanese web. Click the image

for photo montage and sources.

The Wonderful Tea Kettle (title page). English text by Mrs. Thomas H. (Kate) James.

Tokyo: Hasegawa Takejiro, ca. 1896. Woodblock book, printed on crepe paper, 8 in. x 5 in.

Source: Library of Congress. See Rare Book and Special Collections Division.