Tradition: Japanese Mythology
Alternative Names: Hibushimi, Kobushime
Category: Mollusc
The Myth
Hibushimi is a supernatural squid associated with a legend from Okinoerabu Island in Kagoshima Prefecture, Japan. The story tells of Fuefukimatsu, known as the Little Father of the Rock Flute Pine, a lonely man without parents or siblings who spent his days aboard a boat playing the flute. One day, he discovered a kobushime squid by the seashore and had intercourse with it. When he returned to the same place the following day, the squid had disappeared.
Three years later, while Fuefukimatsu was playing his flute on his boat, two children emerged from the sea and called him their father. They explained that their grandparents wished to meet him, and he followed them into the water, carrying the children on his back. They led him to Nira Island, a beautiful undersea paradise, where an elderly man and woman welcomed him warmly as their son-in-law. Fuefukimatsu stayed with them for three days, enjoying their hospitality, before the children told him it was time to return home. He was astonished to learn that three years had passed in the world above while he had been beneath the sea.
Before his departure, the elderly couple asked what gift he desired. Fuefukimatsu requested seeds that would produce crops without being sown, and the old man gave him a shellfish called kujima, also known as hizaragai. Returning to his homeland with the children, Fuefukimatsu discovered that his only field had passed into someone else’s possession during his absence. With no land left to cultivate, he decided to live from the sea. He removed the shell from the kujima while aboard his boat and ate it, but in doing so, he himself became a kujima.
Sources
“Hibushimi.” 新版TYZ 妖怪図鑑 (New TYZ Yokai Encyclopedia). https://tyz-yokai.blog.jp/archives/1070234919.html