Tradition / Region: Japanese Mythology
Alternate Names: —
Category: Mountain dweller, Yokai
The Myth
On the island of Hachijōjima, where steep mountains rise sharply from the sea, people once spoke in hushed voices of something called Yamabora. It was not a creature that could be clearly seen, nor one that left tracks or shadows. Its presence was known by a single, unmistakable sign: an unbearable stench that struck without warning in the depths of the mountains.
In earlier times, Yamabora was said to dwell in the forests of Higashiyama. Those who wandered too far into the slopes would suddenly be overwhelmed by a smell so foul that it turned the stomach and robbed the breath. Panic would seize them, and they would flee downhill without ever glimpsing what caused it. Some said Yamabora was a monster, others that it was a spirit of the mountain itself, angered by human intrusion.
By the early nineteenth century, Yamabora had already become rare, spoken of more as memory than menace. Yet during the Tenpō era, the old fear returned. An exile named Kinzo Bunyamura was traveling deep in the Higashiyama mountains when the air around him suddenly thickened with a stench so intense that he could not endure it. Believing himself to be in the presence of Yamabora, he ran down the mountain in terror, certain that had he lingered even a moment longer, something dreadful would have happened.
Those who claimed encounters with Yamabora all told the same thing. There was no shape, no sound, no movement—only the smell. It came suddenly, filled the forest, and vanished just as mysteriously. Because of this, Yamabora was remembered not as a beast with claws or fangs, but as an unseen warning, a sign that some parts of the mountain were not meant to be entered, and that the land itself could drive humans away without ever revealing its face.
Gallery
Sources
TYZ-Yokai Blog contributors. (n.d.). ヤマボラ (Yamabora). In TYZ-Yokai Blog, from https://tyz-yokai.blog.jp/archives/1042311445.html
Interpretive Lenses
Religious Readings
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Philosophical Readings
- Nietzschean Deep Dive
Psychological Readings
- Jungian Deep Dive
Esoteric Deep Dive
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Political / Social Readings
- Marxist Deep Dive
Other
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