Tengu
Tengu are the goblins of Japan’s mountains and forests: bird-like at first, with wings and a beak, and later long-nosed, red-faced men in the dress of mountain ascetics, with a feather fan. Some count them as the kami of the mountains.
Meaning
The name, written 天狗, means “celestial dog”, after the Chinese mountain god Tiangou, but the JAANUS dictionary of Japanese art also ties the tengu to the winged Buddhist deity Garuda, and Chamberlain pointed out in 1905 that the Japanese creature is entirely bird-like. JAANUS sorts tengu into two types: the karasu tengu (crow tengu), with a bird’s head and beak, and the konoha tengu, with a human body, wings and a long nose, often holding a feather fan. The National Diet Library says tengu are either yōkai that lurk in the mountains or a Shinto god of the mountains, and JAANUS calls them transformations of the yama-no-kami, the mountain guardians. The Japan Tourism Agency describes them as guardians of mountains and forests.
Origin and history
The early tales are hostile. JAANUS notes that the Konjaku monogatari (early twelfth century) makes tengu enemies of Buddhism, setting fire to temples and tricking priests, and that priests who used powers gained by religious discipline for their own ends were thought to be reborn among the tengu (tengudō). The earliest pictures, in Kamakura-period scrolls such as the Tengu zōshi emaki of 1296 in the Nezu Museum, mock arrogant priests who end up as tengu. Over the centuries the tengu softened. Once thought to carry off children, by the Edo period they were called on to help search for missing ones, and they became temple guardians. In ukiyo-e prints, JAANUS adds, the long nose carried comic and sexual meanings.
Bird or long nose
How a tengu looks depends on when it was drawn. The National Diet Library points out that tengu are now usually shown in human form, as mountain ascetics, while Toriyama Sekien drew them as large bird-like figures; Tsukioka Yoshitoshi gave his a more human look, and even drew modern tengu flying over telephone poles. Chamberlain describes the change: the beak becomes a large and very long human nose, and nothing bird-like is left but the fan of feathers; the tengu is often dressed in leaves and wears a tiny cap. That cap and robe are the yamabushi’s, the mountain ascetic’s, whose form JAANUS says tengu often take, and the Japan Tourism Agency adds the red face. Joly records a story that the first tengu with a long human nose was painted by a Kanō artist after a dream.
The long nose and Sarutahiko
JAANUS explains that the long nose links the tengu with Sarutahiko, the kami who, in the account the Encyclopedia of Shinto gives, met the heavenly grandchild Ninigi with a nose seven spans long and eyes that glowed red like a mirror. Tengu masks play a part in some religious festivals.
Sōjōbō and Yoshitsune
The king of the tengu, Sōjōbō, lived near Kurama-dera in the mountains north of Kyoto, and in legend taught swordsmanship to the boy Minamoto no Yoshitsune (1159–89). Joly calls it a common subject of prints, and describes the Dai Tengu, the ruler of the tengu, with long moustaches, a grey beard to his belt and a fan of seven feathers as the mark of his rank.
Where tengu are honoured
Chamberlain noted in 1905 that several fine temples were dedicated to tengu, the Dōryō Sama near Miyanoshita among the most beautiful; Joly names it as the Saijōji, which the Dai Tengu visits. The tengu became temple guardians, JAANUS notes, with carved images on and around temple buildings, and the Japan Tourism Agency describes a bronze tengu in bird form set on top of Tengu Rock, an outcrop said to look like a tengu’s nose.
Read next
- Next in Yōkai and creatures of Japanese folkloreKappaThe kappa is the water imp of Japan’s rivers and ponds: child-sized, with a beak, a shell, webbed hands and a hollow on its head that holds the water of its strength. It drags people and horses into the water, and loves cucumbers and sumo.
- The same shape in Thanksgiving symbolsCornucopiaThe cornucopia, or horn of plenty, is a horn overflowing with fruit, grain and flowers, the ancient sign of abundance. It comes from Greek and Roman myth, where it is either the horn of the goat Amalthea who nursed the infant Zeus or the horn Heracles broke from the river god Achelous; in the United States it is a harvest and Thanksgiving decoration.
See also
Kitsune (fox), Tanuki (raccoon dog), Bakeneko and nekomata (cat yōkai), Jorōgumo (spider woman), Oni (and the oni mask), Yuki-onna (snow woman).
Sources
- Henri L. Joly, Legend in Japanese Art (1908), Henri L. Joly, Legend in Japanese Art: A Description of Historical Episodes, Legendary Characters, Folk-lore, Myths, Religious Symbolism Illustrated in the Arts of Old Japan, London: John Lane, 1908, John Lane (Internet Archive, University of Toronto copy), entry 970, Tengu
- tengu (JAANUS), JAANUS: Japanese Architecture and Art Net Users System, “tengu 天狗”, JAANUS (Japanese Architecture and Art Net Users System), entry text
- TORIYAMA Sekien’s Illustrated Night Parade of the Demon Horde (NDL Image Bank), National Diet Library, NDL Image Bank, Columns: “TORIYAMA Sekien’s Illustrated Night Parade of the Demon Horde”, National Diet Library, Japan, “Tengu”
- Basil Hall Chamberlain, Things Japanese (1905), Basil Hall Chamberlain, Things Japanese: Being Notes on Various Subjects Connected with Japan, fifth edition, London: John Murray, 1905, John Murray (Internet Archive, University of Toronto copy), “Supernatural Creatures”, pp. 442–443
- Tengu Rock (Japan Tourism Agency), Japan Tourism Agency, multilingual commentary database, R3-00525: “Tengu Rock”, Japan Tourism Agency, English text
- Sarutahiko (Encyclopedia of Shinto), Encyclopedia of Shinto, Kokugakuin University, “Sarutahiko”, Kokugakuin University, article text
The same shape elsewhere
Browse symbols formed from curves and waves.
Researched, edited and approved by Rory Hansen before publishing. Last reviewed October 10, 2026. How we research
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