Kijimuna Legend

The Kijimuna tradition is the tradition of red-haired, red-faced child-form spirits said to dwell in old gajumaru (banyan) trees of the main island and outer islands of Okinawa. Kijimuna are fond of fishing and have tales of cooperation, riding in fishermen's boats and guiding them at night at sea, while if they take offense they overturn the boat, mislead the walker, or play other tricks. They are said to eat only the left eye of fish, and to dislike octopus and fire, fixed taboos. If a gajumaru is felled, the Kijimuna who has lost his home is said to rage and bring disaster on the household, and to this day mountain-village Okinawa keeps care over the felling of gajumaru. The story has three stages: the dwelling in the great gajumaru, the cooperation and gift in fishing, and the violation of taboo (offering octopus, showing fire, cutting the tree) and the retribution. Kijimuna stand in comparison with the home-territory spirits of mainland Japan, the zashiki-warashi, the kappa, and the yamawaro, and are placed at the edge of native Okinawan belief in utaki and ancestral souls. The center is across Okinawa Prefecture as a whole, especially in villages of the northern and central main island and the outer islands (Ie Island, Miyako Island, the Yaeyama Islands). Kijimuna tales are often told around the utaki and ugaiju (places of prayer) where great gajumaru grow, with local traditions also held around the great sacred place of Sefa Utaki in Nanjo. Iha Fuyu's Ryukyu Kokon-ki, Yanagita Kunio's Santo Mintan-shu, and Miyara Toso's Okinawan ethnography are the textual basis; the Okinawa Prefectural Board of Education's Okinawa Kenshi Minzoku-hen and municipal histories also collect material. The figure does not appear in the Kiki and is placed within Ryukyuan spirit traditions.