Ubume Legend

The Ubume tradition is a kaidan about a woman who died in childbirth and appears, named ubume, to ask a passerby to hold her baby. In Kyoto, at a bridge end or crossroads, a white-robed woman holds out a crying baby and asks to have it held. If the receiver keeps the proper countermeasure -- chanting the nenbutsu, touching the baby with a sword scabbard -- the baby turns out to be a stone or fallen leaves and the woman departs with thanks; if the countermeasure is neglected, the baby grows heavier and the receiver collapses. The figure has roots in the Chinese kokakucho (a night-flying bird) recorded in Bencao Gangmu and Youyang Zazu; in Japan, from the Heian period, it merged with the pollution of death in childbirth and was retold as a female entity. The Konjaku Monogatari-shu, scroll 27, the Shasekishu, and Toriyama Sekien's Gazu Hyakki Yagyo (Anei 5, 1776) "Ubume" carry the picture and inscription. Cases concentrate around the Kamo River bridges of Kyoto (the Gojo and Shijo bridges) and the Katsura River bridges; the figure is widely distributed across central Japan with regional names such as ubume in Kanto and ugume in Kyushu.