Okuri-inu

Okuri-inu is a dog-yokai said to follow night travellers along mountain paths at a fixed distance. It does not attack while one walks, but in the moment one stumbles it is said to spring; conversely, if the traveller reaches home safely, the dog leaves at the gate. Cases are densely recorded in Hida (Gifu), Kiso (Nagano), and the mountain villages of Gunma and Tochigi. The protective formula is well known: even if one falls, saying "ah, a fine rest" aloud spares the traveller; folk practice records giving an onigiri or one straw sandal at the gate as thanks if the dog accompanies one to the house. Yanagita Kunio's Yokai Dangi and Santo Mintanshu systematically collected okuri-inu and okuri-okami cases; the gazetteers of Gifu, Nagano, and Gunma record the type, with the Hida-Mino border region as a notable transmission area. Toriyama Sekien's figural cycles do not include the figure, which is treated as a strictly folkloric yokai. Murakami Kenji's Nihon Yokai Daijiten (Kadokawa, 2005) and the Nichibunken Strange Phenomena and Yokai Folklore Database systematize the cases. Adjacent figures include okuri-okami (the wolf form, dominant in the Tohoku mountains).