#namazu-e

[cuckootheone]

[kumamonfan]

now we know what kumamon has been doing- he’s trying to subdue  o-namazu 

he’s a giant catfish that creates earthquakes when the stone pillar ( 要石-kaname-ishi) on his head is loosened.  

[dwellerinthelibrary]

Naughty catfish apologise to Kashima for causing the earthquake while he was away.

[dwellerinthelibrary]

I adore the namazu-e (catfish pictures) which sprang up after the 1855 earthquake in Tokyo (then Edo). Talk about facing disaster with humour. Monster catfish were believed to cause quakes with their subterranean movements; the god Kashima's task was to prevent them using a large rock, the kaname-ishi. This picture shows not just an enormous and gleefully insane-looking catfish, but Kashima racing home on horseback, having unwisely left the city under the protection of the god of fishing, Ebisu.

[blushisthecourt]

According to Japanese myth the cause of earthquakes is the giant catfish Namazu or Namazu-e (the second term refers to the woodcuts of Namazu) living buried in the underground. Namazu is one of the yo-kai (in a very broad sense translatable as "monster"), creatures of Japanese mythology and folklore that were associated or caused misfortune or disasters. via.

[two-heavens-as-one]

「天地乾坤のその間に地震雷火事親父の譬ハおろか大江戸の根生の随一名物のかずにも入し火事荒事他国に双ぶ者なけれハわんぱくものに御ひゐきの引立つよき四十八組うしろだてにたのんできたハ地震雷二人共そこ一寸でも動きやァがるなおれが持ばをあらしこめら鹿嶋の神も上らんあれ愛宕の神社が御たくせん江戸繁栄のしるしとて万ざい楽より太平楽　出火も三十二三が所ホウホウじつまつて申す」

-Artist Unknown

[fromthefloatingworld]

Kashima Controls Namazu, Namazu-e, Edo period