Nobusuma
A nobusuma or tobikura is a type of flying or sky-gliding yōkai monster, whose lore is localized in the Edo, which some say is a transmuted bat, and others a flying squirrel.
It may latch onto a human from and cover his eyes and mouth, perhaps to suck blood. It attacks animals to feed on their blood, according to other sources. It is also said to consume fruits or tree-nuts. As for it allegedly consuming flame, a source explains that it engages in a sort of fire-eating and -breathing behavior after chomping the tip off a lit torch.
According to the transmutation theorists, it starts off as bat, but with age eventually becomes a nobusuma, then later another yōkai named ; this yamachichi is characterized as a due to its habit of sucking the breath out of a sleeper and even cause death.
Etymology
The name nobusuma translates to "field bedding", where fusuma is also glossed as either "kakebuton" (the top cover futon or "night robe". The word is thought to derive from fusu mo.Mythology
The nobusuba of this type is said to be part of the folklore of Edo.As flying squirrel
This nobusuma is essentially a giant flying squirrel according to Toriyama Sekien in his Konjaku Gazu Zoku Hyakki, and he illustrated the creature like a flying squirrel, though his text states it resembles a bat, with fur growing on it, equipped with fleshy wings.. It purportedly ate nuts and flames.Sekien has a separate entry for another yōkai called momonjī, which in his opinion is a name composed partly of "" for "Japanese dwarf flying squirrel", which he asserts is also called nobusuma.). This creature transforms into an elderly human after dark when certain conditions are met: a foggy and windy night when no one is watching; this causes the traveler it subsequently encounters to fall ill.
Sekien's caption more or less matches 's commentaries in Honchō seji danki. Here it is stated that the nobusuma eats fruits. It also slices off and extinguishes the torch a human is carrying at night, then breathes that same fire, and is feared on that account. This work merely states that the fleshy wing when folded resembles the bat's wings, and does not suggest it resembles a bat overall.
Bat-type, vampire
Yet according to the Ehon Hyaku Monogatari attributed to Tōka Sanijin and illustrated by, an aging bat first turns into nobusuma then later into another monster called the yamachichi, which would suck the breath out of sleeping men. This results in death if yamachichis deed is unwitnessed, but has the opposite effect of lengthening the victim's life if spotted by another human. Due to its nature of apparently feeding on humans, it is characterized as a "vampire" by an early 20th century English commentator.A legend in the Baiō zuihitsu collection claims that in the year 1798, a weasel-like winged beast was responsible for attacks on cats in Edo. It was caught, and had right and left wings of a sort, but not quite really wings at that. Someone identified the body as that of nobusuma which dwelt in the deep mountains.
The same bat-like monster is called a tobikura and was purported to cover over the face of humans, according to the illustrated by Ryōsai Kanjin Masajumi. The nobusuma is also said to fly onto a person, and cover his eyes and mouth. It is even said that while the nobusama s and s the victim, it will suck the blood out of the traveler it spots on a mountain path.
Iconography
As already alluded, the nobusuma has been illustrated by Sekien. and byin Ehon Hyaku Monogatari.
And the tobikura was depicted covering up the face of a person in Kyōka Hyaku Monogatari, painted by Ryōsai Kanjin.
Ukiyo-e artist Utagawa Kuniyoshi has depicted swordsman Miyamoto Musashi eradicating a bat-like nobusuma in the mountains. There is no historical basis for this, except that his training did take him all over the country.
Derivation
Sekien's illustration explains in caption that the nobusuma Is essentially a flying squirrel, as already noted. A burrows inside hollowed trees by day, and comes out at night to glide through the air. Such spooky conduct may have inspired an actual mammal being treated as a type of yōkai. Since musasabi or the both have acute night vision, it could be blinded by bright torch or lantern light in the dark, causing it to latch on to humans. Such behavior could be mistaken for a yōkai attack experience, and spread by word of mouth.The encyclopedia Wakan Sansai Zue has an entry for the beast, read as both musasabi and nobusuma. It explains: "the name nobusuma is colloquial, while it is called momoka in the Kantō region, and itaojiki in the western provinces". It is described as practically resembling a rat in fur color and shape, with fleshy wings. Then the encyclopedia defers the detailed description to the entry for "bats" under the "land bird category" volume.
The actual relevant entry is not "bats", but the next one for "flying squirrel", more specifically: "musasabi/nobusuma/momi/momoka" ;. As is often is the case, the Wakan Sansai Zue entry here is derivative of the corresponding entry for the leishu flying squirrel in the Chinese compendium Bencao Gangmu. Here Su Song is quoted as saying "When the people in the South see them, they consider them to be abnormal", though construed as "in the south many regard it as yōkai" in the Japanese translation. Also, Guo Pu's annotation to the Erya dictionary is quoted, which states that the "giant flying squirrels are shaped like small foxes,.. Their legs are short but their claws are long.. They consume smoke rising from fire", also paraphrased in Wakan Sansai Zue, and comparable to some of the descriptions and attributes of the yōkai given above.