#youkaigakkou trivia

[youkaigakkou-tl]

Some tweets about the characters' academics from 2018

Only based on the 5 major subjects, youkai-related subjects like youkai studies omitted. Tied for 1st: Haruaki and Ranmaru 3rd: Miki Counting from the bottom 1st: Mame and Tamao 2nd: Hatanaka (Good at youkai-related subjects. Bad at everything else) 3rd: The mandragoras (Can write their own names) Something like that...? 🤔✍️ In regards to academics only, it's not the same as general intelligence!

Haruaki taught the mandragoras to write their names ✏✐✎✍️ How Hatanaka managed to get his teaching license is one of the seven mysteries of Hyakki Academy. 😇✍️💯

When I posted these academic rankings a long time ago, a friend asked, "Does Dr. Takahashi place first?" He flunks Japanese, so he places 4th overall (ᯅ̈ ) He knows the grammar, but he gives weird answers when the question is about a character's feelings 🤭

1 / 2 / 3

#youkai gakkou no sensei hajimemashita #a terrified teacher at ghoul school #translations #youkaigakkou trivia #twitter pics #mostly the same stuff as the 2020 tweet. but theres a little more detail so. yknow #its ok hatanaka im right down there with u i didnt really know the difference between the 2 “zu”s either

[youkaigakkou-tl]

Academic ability ranking based on the 5 major subjects

(English, Maths, Japanese, Sciences, Social Studies)

Ranmaru > Haruaki > Miki > Takahashi > Principal > Nyuudou > Utagawa > Sano > Kashima = Fuji > Yanagida > Amaaki ￤great barrier￤ Hatanaka's sister > Marilyn & Daisy > Toubyou > Maeda > Renjou > Odawara > Koizumi > Momoyama > Akibe > Ogatas > Oota > Mujina > Ogoso > Hijita = Beniko > Tenmaru > Kurahashi > Marshmallow ≧ Hatanaka > Tamao = Mame

Average score above the great barrier is 80, average score below is 15.

(Jan 11, 2020)

#youkai gakkou no sensei hajimemashita #a terrified teacher at ghoul school #translations #youkaigakkou trivia #(sobbing) everyone is so stupid... #biggest mystery: where does ebisu place in this #definitely above takahashi but where exactly #twitter pics #its not pics.... but im gonna use that tag anyway....

[youkaigakkou-tl]

Hanafuda

Was trying to figure out who would be on the middle card, as it turns out, probably Haruaki lol

Anyway, here's what each of the hanafuda cards on this color page correspond to.

#youkai gakkou no sensei hajimemashita #yohaji #youkaigakkou trivia

[youkaigakkou-tl]

Yohaji Early Drafts

All the tweets about Tanamai-sensei’s early draft of yohaji, collected into one post and translated!

(Most of the tweets can be found under this twitter search)

September 25 2015

Sano was originally going to be the human teacher MC instead of Haruaki, Hijita was going to be an actually terrible delinquent.

Also, this seems like a similar scenario to the finalized chapter 1, with Mame doing the steal-and-run instead.

Pic 5 and 6 is captioned "Sano-kun-sensei vs Omame! A fight that wouldn't happen in the actual story!"

Also the guy with glasses in pic 6 would later become Haruaki (or in sensei's words, sailor fetish ahoge guy)

He actually looks like if you combined Haruaki and Hatanaka

I'm not sure if pic 5 and 6 come from the same version of the chapter as 3 and 4, actually.

December 10 2015

The font changed because I translated that first tweet like 2 months ago, and everything else today lol

July 19 2018

The caption:

1: early draft of beniko with short hair 2: Haruaki was originally going to have to use tools for exorcism, but the idea was dropped. 3 and 4: from the draft when Sano was going to be the MC, doppelganger policeman appears here as a train conductor

I think its a good call, to let Haruaki use his power without any tools. More drama that way lol

He's holding kagura bells on that page, which are said to call gods, and Sano reacts to it, so that's probably already a plot point at that point.

Also, where the hell is this train?? Is it running on the water like in spirited away?? Ok that's pretty cool

August 30 2020

From that same early draft where Sano is the MC

Renren was also originally going to be just a background character and one of Hijita's delinquent buddies

Also, sensei's computer with all these old draft files got bricked a couple years ago 🥲

January 14 2020

Early design of Hatanaka (Was he a student???? Is this the draft where Sano is a teacher since he's wearing a tie??? Why is he floating????)

January 7 2017

"Hatanaka" wasn't a character yet when the first chapter was published in the GFantasy magazine, and was only added in the volume release.

Also, the detail that he's an ex-delinquent and was classmates with Miki was only added in volume 2, so for volume 1 he was just a genuinely serious teacher.

September 18 2018 (Not translated bc I'm lazy)

"Hatanaka" was actually the MC of one of sensei's early works, who had the same name and looked about the same.

He's actually a super important character to her, since she's drawn like 10 oneshots for contests at that point, and this one where the MC is Hatanaka won her a honorable mention and got her to become a mangaka.

So basically. Hatanaka is sensei's blorbo

Conclusion

So this probably explains why sensei is so fond of the teacher Sano AU for april fools comics (this was the entire point of this post)

I'm glad we live in a world where Haruaki exists and is the MC? Maybe I would also have enjoyed this manga if Sano was the MC, but I'm glad Haruaki exists.

I think we're living in the best possible timeline, there's nothing in these drafts that makes me feel strongly that "I wish it was like that".

#youkai gakkou no sensei hajimemashita #a terrified teacher at ghoul school #rambles #youkaigakkou trivia

[youkaigakkou-tl]

Timeline of the main story

I actually made this blog to share stupid trivia i find while translating, so stupid trivia you’re getting.

Youkaigakkou is actually surprisingly clear with what happens when, although im not sure if thats the case with all school life manga, since i dont read school life manga that much lol

this is gonna get long real fast, so everything is under the cut

April

Generally the school year starts at the beginning of April, but it doesn’t actually get any more specific than “April”

In yoseito ch 22, its april 18 on hatanaka’s 2nd day of school, so school started on April 17 for him. It also says 200X, and this is 9 years before yoseito, so 10 years before main story, which means the year timeframe is 2010 to 2019.

Chapter 4 (MIki’s lesson) happens at least a week after the start of school

May

Chapter 6: we get a calendar at the end of the chapter!!

pretty shite calendar. why aren’t the columns labelled. honestly not quite sure how to parse this.

i believe ch 7 (spooking lesson + haruaki goes home directly after) happens on may 1st

ch 8 and 9 (the gang goes to haruakis house) happens on may 2nd

the end of ch 9 is the next day and the train ticket says may 3rd

ch 10 (run melos) is a week before midterms, so like, mid may? idk

ch 11 (senseis sunday), pretty sure it’s may 26. see the next point

idk what this is called but ch 13 sure gives us this.

this would be 2013 or 2019, this kinda lines up bc this manga started in 2014

but also theres no world where this lines up with the calendar from above so whatever

ch 13 is sports day prep, which is may 31, friday

ch 14 to 16 is sports day itself, june 2, sunday

June

No specific dates for anything that happens in june (ch 16 to 19)

ch 19 (zashiki and co sneak into school at night) happens a week before end of term exams (early july), so like late june.

July

ch 20 (momoyama perfume) happens right before sano’s birthday! (july 7)

we dont actually get a chapter about sanos birthday. wtf

we get another timetable in ch21, but its the same one as the one above so im disregarding it. this is called reusing assets, a very smart move

ch 21 and 22 (karasutengu troupe introduction) happen on the same day as ch20, just in the afternoon

ch 23 (amaaki impersonation) happens after july 7, thats all i know

everything that happens in july is before the 20th, since thats when summer vacation starts.

a lot actually happens in that small timeframe

ch 26 (teacher trio go to kyoto + reminisce) happens some weekend

ch 28 to 30 (spookology camp) happens at some point, idk

ch 36 to 38 (lost in tokyo) happens a week before summer vacation starts

summer vacation should be july 20, but i cant be sure since it isnt mentioned in any chapter, but the timeframe is around there.

August

ch44 and 45 (beniko haunted house) is august 10, and it says “middle of summer vacation” so the start would be around july 20, yeah...?

ch 46 (beach episode) and ch47 to 49 (miki house) happen on the same day, not sure what day exactly tho.

ch50 (august 31) happens on august 31. shocking!

we also get this calendar.

which would be 2016, which.... wasnt even the year this chapter came out on. this chapter came out in like 2019

September

anyway, second term starts september 1, which we do get confirmation on in ch50.

ch51 (haru and sano get handcuffed together) happens 2 weeks into september

my mans, can you be less casual about predicting the future like that

ebisu came to hyakki at the very least around 2.5/3rd week of september, since the above is already 2 weeks into september, and in ch52 he says “starting next week”

the timeline’s surprisingly tight around this time, since

ch55 (part time job)

ch56 and 57 (culture festival discussion)

ch58 and 59 (youkai train)

all happen within a week or less, and they happen on different days

the culture festival (ch61 to 66) is two days, and happens around 22 to 23 september. the second day of the festival is the autumn equinox/ohigan, which is 23 or 22 september depending on the year

the whole of the renren arc (ch 67 to 77) happens in one day

this one day is actually really tight. in ch67 u can see a clock, i do believe this is around 1:40pm and not 8am

and then another clock in ch70, which is 5:50pm. this is after haruaki was trying to come up w a plan for 2 hours and then actually executing his genius social media slander plan

and then this

and then the whole ordeal actually goes all night, and ends at sunrise

October

Unclear when exactly the school trip happens, but its sometime in october.

ch 83 until ch 90 (so far) has been the 2nd day of their 4D3N trip......

also, a fun bit of trivia:

ebisu’s festival is 20th october, so even when all the other gods are gone for kannazuki, ebisu is still available for worship in october.

the fact that the mangaka managed to line up the exact right characters and situation for this to happen and this detail to be relevant is kinda impressive.

thats all the chapters for now, heres how the months measure up

april: ch 1 to 7 (7 chapters)

may: ch 8 to 13 (6 chapters)

june: ch 14 to 19 (6 chapters)

july: ch 20 to 43 (24 chapters!)

august: ch 44 to 50 (7 chapters)

september: ch 51 to 78 (28 chapters!)

october: ch 79 to 90 (12 chapters so far)

#youkai gakkou no sensei hajimemashita #a terrified teacher at ghoul school #youkaigakkou trivia #rambles

[youkaigakkou-tl]

Useless(?) Trivia

Mouse sensei’s profile in ch33 is actually a mistranslation!

It actually says “A teacher at Hyakki Academy. Second oldest after the Principal. Homeroom teacher to the two below (Yamazaki and Takahashi)”

I can kinda see where the mistake came from, they combined the 3 sentences into 1 sentence and all the keywords got mixed up. (or its machine translated, I get roughly the same result putting it in google translate)

3rd pic is the official chinese tl, which they did tl correctly.

#youkaigakkou trivia

[youkaigakkou-tl]

Chapter 35 fortune telling

I was going to put this in the timeline post, but the tangent got a bit too long

just for reference, this is the chapter where ogoso, fuji and haruaki spy on the class 3 kids, its also right before the lost in tokyo incident

expanding on each of these under the cut

February

this applies to both haruaki and amaaki!

haruaki met ebisu, and amaaki met hatanaka, miki and takahashi, 3 very untrustworthy adults.

although this doesnt rly apply to them, tamao and maeda (the merman) are also february kids. 2/22 (cat day) and 2/7 respectively

April

utagawa and momoyama are both april kids

yanagida likes messing with momo, they’re drawn together a lot

utagawa also gets jerked around, but i feel like this is mostly referring to momo

as an aside, takahashi’s birthday is april 10th (not mentioned in any of the chara profile pages, but mentioned in a tweet from the mangaka) hes the one doing the jerking around tho lol

May

hatanaka is the only one born in may that i know of, the fortune’s clearly talking about miki and haruaki lmao

December

fuji’s a december kid, and right in this chapter he makes friends with ogoso!

November

mame’s a november kid and..........

#youkaigakkou trivia

[youkaigakkou-tl]

The Kyoto Arc Analysis Post (Part 1)

In other words, “OP has been consumed by wikipedia rabbit holes for the past 3 months”

Starting writing this in September, now it's November. Also this thing is nearly 7000 words.

TLDR: This is basically a crash course on ancient Kyoto, the mythology then, and stuff that details in this arc points to. Chinese philosophies and mythology are mentioned too, when relevant.

Spoilers for chapters 82 to 94.

I keep hitting image limit so this has been split into multiple posts

This part covers the urban planning of ancient Kyoto, what the four gods are, and some locations shown in ch 83.

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4

(If you want to read the whole thing in a google doc, here's the link)

Warning: I’m not a historian, just some rando on tumblr, I’ll probably get some details wrong. If you have anything to add or anything to correct, please do, also don’t get too mad at me.

Also, if this shows up in the searches for some of the other mangas I namedrop, I’m sorry!

If there’s a concept you’re interested to know more about, just google it. I’m bound to leave out stuff bc not everything is relevant (and there’s already plenty of irrelevant stuff in here sobs), people write whole books about this stuff, I’ll be here for 1000 years if I were to bring up all of it.

I Don’t Know How To Start This

I guess I’ll recommend some other manga that have to do with gods, Shinto, that stuff.

Well. Everyone knows what Noragami is. If you don’t, go read/watch it. If you do, go read/watch it again. It’s probably better than you remember it being. That’s the curse of monthly manga, it feels like there’s pacing problems when you read it once a month, but usually when you binge it you find it’s structured pretty well. Strangely I don’t find this with youkaigakkou, but maybe because I think about it 24/7.

Touge Oni, or “Primal Gods in Ancient Times”. This manga leans heavily into ancient Japan, Shinto creation myths, stuff like that. Tonally it’s kind of like Mushishi, in the way that powers beyond human comprehension just do crazy shit. Anyway, great manga, highly recommend.

Wow, The Actual Manga, Right

Just some trivia to start with. This is going to wander quite a bit, because there’s a lot about history and mythology, which means everything is connected to everything else. You know how it is.

Shinto shrines are called shrines, 神社 -jinja, meaning “place of the god(s)”

Buddhist temples are called temples, 寺 -dera or -ji.

The temple they’re staying at is called “Bonnou-ji”, or "worldly desires temple". As far as I can tell, this isn’t a real place, nor could I figure out what temple it’s based on just from the scenery we get to see. (We don’t even get a general location of what part of Kyoto it’s in.)

Heian-Kyo

You may have noticed South is oriented at the top on this page.

I have a guess, but I can’t be sure it’s right.

Why does it matter? First of all, we have to talk about the other thing Seimei mentions about Kyoto: It’s built in a grid.

(By the way, this is an insane thing to say. What does he mean?? Does he mean “ah yes city was built like this over 100 years ago so one day someone could use this specific spell involving a grid to subdue a giant booba monster”?)

Also, the word he uses for “grid” here is “碁盤目 (gobanme)”, which in the literal sense means “shaped like a Go board”, which is cute. I want to see them play Go.

Heian-kyo (the name for Kyoto back then), like Japan’s previous capital of Heijo-kyo (now Nara), was modelled after the Chinese capital of Chang’an (now Xi’an).

For the record, they probably didn’t call themselves “Heian-kyo” back in those times, and started calling themselves Kyoto around the 11th century. It’s kinda like how we call it “ancient Japan” but they didn’t call themselves that. To them it was just “now” and “the capital”. Why make a name for “the capital” when there’s just one capital that will be capital forever? Makes sense.

(Just for reference, the layout of the streets and where Heian-kyo would be compared to modern Kyoto.)

The emperor’s palace is in the northernmost part of the rectangular city, with the main street Suzaku-oji going down the center of the city to the southern gate.

The reason behind that is the idea that left (east) is more important than right (west), and that the emperor should sit with his back facing the north star (Polaris), so that the sun rises from the left (east) and sets on the right (west).

What Heian-kyo and Chang’an are both based off is the urban planning fengshui idea of “shijin-so-o”, which translates to “four gods topography”, which is the very same four gods we’re talking about this arc.

There are two very similar versions of this philosophy, the original one and the one derived from that.

The original version is based off the idea of “zofu-jusui” meaning storing wind and water. There is to be mountains in the North, hills in the East and West, and a body of water in the South, creating a sort of jug.

The expanded version is:

Seiryuu to the left, flowing water in the East Byakko to the right, thoroughfare in the West Suzaku to the front, lake in the South Genbu to the back, mountains in the North

Basically, a city is to be bounded by mountains in the North, a river in the East, a road in the West, a lake to the South. Also, again, left and right in this definition is based off the emperor’s perspective, which could explain the direction labelling on that page.

In any case, both of these definitions apply to Kyoto.

Also, Chinese maps traditionally were oriented with south at the top, I can't say for certain if Japanese maps did too, but it's likely!

However, if you look at maps today, you may find that there’s no major body of water south of Kyoto.

In the past, there used to be the Ogura-ike pond south of Kyoto, which symbolised Suzaku. (Despite being called a “pond”, it was more the size of a lake, 4km by 3km). In the 1930s, it was filled in because of land reclamation, to create more farmland.

In a sense, Kyoto had “lost Suzaku”.

Intermission

It’s also BECAUSE of this very philosophy that Kyoto nowadays gets abnormally hot in summer (above 35 degrees celsius for 15 days a year on average, compared to 5 days everywhere else).

Because it’s inland and blocked by mountains on all sides, on hot days, cool air can’t flow in from elsewhere so it just keeps getting hotter. Sounds like a stupid trade-off for stupid philosophy, but the practical reason behind the philosophy was probably that surrounded by mountains, Kyoto would be harder to invade.

Suzaku-oji

The main street, Suzaku-oji, also gets its name from the four gods. The main entrance to the palace, connected to Suzaku-oji is also called Suzakumon, or Suzaku Gate.

Speaking of Suzakumon, it shows up in the manga!

It’s where Byakko brings the gang when they go to the Seimei shrine. (Albeit a surreal version) The text on the plaque over the door is hard to read on this manga page, but it’s clear in this chapter promo art.

I believe it’s also where Shutendouji appears in ch 89. The text over the door is even harder to make out, but the building itself looks just like in that promo art.

Back to Suzaku-oji. Looking at modern Kyoto, you may notice that there's no major road down the center, instead there’s that major road to the right (in yellow). Zoom in! Enhance! What’s that road called!

Karasuma-dori street. Corresponding to Karasuma-koji of Heian-kyo, and has replaced Suzaku-oji in modern times as a main street of Kyoto. You know, like Karasuma Ranmaru. (launches myself out the nearest window)

So anyway, what gets me hung up about why south is at the top in that page, is that it just does not correspond to the map under it.

Left side is a miniature model of Heian-kyo, it’s basically a perfect match. And you can see Suzaku-oji right there on the miniature model, that big wide road, stretching from the palace gate towards the south, which would mean that south should be at the bottom of the page instead of north.

So why is it like that? idk

ALSO, IF YOU LOOK AT THIS PANEL FROM CH88, WHERE IS THE MAIN STREET???? This panel drives me insane. YOU KNOW WHAT THIS LOOKS LIKE? If you took that top half, the palace, and just pasted it at the bottom. And also the sides. DID THEY THINK NOBODY WOULD NOTICE? You know what they had a point. Canada “most sane yohaji enjoyer”, OP of this blog, who spent 2 months looking for sources on ancient Japanese and Chinese urban planning in 3 different languages, is an outlier and should not be counted.

What does this have to do with Kuji-kiri?

Honestly? I don’t know! There’s not a super obvious connection.

Kuji-kiri is the grid thing Douman does, “kuji” means nine words, “kiri” means cut. It’s a version of the kuji-in (nine hand seals), where the kuji-in is nine hand signs paired with nine words or phrases, the kuji-kiri is 5 horizontal and 4 vertical lines, drawn alternating, starting with a horizontal line.

It’s said to be derived from the principle of yin-yang in Taoism, which Onmyoudou as a whole comes from. (Onmyou and yin-yang use the same kanji)

Specifically, the 5 horizontal slashes are yang and offensive, the 4 vertical slashes are yin and defensive.

Worth mentioning, Onmyoudou also incorporates the philosophy of gogyo (five elements). Will elaborate on that later.

9 is a symbolic number in Taoism, said to be the perfect number in divination for yang, or the nine planets, or the seven stars of the big dipper plus two guardian stars, believed to be the gateway to heaven. There is the most tenuous of connections here, in that 9 was an important number in Chinese philosophy, where an ancient Chinese urban planning guide states “9 li x 9 li squares” (“li” is a unit of measurement) and “9 vertical and 9 horizontal streets in the city”

To that end, I assume the connection is simply that Kyoto is grid = Kuji-kiri is grid.

Four Gods

Four gods, auspicious beasts, symbols, guardians, whatever. The idea originated from China, and didn’t change all that much when they got to Japan. They don’t have this many names in Chinese, it’s just called “si xiang”. “Si” means four. “Xiang” doesn't have a great exact translation.

Not to be confused with any other mythical figures that come in fours that China/Buddhism/whatever seem to love so much, for all that “four” is an unlucky number.

Like a lot of other Chinese mythical things, while associated with Taoism, the four gods didn’t really originate from any religion. In that sense, I think they occupy the same cultural space as Japanese youkai, in that while sorta connected to religion, they’re not the focus.

They’re not gods of any religion, so what are they?

They’re constellations.

In Chinese astronomy, much like the western zodiac, the night sky is split into parts corresponding with the Earth’s position throughout the year. (Albeit, based off the moon rather than the sun.)

The night sky is split into 4 quadrants and 1 middle section, the middle around polaris symbolizing the emperor, and each quadrant is one of the four gods.

As said before, this is relevant because it’s part of the fengshui stuff behind the layout of Chang’an, which was inherited into the layout of Heian-kyo.

What does this have to do with Abe no Seimei?

Well. Onmyoudou is just divination, which is just astrology.

The four gods are very much tied to the Gogyo (five elements), which is half of the basis of Onmyoudou (the other half is yin-yang).

We know it's specifically the Taoist Gogyo and not the Buddhist Godai (another thing with 5 elements), because Seiryuu specifically says his domain is “wood” and “wood” is not present in the Godai.

If you’ve seen other media with Abe no Seimei, you may have heard of the 12 divine guardians (or divine whatevers, you get the idea). They’re shikigami employed by him, four of which are these four gods. I’m not entirely sure if it’s these four gods themselves, or if they just share namesakes.

(Also not to be confused with whatever other figures in Buddhism/whatever that come in twelves)

These 12 divine guardians also each correspond to a direction and the Chinese year zodiac.

The idea of the four gods is oddly extremely tied to Abe no Seimei, I assume because of the astronomy and astrology connection, so much that the gate to the Seimei shrine is the “shijinmon” or “four gods gate”, and also the pillars with the four gods carvings that show up in the manga as well.

Abe no Seimei tangent! According to legends, Abe no Seimei's mom was a white fox, Kuzunoha, often considered a youkai, but also sometimes said to be the envoy of a god or is a god herself.

In other words. What I’m trying to say is. I want to see fox Haruaki. (OP's worldly desires)

Also, look at this fun story about how Seimei died.

Tbh, I don’t know how much of this is common knowledge. I’ve seen a pretty big variety of people reading youkaigakkou, from people who are hearing about youkai for the first time to people who know absolutely everything about onmyoudou and onmyouji. I guess in this essay so far, the Abe no Seimei stuff is more towards the “everyone knows this” end of the spectrum and the Heian era urban planning is “who the fuck knows this”.

Youkaigakkou Geoguessr

That was a lot, so here’s me messing around on google maps for a little bit.

This panel was changed slightly in the volume release, but these are the Toji pagoda, the Fushimi Inari Shrine torii gates, and Kyoto Tower.

At the start of ch83, they’re at Nijo Castle.

When Haru hears Byakko’s voice and runs off, this is probably where this panel is. I can’t get an exact angle from google street view, but it probably looks like the panel if you’re on the sidewalk. The parking sign, tree, and road sign line up almost exactly, and the building looks roughly right. (Seimei shrine also marked on the map for reference)

Mans casually sprinted 1.5km. You go king.

Seimei shrine is pretty cool. Sensei got to go there for photo references. It never really occurred to me how weird featuring real places in a manga would be, as cool as it always is, all the paperwork you probably have to do. (They have a link to apply for that on the website) They have a wall with Ema (wooden plaques) written by actors, authors, filmmakers and mangaka that feature the shrine in their works. I wonder if Tanamai sensei got to write one.

This page was also changed in a pretty big way in the volume release.

I mentioned this in my TL note, but this is referencing the reports of taxi drivers ferrying ghosts, especially after major natural disasters.

Yasaka shrine, roughly 3km straight line distance from Seimei shrine, 5km on the road. I’ll take the manga at its word as the closest Ebisu shrine lol. That panel in the manga specifically would be the west gate, which lines up with the road they probably took (straight south and then east).

The main deity enshrined there is Susanoo-no-Mikoto, but there’s a bunch of shrines on the grounds dedicated to different gods, one of which is to Ebisu.

Specifically, it’s the “kitamuki-ebisu-sha”, or “north facing Ebisu shrine”. Because it… uh… (checks compass) faces north… I guess…? The interesting trivia about this is that Ebisu is written like “蛭子” instead of “恵比寿” (though it’s read as “ebisu” all the same)

蛭子 is more commonly read as “Hiruko”. (Anybody watch Summer Time Rendering here?)

Ebisu is thought to originate from the first child of Shinto creation myth big names Izanagi and Izanami, Hiruko, meaning “leech child” because he was born without bones, and was cast into the sea and floated ashore somewhere. In a popular version of the story, he washed ashore in Hokkaido, to be raised by an Ainu guy called Ebisu Saburou. (Or sometimes this guy is an Ainu deity? I cannot find a reliable primary source for this. This name comes up fairly frequently but I can’t pin it down.) I’ve also seen claims that “Saburou” is a generic name meaning “third child”, and since he is definitely the first child, that the “first two” are Izanagi and Izanami.

In any case, this would make him the older brother of Susanoo-no-Mikoto, who I’m not saying has any connection to any Mii-kuns we know of, but you know.

I got to the image limit, so the post gets split here.

Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Part 4

#youkai gakkou no sensei hajimemashita #a terrified teacher at ghoul school #yohaji #rambles #analysis