DOROTABŌ 泥田坊

Pronunciation: DOH-roh-TAH-boh

Translation: Mud-Field Goblin, Muddy-Field Monk

Overview

The dorotabō is a filth-caked, one-eyed, bald-headed yōkai that emerges from a muddy rice field in the middle of the night, raising its two three-fingered hands in the air as it howls in resentment and anger: “Ta wo kaese!” or “Return my rice fields!”

This muddy-field goblin is a sad, messy monster that is justified in its rage. Before becoming the dorotabō, the creature was a regular man; while he was alive in human form, he bought a rice field and tended it all throughout his adult life so he could provide for his family and bequeath it to his grandchildren. But after his death, it was sold to someone else by his ungrateful, lazy, sake-drinking adult children, and it now lies fallow. He has returned to haunt the fields as the dreaded dorotabō to demand the return of his land.

The dorotabō legends are peculiar. Other than Toriyama Sekien’s depiction in Konjaku Hyakki Shūi (今昔百機種位), or Supplement to the Hundred Demons from the Present and the Past (1781), there are no other mentions of this mucky monster in early texts or art. The appearances that came after imitated Sekien’s piece. It’s well known that Sekien didn’t just give likenesses to old folktales and myths; he made up his own creatures too. The dorotabō very well might be one of those Sekien-original yōkai, and a humorous one at that.

In his woodblock print, Sekien gives the dorotabō only three fingers on each hand. This is a trait often found in images of oni (ogres) and other wicked creatures. There are different theories as to why this association exists, but one is that in Buddhism, monks use their hands when reciting the five states of the human heart and mind. Two fingers represent humanity’s virtues—wisdom, or chie (智慧), and compassion, or jihi (慈悲)—while the other three symbolize the poisons of humanity, described as ton-jin-chi (貪・瞋・痴): jealousy and greed, hatred and anger, and delusion and ignorance. Scholars and folklorists alike have hypothesized that dorotabō (as well as other beastly monsters) have only three digits on each hand because they possess only those three negative traits and lack the goodness of wisdom and compassion that humans have.

Background and Popular Stories

The yōkai researcher and author Katsumi Tada has a theory about the origins of the dorotabō. Considering that the first image of this filth-covered monster was made by Toriyama Sekien, who never said no to a good pun, Tada suggests the term dorotabō is actually wordplay.

He may be on to something. Consider, for example, the poet Dorotabō Yumenari (泥田坊夢成), who lived during Sekien’s time. This particular poet wrote kyōka (狂歌), a type of poetry that was full of playful verses and vulgar turns of phrase. Dorotabō Yumenari often visited the Yoshiwara pleasure quarters, and would spend all his money on women and sake. It’s possible Sekien was playfully castigating the poet for living a little too recklessly when crafting the yōkai dorotabō.

To give another example: When Sekien included his image of the dorotabō in his collection Konjaku Hyakki Shūi, a new red light district opened north of the capital Edo. It was called Hokkoku, or the Northern Country, but nicknamed “Yoshiwara Tanbo,” or “Yoshiwara Rice Fields”—“rice fields” being a nickname for brothels in Sekien’s time. Perhaps Sekien was alluding to this red light district in his tale of the dorotabō.