Myth Tales: Vol. 2 The Wild Child Susanoo
Hey hey, this is Thersa Matsuura author of the Book of Japanese Folklore and the coming-this-fall Yokai Oracle Deck, and I’m here to share with you all those hidden, fascinating, and sometimes frightening corners of old Japan. Join me as I explore strange superstitions, curious creatures and cultural enigmas right here on Uncanny Japan.
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It’s time for another deep dive into Myth Tales — number two to be precise. The first one was Episode 132: An Origin Story that Ends with Dragons where I talked about the weird relationship between Izanagi and Izanami and all the delightful and delightfully-weird gods and goddesses (and creatures and islands) they created. Logically, next should be Amaterasu — the Sun Goddess — and most important deity in the pantheon for Japanese. I’ll get to her in a bit. But right now I’m a intrigued with her brother. Susano-o. The god of Storms and Sea (lightning strike/thunder roll). He’s an absolute nutter and I love him.
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(some fairy tale music intro)
Mukashi mukashi, long long ago — you’ll remember because you already listened to the origin story, Episode 132 — Izanagi visited his dead wife/sister in Yomi no Kuni — land of the dead or the underworld. Long story short, he snuck a look at her as a rotting corpse when he promised he wouldn’t and incurred her wrath. Which included a whole horde of nasty demons and oni springing from various parts of her body and chasing after a quickly fleeing Izanagi.
He managed to escape — in some versions of the story by tossing peaches at the monster army. Izanagi was then able to roll a boulder over the entrance/exit of the Land of the Dead sealing the love of his life and the mob of fiends inside.
Izanagi is feeling pretty gross after this encounter — as you can imagine. So he stops by a river to purify himself. This is important. Because it’s from that little bath that some other gods are born, most importantly: The Three Precious Children. And by born I mean, while washing his face, Amaterasu (Sun Goddess) springs from his left eye, Tsukuyomi (Moon God) leaps from his right, and today’s subject, Susano-o (god of storms and sea) emerges magnificently from his nose.
(sneeze)
Susano-o right out the gate, is a bit of a problem. Keep in mind, all three gods aren’t in baby form, they’re full on adults. But even though, Susano-o is bawling like a little brat. Saying he misses his mom and wants to go see her. Like, he hasn’t even MET his mom. Anyway, he’s crying and howling nonstop, so hard (and I quote) “until his beard eight hands long extended down over his chest”. All this caterwauling caused the mountains to whither and the rivers to dry up.
Remember, his dad, Izanagi is dealing with a lot. He’s heartbroken at the loss of his soulmate/wife/sister; has just escaped death by numerous blood thirsty beasts; had to strip naked and bathe in a river because he was so funky after the encounter. And now this. So he does what any new dad would do, he banishes Susano-o from the High Plain of Heaven down to Ne no Kuni (Root Country or The Land of Roots).
Some says it’s the same as the Underworld (Yomi no Kuni), but others insist there are some key differences. For one in Yomi no Kuni there is almost no escaping, it’s all about the dead or the undead living in the World of the Dead. If that makes sense. Ne no Kuni, while it attracts the deceased, is more of a dark place of chaos, monsters, and transformation. It’s also said to be deep in the ocean or beyond the sea. Later, Susanoo will be known as the ruler of Ne no Kuni. Where Izanami — his mom — lords over Yomi no Kuni, the Underworld.
So poor, sensitive, (I believe) misunderstood Susanoo is ordered to go to this scary place. But before he leaves he says he needs to visit his dear older sister, Amaterasu to say goodbye. Screw you, Tsukuyomi Moon God, I guess. There really isn’t a whole lot about the Moon God, unfortunately.
There are several versions of how things went down, but basically, mountains and rivers all over the land shook violently as Susanoo shows up in the Sun Goddess’s palace. Amaterasu, understandably suspicious of her impulsive brother’s intentions and thinking maybe he wants to steal her land, dresses up in male clothing and armor. She straps a 1,000-arrow quiver on her back and a 500-arrow quiver on her chest, stomps the ground, lets out a war cry, then goes out to meet him.
Susanoo explains the situation — that he’s been banished and just wants to say goodbye. He also suggests they swear an oath and make some more gods while their at it. A kind of competition. Again, several variations of what happened, but basically one thing leads to another and Amaterasu in a very badass move, takes his Ten-span sword, breaks into into three pieces, chews each part up, and spits out three new goddesses. Susanoo in return, snatches up her bracelets and hair decorations, masticates those comma-shaped magatama beads for a while and spits out five male deities.
So who won? Amaterasu says since he used her magatama to create the five gods and five is more than three, she won. Susanoo thinks differently.
In the end, Susanoo just outright declares he won the challenge and then proceedes to lose his ever long mind. He goes on what’s called a victory rampage. Absolutely unhinged. For days, he goes around destroying everything, he breaks holy bridges, tears up holy rice fields and smashes parts of the holy palace. He even goes as far as to defecate on Amaterasu’s throne. But the whole time the Sun Goddess is remaining calm, enduring all this. Until. Until, he takes a holy horse, flays it alive, punches a hole in the roof of the weaving hall and tosses the poor animal down. One of Amaterasu’s maidens is so surprised she runs, bumps her private parts into a weaving shuttle and dies right then and there.
That’s the last straw.
Amaterasu marches off and hides herself in the Heavenly Rock Cave and seals it. Remember she’s the Sun Goddess, so this throws all of the heaven and earth into darkness.
I’ll leave you there in the literal and figurative dark about how that problem got solved, because that’s more of a Amaterasu story, not a Susanoo story. As a teaser, just know some ingenuity and a risque dance later and light is restored onto the world and heaven again.
So next, we find Susanoo leaving the High Plain of Heaven and descending to Ashihara no Nakatus-kuni (Central land of Reed Plains). Imagine an uncivilized, chaotic place of rustling reeds, inhabited by wild gods. Yes, earth. Or more precisely, Japan. While wandering around, Susanoo noticed a single chopstick floating down a river and surmised there must be a village nearby. He traveled upstream where he met an elderly couple and a young girl all weeping, piteously.
When asked what was up, the couple told him about how seven of their eight daughters had all been eaten up — one a year — by a nasty, vicious, voracious eight-headed and eight-tailed serpent or dragon called Yamata no Orochi. And now it was time for their last daughter, Kushinada-hime to be devoured.
Susanoo asked exactly what this Yamato no Orochi looked like, and the description given is just wonderful.
“Its eyes are like red cherries and it has eight heads and eight tails. Covered in moss, cypress and cedar, it spans eight valleys and eight peaks, and when you look at its belly you see blood oozing out everywhere.” Nice.
So Susanoo does what any old-timey hero would do, he says, “I’ll slay that serpent dragon with the eight heads and eight tails if you let me marry your daughter.” And the father said what any old-timey father would say in folktales of yore, “Sure! Here you go.”
So Susanoo promptly turns her into a comb. Yes, you heard that correctly. He turns her into a comb and puts her in his long locks — to keep her safe, he says — and instructs the mother and father to brew up something he calls: Eight-fold-brewed-sake, called “Yasakaori no sake”. Eight fold meaning it was extremely potent. Think: the Everclear of nihonshu.
Then after having done that they were told to build a fence with eight gates and place a vat of the sake at each gate. Next all they had to do was wait.
Sure enough, the enormous Yamato no Orochi comes slithering along and smells the magical sake. It sticks its eight heads through each of the gates and starts drinking until it’s drunk and passes out.
Now is Susanoo’s time to shine. He takes out his Totsuka no tsurugi sword and starts hacking. And hacking. And hacking. He cuts the serpent into hundreds of pieces. It’s a gore fest. The river and land is running red with it’s blood. It’s dead already. But Susanoo keeps going, moving to the tails. When Twang! His mighty sword hits something and it snaps in half. Some tales say it was just nicked.
What the?
He digs around the dead dragon and discovers ANOTHER sword, one more powerful than his up until then, favorite weapon. This was called the “Ama no murakumo no tsurugi” (“Sword of gathering clouds in heaven”). But would later be renamed the “Kusanagi no Tsurugi” or “Grass cutting sword”. There’s a nice story behind that, too. I’ll get to a little later on a different episode. Just know that this sword went on to become one of the three sacred treasures or sanshu jingi or three imperial regalia of Japan. The other two are a magatama bead (a stone or jewel shaped like a comma), and a mirror. All still in existence today. Probably. Again, another story.
So after this epic battle, or well, more like slaughtering — the Yamata no Orochi didn’t put up much of a fight — Susanoo appointed his new bride’s father as the headman of his new dwelling. He and Kushinada hime had one son. Then he married the daughter of the mountains and had two more children. Susanoo was busy though. There were at least thirteen other gods and goddesses born to him, these were a mixture of “created in some magical way” (like chewing magatama beads) or with a mother who isn’t on record.
Finally, after so many years living here, he decided to move on to Ne no Kuni (the Land of Roots). Remember that?
Now I suggest you don’t get any ideas about trying to date or marry any of his daughters. Or if you do, you’re going to have to be made of some pretty tough stuff.
There’s a tale of how a descendent of Susanoo named Onamuji no kami had some really disturbed brothers who would do things like say: Hey! “Catch a red wild boar!” And then they’d heat up a large boulder until it is glowing red and roll it down a mountain toward him. The naive Onamuji grabs it and is promptly burned to death. His mother steps in, goes to heaven and gets a couple of goddesses to bring her sweet and handsome Onamuji no kami back to life.
Those rascally brothers though. They convince Onomuji to walk onto a large tree that has been split in half and held open by a wedge. Once he steps on: Splat! The tree snaps shut killing the poor brother again. Cue: Mom. Mother visit the High Plain of Heaven again and gets the gods to bring him back to life…again.
There was a third attempt on his life, but this time he manages to escape and heads to the Ne no Kuni with the intent of seeking Susanoo’s wise counsel. However, before that can happen he meets and falls in love with Suseribime — Susanoo’s hot daughter.
Oh dear. Susanoo finds out and is none to happy. Okay, he says, how about you pass four challenges before I let you date my daughter.
Challenge number 1: Here sleep in this chamber filled with snakes. Onamuji was able to survive thanks to a snake-repelling scarf Suseribime gave him.
Challenge number 2: All right, snakes didn’t work. Here sleep in this room filled with centipedes and bees. Again, a handy dandy centipede and bee-repelling scarf presented to him by the lovely Susurebime saves the day.
On to Challenge number 3: Susanoo ups his game. Here go retrieve this arrow. And he fires an arrow into the middle of a large field of grasses. Onamuji chucks it out there to find the arrow and while he’s innocently looking around he hears something.
(fire crackling)
Susanoo has set the entire field on fire. Luckily, a little field mouse leads Onamuji from danger.
One more. Challenge number 4: Susanoo was actually surprised that Onamuji made it through that last one. So he thinks of something worse than snakes, lice, bees, and fire.
Here, pick the lice and centipedes from my hair while I relax. Onamuji was a man in love and of incredible resolve. He said, Okay! But he used some weird mix of red clay and nuts give to him by Suseribime and while pulling out the offending bugs, pretended to chew and spit them out. It must have been very soothing. Because it lulled Susanoo into a deep sleep.
Here is where I guess Onamuji snapped. Was everyone out to kill him? Having had just about enough of this father in law to be, he took the sleeping Susanoo’s long hair and tied it firmly to the rafters, then blocked the exit with a large boulder. He goes on to steal Susanoo’s sword, koto, and some bow and arrows, before grabbing Suseribime and saying, let’s get out of this place.
Together they attempted to escape Ne no Kuni and the not entirely stable Susanoo. They would have made it, too, had Onamuji not banged the koto against a tree, making a sound and waking Susereibime’s dad.
An outraged Susanoo goes into beast mode, but not realizing his hair is tied to the building, ends up pulling the whole place down around him. I’m guessing that earned Onamuji a bit of respect in the ol’ Susanoo Playbook. Meanwhile, Onamuji and Suseribime are still hoofing it to the exit of The Land of Roots. Susanoo blasts his way through the rubble and pursues. He gets all the way to the exit and just as he reaches them, has a change of heart. Instead of murdering Onamuji or worse, he calls to them, that he gives them his blessing. Also, Onamuji no kami, change your name to Okuni nushi no kami. Which he does.
He also uses the sword and bow an arrows to defeat his obnoxious brothers and become the ruler of the land. Well, it wasn’t exactly as easy as that. But that’s the gist of it.
One more Susanoo story before we go.
I guess my absolute favorite image of this wild man is one regarding trees. There’s a legend that has him lying around plucking hairs from different parts of his body and turning them into different kinds of trees. He then hands them over to his children and has them go around Japan planting them.
Thank you all for listening and reviewing The Book of Japanese Folklore. Stay safe and well, and I’ll talk to you soon. Bye bye.
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