"Baku (獏 or 貘) is the name of a fantastic beast in Japanese folklore, originally from China. It is usually depicted as a squat, trunked creature, vaguely resembling the tapir with which it shares its name in Japanese. It is often described in chimeric terms. Today the most common description gives it the body of a bear, the legs of a tiger, the nose of an elephant, the tail of an ox, and the eyes of a rhinoceros, but other descriptions exist, such as one from ancient China pegging it as a goat-like animal with nine tails, four ears, and eyes on its back." - quote from here.
These are a few examples of the monster that eats dreams. The top stitched interpretation was found here. The origin of the second one is lost to me at the moment but I believe it is from the 18th century. Click here to see another version of a Baku. And don't miss the one posted at Wikipedia.
3 comments:
That's some good stuff.
I'm back up at LukePski.blogspot.com
The second creature isn't actually Baku, it's Hakutaku (I even see the kanji for its name, 白澤, over towards the left side of the image).
Nice needlepoint interpretation of my Baku though. (It's the second thing that comes up in a GIS of "baku dreams", which is what I'm doing looking at this old entry.)
Yeh man, that image isn't a Baku either. That is Kudan, the speaker of truth. Baku is an elephant headed lion with bull ears and horns.
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