This yokai is named after the Japanese word for “wandering about”, “rambling”, or “strolling around”. Toriyama Sekien depicts a lantern with eyes and mouth, tied to bamboo, tilting toward the open road. While it looks like a lantern standing in a rice field, Sekian writes that he dreamed of a fox, or a fox fire, hiding in a field of orchids. According to Japanese Wiki, Sekien’s commentary in the “Hyakki Tsurezure Bukuro” says the Burabura looks like a lantern light. However, it is actually believed to be a Kitsune-bi (a Japanese will-o’-the-wisp). There are few references of the lantern yokai despite its popularity. However, the lantern yokai has often been reported not as a Chochin Obake (literally, lantern ghost) but as a fire of mysterious or suspicious origin, such as the kitsune-bi and chochin-bi (lantern light). Since it is portrayed as a yokai of items and artifacts, some say that it should not be considered as a kitsune-bi yokai, as described in the commentary, but as a variation of the so-called Chochin Obake.
Description This yokai is named after the Japanese word for “wandering about”, “rambling”, or “strolling around”. Toriyama Sekien depicts a lantern with eyes and mouth, tied to bamboo, tilting toward the open road. While it looks like a lantern standing in a rice field, Sekian writes that he dreamed of a fox, or a fox fire, hiding in a field of orchids. According to Japanese Wiki, Sekien’s commentary in the “Hyakki Tsurezure Bukuro” says the Burabura looks like a lantern light. However, it is actually believed to be a Kitsune-bi (a Japanese will-o’-the-wisp). There are few references of the lantern yokai despite its popularity. However, the lantern yokai has often been reported not as a Chochin Obake (literally, lantern ghost) but as a fire of mysterious or suspicious origin, such as the kitsune-bi and chochin-bi (lantern light). Since it is portrayed as a yokai of items and artifacts, some say that it should not be considered as a kitsune-bi yokai, as described in the commentary, but as a variation of the so-called Chochin Obake.
