Kamikiri, the “hair-cutter”, is a Japanese yōkai said to secretly cut people’s hair on the head. They were rumored from time to time in the urban areas of the Edo Period, and can sporadically be seen in the records from the 17th to the 19th centuries. It is thought that they would appear out of nowhere and cut people’s hair on their heads without them noticing. In the Shokoku Rijidan, a collection of stories (setsuwa) compiled in the Kanpō years (1741-1743) of the Edo Period, there is written a tale about how near the beginning of Genroku, at Matsusaka, Ise Province (now Matsusaka, Mie Prefecture), and at Konya, Edo, (now Chiyoda, Tokyo, Tokyo), strange paranormal incidents about how people’s hair, both male and female, would suddenly be cut off from their motoyui (元結, a hair-tying string) as they were walking along on roads at night. Those people would not notice this at all, and the cut-off hair would fall down on the road still tied up. A similar paranormal incident is recorded to have occurred in the essay Hannichi Kanwa (半日閑話) by Ōta Nanpo at Shitaya in Edo (now Taitō, Tokyo) and in Kohinata (now Bunkyō, Tokyo), and it says that females servants employed at shops and residences would be victims of this.
Alias Kamikiri (髪切り)
Real Names/Alt Names “Hair-cutter”; Alt: Kurokamikiri (黒髪切, black hair-cutter)
Appearance List Bakemono Zukushi Monster Scroll (Edo Period)
Sample Read Bakemono Zukushi Monster Scroll (Edo Period) [Internet Archive]
Description Kamikiri, the “hair-cutter”, is a Japanese yōkai said to secretly cut people’s hair on the head. They were rumored from time to time in the urban areas of the Edo Period, and can sporadically be seen in the records from the 17th to the 19th centuries. It is thought that they would appear out of nowhere and cut people’s hair on their heads without them noticing. In the Shokoku Rijidan, a collection of stories (setsuwa) compiled in the Kanpō years (1741-1743) of the Edo Period, there is written a tale about how near the beginning of Genroku, at Matsusaka, Ise Province (now Matsusaka, Mie Prefecture), and at Konya, Edo, (now Chiyoda, Tokyo, Tokyo), strange paranormal incidents about how people’s hair, both male and female, would suddenly be cut off from their motoyui (元結, a hair-tying string) as they were walking along on roads at night. Those people would not notice this at all, and the cut-off hair would fall down on the road still tied up. A similar paranormal incident is recorded to have occurred in the essay Hannichi Kanwa (半日閑話) by Ōta Nanpo at Shitaya in Edo (now Taitō, Tokyo) and in Kohinata (now Bunkyō, Tokyo), and it says that females servants employed at shops and residences would be victims of this.
