Talk:Tengu

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Contents

[edit] Misc

Regarding the recent vandalism, perhaps the article should be protected for a short time. --Oni Ookami AlfadorTalk|@ 05:07, 16 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Nomenclature

from the article:

Tengu can change their appearance to that of an animal (often a tanuki or a fox)

Why should we say tanuki?

The reference to raccoon dog was changed to tanuki because like other things unique to a country, the common practice is to use words from that country's language. Just as english has adopted terms such as Sumo wrestling and Shinto shrine rather than fat man wrestling or nature church, this change uses the Japanese term for an animal unique to Japan.

The only reason one could argue against using the term tanuki is that unfamiliarity may leave people wondering what you are referring to. But in this case we are blessed with effortless cross referencing, and with a single click an uncertain reader can find out exactly what is being discussed, which is even better than the dubious image one might form from trying to imagine a raccoon dog.

Some people claim that the english articles in wikipedia should favour english names when more than one is in use, but in this case it should be noted that the raccoon dog gets redirected to the page with the title tanuki, so in this sense the issue has already been decided and consistancy also dictates that the link in this article remain as tanuki.

First off, Raccoon dogs are *not* unique to Japan. Read the article on raccon dogs. Secondly, Raccoon dog is the English equivalent for the Japanese tanuki, but fat man wrestling and nature church are *not* the English equivalent for the Japanese sumo and shinto. Sumo and shinto is used because there is no term in English with equal meaning. Sumo wrestling is an expression which clarifies sumo, and shinto shrine is an expression for what is called jinja in Japanese.
However, I do understand the argument that there already is a seperate article for tanuki, being on the role of the raccoon dog in Japanese culture. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 221.190.19.66 (talk • contribs)

[edit] Tengu in media

First off, thanks for the recent addition to the article. However, I cut the following bit:

"Since the use of tengu in these games, the popularity of the creature has increased dramatically and they can be seen with increased frequency in many fictional works, espcially those in the form of fanfics of popular Japanese anime."

The reason is that no source was cited, and this reads like original research. If a source is provided, I have no problem with its inclusion. (Incidentally, I need to provide sources for some of the rest of the material -- I wrote the first big expansion of the article back before I understood to cite sources . . . . --Amcaja 12:56, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

Thanks. I'm taking a look at some of the sites where I noticed these references so that I can make a statistical comparison based on post dates.--Oni Ookami Alfador 01:43, 11 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] More cuts

I have removed this bit twice:

In the anime and manga, Tactics, an 'oni-eating' tengu is unsealed from the rock by a folklore scholar named Kantaro. The translationed manga (released by ADV Films) changes 'tengu' to ogre. The tengu's name is Haruka, a pun on the phrase 'really strong'-Haruka no tsuyoi. The anime has yet to be relased offically in America (however it is available through fan subs and IRC.)

This seems like too much information on a fairly insignificant piece of Japanese popular culture. It is highly doubtful that someone visiting the Tengu article really cares to read a complete list of every appearance of tengu in popular culture anywhere, let alone a detailed plot outline of such works. If such a discussion is desired, it belongs at Tactics (anime), not here. — Amcaja 16:40, 8 February 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Tengu sound like "Grays" aliens/UFO Abduction

Flying around in saucer type contraptions, kidnapping with the victim has no memory of the missing time, communicating with telepathy. Has anybody heard of this? DyslexicEditor 05:00, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

I thought the same thing. If you're a UFO nut, it's evidence of aliens' existence. If you're a scholar, it's evidence of some innate human super-myth that appears in multiple cultures. For us, it's original research, unfortunately. — Amcaja 12:56, 3 March 2006 (UTC)
Hmm.. I did a google search for the word Tengu and alien and it found I wasn't the first to have the idea. DyslexicEditor 14:35, 3 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Removed bit

In Capcom's Onimusha 3: Demon Siege, a tiny tengu named Ako took on the role as the messenger, time-warper and guardian between Oni-Samurai Warrior Samanosuke Akechi that originate from Medieval Warring State Japan, and Special Task Force Jacque Blanc, who was from the Modern Day France, whom found themselves in the opposite timeline respectively, during the Genma's Invasion.

I removed this. I don't have a problem with mentioning Onimusha 3, but the person who added this should probably determine if this reference is more pertinent than one of the others that's listed and replace the less appropriate one. Further, there is no need to go into this level of detail here. Describe this on the Onimusha 3 page, but this page is about tengu in general, and should be kept general. — Amcaja 12:58, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree that its a bit too much. If you ask me the section should be simply a list of the appearances of tengu in various media and pop-culture. The only time any additional information may be needed, is if the reference requires some kind of clarification. I really dont get though why people see what is obviously a concise list and decide to add a paragraph about one obscure item to that list.--Oni Ookami AlfadorTalk|@ 05:22, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

I'm assuming you meant "decide to add a paragraph"? :) — Amcaja 19:33, 23 March 2006 (UTC)
Haha, my apologies, I've had a long day and whatnot. I fixed my typose now, but yeah you're right.--Oni Ookami AlfadorTalk|@ 05:22, 24 March 2006 (UTC)
I just thought it might be a Freudian slip. :) — Amcaja 13:52, 24 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Unsourced bit

A Tengu may strap a monk to the top of a tree or offer them savory foods that transform into excrement when eaten.

The current article is very careful to cite sources. In the interest of maintaining that level of integrity, I removed the above sentence from User:Maria Caliban pending citation. She has been notified on her talk page. — Amcaja 13:57, 24 March 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Konohatengu

I'm going to change this, as everything in Japanese that I've read says that the konohatengu is a low-ranking, bird-like tengu similar to the karasutengu. It seems that equating this name with the daitengu is an widely-copied error by an English-speaking writer.

Some references, with my translations:

Konohatengu statue based on the work of yokai expert Shigeru Mizuki.

An illustration - A carved image ("koppa" is another pronunciation of the kanji for "konoha")

Entry in the Youkai Denshou Database. "At the Ooi River, when night falls, something like a great bird with eagle-like wings stretching about 6 shaku comes flying in great numbers. This seems to be a kind of konohatengu."

The Japanese Wikipedia Entry says: その姿は大天狗や烏天狗と同じく山伏装束で、烏天狗によく似ていると言われている。 "As for its form, like the daitengu and the karasutengu it wears the costume of a yamabushi, and it is said to resemble a karasutengu very much."

Kotengu 00:56, 8 May 2006 (UTC)

No problems here. Please be sure to add at least one of those sources to the References section (even if it's in Japanese). — Amcaja 03:11, 8 May 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Ravens and Crows

Re: [this edit:]

Karasu in Japanese refers to both ravens and crows (and rooks and jackdaws and anything else in genus Corvus) - the best known Corvus in Japan, however, is probably the big, chunky, ravenish Corvus macrorhynchos, commonly called the Large-billed Crow, so "crow" may be the best translation after all. Also I don't know where anyone would get the "raven" translation other than Whitewolf (sigh).

...anyway now that I look at the current article it looks like the reference to a specific bird type is no longer there - just for future reference, though, the bird tengu were historically associated with was not a corvid so often as the Black-eared kite and other similar raptors. I've seen this in various places but here is one reference:

Mizuki, Shigeru. Mujara 3: Kinki-hen. Soft Garage, 2003. p. 95. ISBN 4861330068

And here's a [google book search] for English references because I'm lazy. Kotengu 18:33, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

Checking the history, it looks like you removed the crow link on 8 May. If you get a chance, add some of the information you've mentioned here into the article. If the bird to which tengu are linked has changed over time (from kites to crows or whatever), that's worth mentioning. — Amcaja 19:38, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
Oh, did I? I forget these things too quickly. Anyway I have a feeling the bird-association has evolved (probably by the term karasutengu becoming popularized), I just wish I could find a good solid reference on that. Let me check around... Kotengu 05:09, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Good Article Nomination failed

This article is close to GA quality, but not there yet. The lead needs to be expanded to summarize the whole article and adjusted in other ways to meet WP:LEAD. The wording needs to be adjusted a bit to help readers unfamiliar with Japanese culture. In addition, I'd like to see the references improved with more print sources and the publication details (place, publisher, date) provided for existing references. --CTSWyneken(talk) 13:44, 28 July 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, I've wanted to use print sources for some time to expand the article and/or replace the web sources. It's been tough locating anything in English, though. Thanks for the ideas to improve the article. -- Amcaja 14:51, 29 July 2006 (UTC)
We're in luck: Google books recently added this article (which I thought I'd never find) to its full-view section - it's pretty much the English language source on tengu which everyone else references. A few pages are out of order though; I'll try to get the fixed PDF I made online somewhere soon. Kotengu 07:18, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
How do you download the thing? — Amcaja 07:29, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
Well now that I've got it uploaded you can download it here. The google site still has the advantage of being searchable though. Either way I'd kind of like to volunteer to rewrite the article myself, as it's kind of my pet subject and I have access to some Japanese sources as well. Kotengu 20:49, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
Dōzo. I'll help out if and where I can. — Amcaja 22:35, 10 December 2006 (UTC)
Well it took a couple weeks of cobbling together in my sandbox, but it's finally done. Kotengu 小天狗 09:06, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Source?

Although malicious tengu may lead people astray or kidnap them, benevolent tengu are sometimes said to help travellers who have lost their way in the mountains.

I removed this pending a source citation. It's probably true, but it'd be nice to have the source. — Amcaja 08:39, 26 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm afraid the best I can do is "I read it in some guide book". I was hoping that someone else would be able to expand upon the idea of the helpful tengu. The article says that the tengu can be malicious or benevolent, but all the behaviors described seem to be malicious. CKarnstein 01:51, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, it does mention tengu teaching sworsmanship. — Amcaja 09:19, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

True, I'd missed that, although I'm not sure if it really counts as benevolent. (Depends on who they're teaching!) I think the article as it stands gives the impression that tengu are generally malicious, or at least mischevious, even though it also states that they are "alternately describe[d] them as benevolent or malicious" and have "ambiguous morality in Japanese tales". I hope someone will be able to give more examples of helpful tengu to balance things out. CKarnstein 02:44, 2 September 2006 (UTC)
Here's a couple of folktales in which tengu aren't such bad guys:
Old Man's Wen
Tengus and the Hana-matsuri
Kotengu 00:42, 9 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Tengu in modern culture

A tengu is featured in the anime Megaman.EXE (Rockman.EXE in Japan). A Net Navi named Tenguman operated by Master Teng-Fian (Fuuten Roushi) appears not only in the cartoon, but in the video games aswell [[IMG]http://i32.photobucket.com/albums/d21/Kouhaisparrow/beast17-screen363.jpg[/IMG]]

(From a school computer:) Another place I've seen them-- IIRC, two of the shikigami/summons from Yami no Matsuei (Decendants of Darkness) are based on tengu (though considerably better-looking). I don't have the manga on hand to check their names/if they're explicitly stated to be tengu, though, and the anime cuts off before the arc they appear in. Still, it't a fairly safe bet, seeing as most of the other shikigami are based off of mythilogical creatures and gods.

(though considerably better-looking)
BOLLOCKS. Real Tengu are much prettier than manganime bishōnen. Seriously though, do we need to make a separate article for pop-culture here like was made for Kitsune? This is getting out of hand. Kotengu 00:37, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
I agree. What would be nice is if WP:JAPAN made a guideline/ruling that pop culture sections are to be avoided unless thoroughly sourced from secondary sources, the way WP:MILHIST has done. Maybe that'll happen, but it would be a tough sell. -- Amcaja 01:26, 9 November 2006 (UTC)
It's worked reasonably well for Kitsune, and I've repeated it at a couple of other pages (Kappa, Oni, Tanuki). Ideally we'd have these sourced. Realistically, though, they tend to keep creeping back in. Splitting that material from the folklore material might not be ideal, but it keeps it off the main page, still leaves it accessible for those interested, and requires a minimum of upkeep compared to just deleting it. One of those compromises I live with in order to spend less time on maintenance and more on actual contribution of some sort. Shimeru 22:14, 10 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Another image

Kudos to Kotengu for the rewrite! I haven't had a chance to review everything in detail, but it looks really nice on the first pass. I just got back from a trip down to Kyushu, and I got a good photo that I thought might have a home somewhere in the article. It's of a shrine in Beppu: Image:Tengu shrine in Beppu.JPG. Have a look and place it somewhere if you think it'll add something. I thought a photograph might be good since all the images in the article at the moment are paintings and the like. — Amcaja 06:44, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Awesome. That could work, actually - I was looking for an image of tengu worship for the "protective spirits" section, but nobody had donated any izuna-gongen photos to wikipedia, alas. Do you have any information on this particular shrine? Kotengu 小天狗 08:14, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
Not really. It was a small shrine in the middle of downtown Beppu. I stopped into a local shop to ask about it, and they said it was portable. The town had tengu flags all over the place, so there may be some sort of tengu festival planned in the near future. — Amcaja 09:56, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
Okay, added it. Kotengu 小天狗 22:32, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
Brian, you didn't by any chance take a photo of the plaque next to the tengu, did you? There was probably some pretty usefull info on it. (Oh, and by the way, is Beppu really all that terrible? :) TomorrowTime 20:05, 3 January 2007 (UTC)
Hindsight and all that (sorry, no). I know a guy who lives in Beppu, so maybe I can convince him to go by and snap the plaque. And to answer your second question, Beppu is heaven on earth, especially if you like onsens! :) — Amcaja 00:11, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
On second look, the plaque is fully visible in the photo. Zoom in quite a bit on the white box down below the tengu head, and you should be able to make out most everything. — Amcaja 00:13, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
Whew, I didn't even realize the whole uploaded photo was that huge. Ok, I think I can make out the gist of it. Here goes:
Yayoi tengu: tengu were often described as protectors of freedom and sovereignity in Japan; In 1688 there was a huge fire in Beppu and this has led to the construction of many shrines to protect the villagers from further grief; the townsfolk got used to worshipping in those shrines constructed on the spot of the fire (in a part of town, called Yayoi), and there were many festivals held there; in February of Showa 48 (I'm too lazy too calculate the date, but the plaque says 19 years ago), a tengu mikoshi was built; since then, every April the tengu mikoshi is part of the town's festivities.
That's the general stuff I can make out. There's more (talk of the founder of the town and such), but I can't really pinpoint what that all relates to, without the proper context.
Oh, and, yeah, give me an onsen any time! That's possibly the one thing I miss most now that I'm not in Japan :) TomorrowTime 10:01, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
Cool stuff! I've updated the Commons photo's description with your translation. Hopefully I'll be able to read Japanese some day . . . . :) — Amcaja 11:50, 4 January 2007 (UTC)
Sheesh, if I knew you were gonna use the text I'd had taken the bother to translate Showa into Gregorian. :) Anyway, apparently Showa 48 is 1973. Way more than 19 years ago, might I add :) That's one old plaque. Regarding Japanese, let me tell you a secret. All that talk about it being difficult is overrated, if you ask me. It's just another foreign language - if you set yourself to master it, you can. Just like any other foreign language. TomorrowTime 15:54, 4 January 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Comments

This is really good. I mean really, really good. I definitely take my hat off to Kotengu for whipping this article into shape like this. I just did a copyedit, mostly removing redundancy, rephrasing to avoid weasel terms and passive voice, and breaking up some long sentences. I hope that if I've distorted or changed the meaning anywhere, Kotengu will fix it back.

I have a few comments about some issues I could not fix with a simple copy edit. Here they are, in no particular order:

  • I question the italicization of the word tengu throughout the text. Granted, it's a foreign term, but it's a foreign term for which there is no English equivalent. It may just be a style issue; I note our article kitsune does not italicize kitsune throughout. On balance, I'd de-italicize tengu here as well.
  • Many of the images are of works of art and include what seem to be titles ("Tengu and Buddhist monk", etc.). Are these the works' titles? If so, they should be italicized; if not, perhaps we can reword the captions to be more action oriented and thus not sound like titles (A tengu confronts a Buddhist monk in a painting by Kwanabe Kyosai.")
  • Many names in the text could use with a word or two of explanation so that the average reader isn't left confused. I've added some of this where I could, but I couldn't find definitions for some of the terms. Here are the remaining terms for which I think we should give a bit of description: yamabushi's costume (what does it look like?), the Kojidan, Go-Shirakawa, the Shokoku Rijan Dan, the Gunpei Seisuiki, the Shasekishu, Kaidan Toshiotoko, and Taira no Kiyomori.
  • There was some weasel language that I wasn't able to squash. "It has often been suggested that the tengu's Japanese image . . . " (Who, for example, has suggested this?) "According to legend, he died in torment . . . " (Even legends can be traced to sources. Can we name one that relates this tale? See also West Dakota Prize) "Hayashi Razan listed the greatest . . . " (In what work did he list them?) "A creature called shibaten . . . is said to live in Koichi Prefecture . . . " (Again, can we trace this to a source?).
  • I don't like the section "In folk tales". Isn't all of this information related to folk tales? And whereas the rest of the article is analytical, this part just consists of plot summaries of tengu tales. Better to mention these tales as examples in the rest of the article (the way kitsune does) and nix this section. Either that or find analytical sources about tengu as comic figures and retool the section to be about that.
  • The "Modern fiction" section is nothing more that a stub. It should probably be reduced to a simple "See also" to Tengu in popular culture.

Again, this is really good. I hope Kotengu puts it up for peer review and eventually Featured Article Candidates. Consider this my early peer review. Thanks for your work on this. — Amcaja 09:13, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

  • Couple more things: Automated peer reviewer thingy says that the lead is too short, and that there are a few more references where there's a space between the punctuation and the <ref> tag (there should be no space). It'd also be a good idea to make sure all of the links are to actual articles and not redirects or disambiguation pages. — Amcaja 09:18, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
1)I'm not sure about the italicization issue at all. Looks like the Manual of Style says nothing about whether they should be dropped in long articles. I'll see what other precedents there are.
2)I think that particular image's title would translate as "Tengu and a Buddhist monk" but I'd have to check the book I scanned it from again. I think I intended it as a description, but finding out the actual titles of the images might not hurt.
3)Noted, I'll try to work on that
4)I'll look up where the bit about Emperor Sutoku came from. For Garuda I'm not sure if de Visser gave a particular source, but I'll look into that too. For the shibaten I believe the source would be "the people of Koichi Prefecture" as it is apparently simply a folkloric creature which doesn't appear in literature.
5)Most of the information in the article comes from old literature (which should be clarified in the lead). The folk tales section is just that, about popular orally-transmitted tales that have been collected by folklorists.
Anyway, I'll try to take care of all that in the morning. Very late at night here. Kotengu 小天狗 10:12, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
Brought up the italics issue on the Manual of Style talk page. Hopefully somebody will know if there's a proper way to deal with it. Kotengu 小天狗 10:50, 10 January 2007 (UTC)
Trying to stub all the redlinks now; will get rid of links on things that don't seem notable enough to find any decent information on them. Kotengu 小天狗 21:39, 11 January 2007 (UTC)
Regarding italics: Apparently it's FA procedure to drop them when the word in question is the subject of the article. I'd italicized every instance of "kitsune" on that page, and during the FAC process they were deitalicized. The editor in question was User:Raul654, so I tend to trust his interpretation; his summary was "isolated foriegn words should be [italicized]; words that are used throughout the article should not be." Shimeru 06:58, 12 January 2007 (UTC)


[edit] Word origins

Hello, I just wanted to add that the word karasu which means crow in Japanese, is believed by some to be a bastardization of the name Garuda. I'm sorry I don't have a source to give you on that one! Garuda is a popular Hindu and Buddhist deity. Tien'kou is the chinese word that shares a similarity with the Japanese word Tengu, but this may only be a coincidence. I have found no evidence that the word Tengu was derived from Tien'kou other than the similarity in spelling. The Tien'kou is a mythical dog that flies through the sky and is regarded as an omen in China, perhaps simply a comet or meteorite. If someone would like to add this please do, though I'm afraid there are no books written about Tengu from a scholarly that I know of so citation is difficult! Most of the information spread on the internet comes from people involved in an organization called the Bujinkan, one of their martial arts schools was said to be founded by a tengu and they have a huge member base. I agree the article should be protected.

Naomi

24.92.74.83 20:31, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Hello, I just wanted to add that the word karasu which means crow in Japanese, is believed by some to be a bastardization of the name Garuda. I'm afraid you're going to have to get a reference on that, because I've only seen that speculation on one website, and it sounds very questionable.
I have found no evidence that the word Tengu was derived from Tien'kou other than the similarity in spelling. And I've found plenty. They're also written with the same Chinese characters (天狗), in case you missed that. You might want to check out the numerous references given in the article.
I'm afraid there are no books written about Tengu from a scholarly that I know of so citation is difficult! There's a scholarly paper on the subject that's available for free on google books. I used it to write a lot of the article. You might want to check it out, it's in the external links on the bottom of the page.
Also, please put new topics at the bottom of the talk page next time. Thank you. Kotengu 小天狗 21:11, 9 January 2007 (UTC)

Oh sorry you are right I did not notice. I will try to find the book where I read the part about Garuda's name being bastardized. My library is so huge it's going to take a while to find that bit, as I must have read it about six or eight years ago. I didn't actually mean to reply in the middle of the talk page, sorry! ::embarassed:: I moved it down here. :)

The google book crashes my browser (firefox) so I'll take your word for it. :)

You know, there is a new english translation out in bookstores of an old text that expresses martial arts tactics that is presented as a dialogue of a tengu. I can't seem to find it on amazon.com so I think am going to go buy that today at Davis-Kidd and see what is in it.

Naomichanart 16:31, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Ok I got the book. I am only a few pages in, skimming, and it is a beatiful little book. You have to get it Kotengu! It is called "The Demon's Sermon On Martial Arts", it was released just last year and is translated by William Scott Wilson, who is known for his translations of Hagakure and The Book of Five Rings. It was originally written by Issai Chozanshi in the 18th century and is a story about an anonymous samurai who travels to Mt. Kurama to speak with a tengu...or what actually appears to be a bunch of tengu. Perhaps this is where Mt. Kurama became connected with the Tengu?

Naomichanart 19:20, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

Is that the Tengu Geijutsu-ron? I've been wanting to get my hands on that but wasn't aware there was an in-print translation, thanks! I don't know about it being the origin of the tengu/Kurama connection though, I'm pretty sure the Ushiwakamaru legend predates the 18th century. Kotengu 小天狗 21:26, 19 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Pass GA

An amazing article. It shows that a lot of work has gone into it. It is excellently structured, easy to read, the references are impeccable, and the images are superb.

Fred-Chess 12:54, 1 February 2007 (UTC)