Tesso - 鉄鼠 - [ Yokai | Onryo ]

Tesso - 鉄鼠 - "Metal/Iron Rat" - [Yokai | Onryō] - Aka: Raigō - Also: "Mii-dera Rats", Mii-dera Nezumi (三井寺鼠)

• About this Yokai: The vengeful spirit of a priest which manifested as a gigantic Rat with iron sharp teeth and claws! he commanded a plague of 84,000 rats to tear up all the books and sutras in temples across Kyoto! - The Legend goes a bit like this: 

"Once, a very long time ago, towards the end of the Heian period, a Buddhist abbot of Mii-Dera's monastery named Raigō was appointed as the spiritual advisor to then heir-less Emperor Shirakawa. One day, the emperor asked Raigō to pray for the then pregnant empresses to give birth to a prince in exchange for whatever the monk desired. Raigō asked the emperor for help with the construction of an ordination building so that he could train new monks, a long standing wish of his. The emperor was happy to approve of this and so Raigō began to pray for twenty-one days straight; performing rituals and reciting mantras. Eventually, his prayers were heard and a young prince was born! ...But Raigō's request was not granted due to some political sway from the nearby rival Enryaku-ji temple at the top of Mt. Heiei (at the time they where the only temple in the area with an ordination program.) The numbers of which protested and caused the Emperor to renege on his promise to the smaller monastery. And so Raigō went on a protest of his own, a one-hundred day fatal hunger strike! Sadly, the emperors mind was already set and Raigō starved to death on the one hundredth day of his strike. However, so intense was his outrage & resentment that his spirit held onto his grudge with an unrelenting grip. Raigō's restless spirit had became an Onryō! Every night from then forward, Tesso appeared as a gigantic ghostly rodent at the young prince’s bedside, after a few years, the young prince passed away, leaving Shirakawa heir-less once again...

Even so, Raigō's grudge was not satisfied and manifested as a plague of 84,000 rats with stone-hard bodies, iron sharp teeth and claws! These rats flooded & ravaged the crop fields, temple library's across Kyoto, eating everything, tearing up books, scrolls, and ruining any religious artworks which they could. The rats swarmed Enryaku-ji and absolutely devastated the temple grounds, they left no sutra un-shredded, nor Buddha statue un-shattered! ...It seemed that nothing could stop them... until eventually a small shrine was built at Mii-dera to appease Raigō's vengeful soul. "

And still! Today the shrine stands near the stone steps leading to Mii-dera’s main hall, it was built facing north towards Mt. Heiei & Enryo-ji, the targets of Tesso’s rage!  The shrine is affectionately known as "ねずみの宮さん" (Shrine of the Rats) Although, it is said to be dedicated to the "guardian deities" of the temple, a small vocative plaque tells an abridged version of Raigō’s story. […Incidentally, the rival Enryo-ji in response built a cat-shrine にゃんにゃん寺, "Nyan Nyan Ji" which faces the opposing direction. today it’s a cat museum complete with a cat cafe.]

[Photo: ねずみの宮さん via google maps] -

• Early Appearances:  Raigo’s Onryo was earliest given the name "Tesso" meaning (metal/iron rat) in Toriyama Sekien's Gazu Hyakki Yagyo (1776). It seems he based the description/name off the 14th century version of the story as told in the "Taiheiki" which describes Raigo’s rats as having 'iron claws' toriyamas description was very short:

"Tesso - "They say Raigo’s spirit transformed into a plague of rats"

[Tokyo national diet library]

And of course, being such an influential work, the name “Tesso” stuck from there.

["Priest Raigo's Mysterious Rats"– [Hyokusai, 1808]

[as drawn in "狂歌百鬼夜興" (1830s)

[Art sticker by @samkalensky, Editing by @Cattype. Part of my Hyakki Yagyo sticker series! follow and support for many more!]