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# The Floating World #3: The giant skeleton that inspired a yōkai
- URL: https://www.jpnstudio.com/the-floating-world-3-the-giant-skeleton-that-inspired-a-yokai/
- Published: 2026-11-01T09:00:00.000Z
- Updated: 2026-11-01T08:59:59.000Z
- Description: Plus: Japan's first photographs in Leiden, and last week's answer
- Author: Bjorn Brussee
- Tags: #Import 2026-10-30 22:59

此道や 行く人なしに 秋の暮

*Kono michi ya / yuku hito nashi ni / aki no kure*

"This road: / no one walking on it / in the autumn dusk."

Matsuo Bashō wrote this in the autumn of 1694, only weeks before his death. Many readers take "this road" to mean more than a path: the road of poetry, and of life itself.

**Word of the Week: 妖怪 (yōkai)**

The ghosts, monsters and strange creatures of Japanese folklore, from shape-shifting foxes to umbrellas that come to life. Yesterday was Halloween, so this week we meet a very large one.

[Support Independent Japanese Art Research](#/portal/signup)

## From the Studio

Thank you for all your replies to last week's issue. So many of you wrote back about the first Japanese artwork that stopped you in your tracks.

The old Japanese calendar is in *Kosame tokidoki furu*, "light rains sometimes fall", and from Monday it moves into *Momiji tsuta kibamu*, "maple leaves and ivy turn yellow". Here in the Netherlands it can still be sunny at times, but the cold is slowly setting in.

Yesterday was Halloween, and Japan has its own long tradition of ghosts and monsters. Edo audiences had their scares too, from kabuki ghost plays to life-sized skeleton puppets performed in Asakusa. So this week's masterpiece is one of the most famous monsters in Japanese art: a skeleton so large it barely fits across three sheets of paper. It also has a surprising afterlife, which you can read about below.

**Hit reply and tell me:** do you have a favourite yōkai, or a Japanese ghost story that has stayed with you?

Bjorn

## The Masterpiece: Utagawa Kuniyoshi, Takiyasha the Witch and the Skeleton Spectre, about 1844

**At a glance:** Utagawa Kuniyoshi (1798 to 1861) | 相馬の古内裏 *Sōma no furudairi*, "The Old Palace at Sōma", better known as Takiyasha the Witch and the Skeleton Spectre | colour woodblock print, triptych of three ōban sheets, about 37 x 74 cm together | publisher Hachi |

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/70/6f/706fca0a-1b32-488d-8e34-34bc5605f919/content/images/2026/10/Takiyasha_the_Witch_and_the_Skeleton_Spectre-_by_Utagawa_Kuniyoshi.jpg)

**First look.** Start on the left, where Princess Takiyasha calmly reads a spell from a handscroll. Now follow her magic to the right. Out of an inky black void, a giant skeleton fills two-thirds of the picture, tearing aside the tattered palace blinds with its bony fingers. It leans in until it is almost nose to nose with the warrior Ōya no Mitsukuni. He does not run: he stands his ground.

**The story behind it.** Takiyasha was the daughter of Taira no Masakado, a provincial warlord who declared a rival "Eastern Court" in 939 and was killed the following year. In legend, she stays on in his ruined palace at Sōma as a sorceress. When the court sends Mitsukuni to hunt down the last rebels, she summons the skeleton to scare him away.

The story was told in Santō Kyōden's novel of 1806 and on the kabuki stage in 1836 and again in 1844\. That timing matters. Under the strict Tenpō Reforms, colour prints of actors and theatre scenes were temporarily banned. The British Museum suggests Kuniyoshi may have told the story as "history" to cash in on the 1844 play without breaking the rules.

**Three details you might miss**

1. **A real skeleton.** The British Museum calls it "harrowingly accurate", which suggests Kuniyoshi studied Western medical illustrations. He is said to have owned a collection of imported Western prints.
2. **A warrior sitting on a sword.** Mitsukuni is not only facing the monster: he is also pinning down Takiyasha's henchman, Araimaru, by sitting on his sword and holding him off with a scabbard.
3. **The calm in the storm.** While the men fight, Takiyasha is shown above them, quiet and in control, set apart from the chaos on her right.

**Why it still matters.** Today this skeleton is often called a *gashadokuro*, a giant skeleton yōkai. But the gashadokuro first appeared in print in 1966, more than a century after Kuniyoshi. When illustrators such as the manga artist Mizuki Shigeru drew it, they based its look on this triptych, where Kuniyoshi had turned what was originally described as many life-sized skeletons into a single giant. A "traditional" monster, in other words, was partly invented by a print.

## For Members This Week

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/70/6f/706fca0a-1b32-488d-8e34-34bc5605f919/content/images/2026/10/1925.3501---Kawasaki_-The-Rokugo-Ferry--Kawasaki--Rokugo....jpg)

At Shinagawa, Hiroshige showed us the sea for the first time. In your next Members' Letter, on Friday, our journey reaches Kawasaki, and the road meets the Rokugō River. A ferryboat is crossing. On the far bank, a pack horse and a palanquin wait for it, and in the distance stands Mount Fuji. Who is on that boat, and what is waiting for them on the other side?

[Become a Member](#/portal/signup)

## Worth the Journey

**Licht over Deshima (Light over Deshima)**, Japanmuseum SieboldHuis, Rapenburg 19, Leiden | 25 September 2026 to February 2027

Japan's earliest photographs, close to home. In the mid-1800s, Dutch and Japanese doctors and researchers on Deshima began experimenting with the camera. Photography soon became a way to record a society in transition, in portraits, street views and landscapes. The exhibition is in the former home of Philipp Franz von Siebold, who helped build the exchange of knowledge between Japan and the Netherlands, and it was made together with Leiden University Libraries, Nagasaki University Library and Dutch and Japanese collections.

**Also on**

- **Osaka:** [Edo in Focus: Japanese Treasures from the British Museum](https://www.tokyoartbeat.com/en/events/-/Edo-in-Focus-Japanese-Treasures-from-the-British-Museum/nakanoshima-museum-of-art-osaka/2026-10-31?ref=jpnstudio.com), Nakanoshima Museum of Art, 31 October 2026 to 31 January 2027\. Screens, scrolls and prints by Utamaro, Sharaku, Hokusai and Hiroshige, on loan from London.
- **Tokyo:** [Katsushika Ōi, Night Scene in the Yoshiwara: The Lineage of Nightscapes](https://www.tokyoartbeat.com/en/articles/-/best-exhibitions-starting-in-october-202610?ref=jpnstudio.com), Ōta Memorial Museum of Art, until 6 December 2026\. Built around a masterpiece by Hokusai's daughter, with night scenes by Harunobu, Hiroshige and Kiyochika. The works change on 7 November.
- **Turin:** [Dreamscapes: The 53 Stations of the Tōkaidō](https://www.finestresullarte.info/en/exhibitions/dreamscapes-at-the-mao-of-turin-on-display-the-53-stations-of-hiroshige-s-tokaido?ref=jpnstudio.com), MAO Museum of Oriental Art, until 29 November 2026\. Thirty-six of Hiroshige's Tōkaidō prints, hung as one journey: the same road our Members' Letter is walking.

## The Collector's Corner: Collector's Notes

**Three sheets, one picture: collecting triptychs**

This week's masterpiece is a triptych: one image spread across three sheets of the largest standard paper size. In the Edo period, those sheets were not fastened together, and buyers did not always buy them as a set. People simply laid them side by side on a table to enjoy the full scene. That has consequences for collectors today:

- **Mixed sets are normal.** Edo buyers did not mind if the three sheets came from different printings, so surviving sets can vary noticeably in colour and quality.
- **Matched sets are what later collectors want.** Later collectors preferred three sheets that read as one even image, and some even fastened them together. That was never done in the Edo period.
- **Check every sheet.** Ask the seller for full images of all three sheets. Compare their condition and trimming, and look for the same collector's seal on each, which helps confirm they belong together.
- **Think twice about a single sheet.** Holding on to one sheet in the hope of completing the set can take years, and may never happen. It is usually only worth it for an important image.

**The collector's lesson:** a "complete" triptych is not always a matched one. Ask how the three sheets came together before you buy.

Own a triptych, or a lonely single sheet? Hit reply.

## Spot the Detail

**Last week's answer:** the lone boatman comes from Utagawa Hiroshige's *Sudden Shower over Shin-Ōhashi Bridge and Atake*, from One Hundred Famous Views of Edo, 1857\. The Dutch painter was Vincent van Gogh. He owned the print and copied it in oil in 1887 as *Bridge in the Rain (after Hiroshige)*, now in the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.

**This week:**

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/70/6f/706fca0a-1b32-488d-8e34-34bc5605f919/content/images/2026/10/Scherm--afbeelding-2026-10-30-om-22.52.25.png)

A white cat looks out from a windowsill over the fields towards Mount Fuji. Which print is this, and who made it?

**Hint:** it shows a festival that still takes place every November in Tokyo. This year, the first day falls next Saturday.

## Presented by JPN Studio: Become a Founding Member

The first 100 members of The Floating World can join as Founding Members and help build this newsletter from the very start. You get the weekly Members' Letter on the Tōkaidō Road, a monthly wallpaper pack, the full archive of 200+ poster designs from the former JPN Studio poster shop to print for your own walls, and a JPN Studio tote bag and postcard pack shipped anywhere in the world. Founding Membership is €15 a month or €150 a year, for the first 100 people only. Yearly members receive the tote bag and postcards straight away; monthly members after their second paid month.

[Become a Founding Member](#/portal/signup)

## Community Gallery

![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/70/6f/706fca0a-1b32-488d-8e34-34bc5605f919/content/images/2026/10/5C9B4B93-73A4-4059-A0CC-7014E20AA235.JPG)

By Jennifer Koski-Vacirca “the illustrated empath”

**What is this piece?**

This illustration is called “the bridge” what are you a bridge for in this lifetime?  
I create art that connects us to our inner wisdom and nature. 

[Check out Jennifer on Instagram](https://www.instagram.com/theillustratedempath/?ref=jpnstudio.com)

Want to be featured? Painting, prints, photography, ceramics, calligraphy, illustration and crafts are all welcome. Submit by directly replying to this email or send us a dm on instagram.

## Before You Go

**Tote bag giveaway:** which Japanese artwork would you love to see up close in a future issue? Tell me in the comments on this issue. Everyone who comments is in the draw for a JPN Studio tote bag. Last week's tote bag went to a reader in the US, Florida: congratulations!

**Share The Floating World:** know someone who would love this? Forward this email, or share it with them however you like. New readers can sign up at jpnstudio.com.

**Next week:** a new masterpiece up close. I am keeping it a surprise for now.

See you next Sunday,

Bjorn