These creatures do harm in countless ways. They wear a dry skull on their heads, clothe themselves with oak leaves, and assume a human guise. "Some say that when the yelping kind are old, they become monsters. Spirit foxes present in a variety of ways: through a dream, haunting people or places, causing sickness or death, granting wealth or prosperity, providing healing or fertility services, or delivering moral advice. The manner in which huli jing interact with humans can be characterised as good or evil, depending on their nature. In China, the morality of foxes is ambiguous. The appearance of foxes can be an omen of death, foretelling war and disaster. Other supernatural powers as well as shapeshifting include creating illusions or glamours, human speech, the ability to disappear and reappear, becoming mist-like, communicating with Heaven, and immortality. Some accounts claim that huli jing can only take on the appearance of a human during the day. When confronted by a dog, a fox in human form may become so unnerved that it will revert to its true vulpine figure and flee. All spirit foxes, whether huli jing, kitsune, or kumiho, are afraid of dogs. If a fox in human form is discovered, humans may kill it for its trickery without fear of reprisal. "A fox's tail is not easily hidden." -Chinese proverb. The fox characteristics of the huli jing sometimes slip through despite the transformation, with a tail or ears emerging from its human form. When a huli jing appears in a human disguise, it's safe to assume that it's up to no good. The huli jing often presents as a beautiful young woman set on seduction, but it can also take the form of a charming young man or a wise elder. Unlike a kitsune or kumiho, which tend to take the form of a beautiful woman, a huli jing can appear as a woman or a man who is either young or old. At the age of a thousand, it can communicate with heaven and become a celestial fox." At the age of a hundred, it can change into a beautiful girl or a wizard or a man who seduces women it can know about happenings a thousand li distant it can bewitch people, leading them astray and causing them to lose their wits. "At the age of fifty, a fox can change into a woman. As a fox ages it becomes an expert at deception and seduction, with countless varieties and transformations. A long-lived fox spirit can transcend from a lower animal to a human, then to a transcendent being. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.Īs huli jing age, their magical abilities increase. Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. As these traditions developed, the fox's capacity for transformation was shaped. The idea that non-human creatures with advancing age could assume human form is presented in works such as the Lunheng by Wang Chong (27–91). Huli jings are also used to explain the incidence of attacks in koro, a culture-bound delusional disorder in which an individual has an overpowering belief that their penis is retracting and will disappear, despite the lack of any true longstanding changes to the genitals.ĭuring the Han Dynasty, the development of ideas about interspecies transformation had taken place in Chinese culture. These foxes are often seen as dangerous, however some stories depict them in love stories between a fox appearing as a beautiful girl and a young human male. Most depictions of huli jings depict them as females who appear as young, beautiful women. In Chinese mythology, these fox spirits are believed to be capable of obtaining a human form, magical powers, and immortality. They predate the Japanese kitsune (狐/キツネ) and the Korean kumiho (구미호). In modern Mandarin and Cantonese profanity, the term "huli jing" describes a woman who seduces married/romantically-involved men. Huli jing ('fox spirit') are creatures usually capable of shapeshifting, who may either be benevolent or malevolent spirits, among which the nine-tailed fox, jiuweihu (九尾狐, 'nine-tailed fox'), is the most famous. Huli jing are akin to European fairies and can be either good or bad spirits.
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