Monsters Stalk Our World Part III

Chapter 1. Reports of living woolly mammoth monsters

Chapter 2. The Kalanoro, Madagascar’s mysterious monster

Chapter 3. The Kappa, an earthquake-predicting monster

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Chapter 3. The Kappa, an earthquake-predicting monster

If any creature that exists is a harbinger of massive quakes—especially in Japan—it’s the Kappa. That is if the creature really exists at all. The legendary Kappa of Tono, a small village on the main island of Japan, is well-known throughout that country. Often depicted on ancient artistic scrolls as a playful water imp, it’s believed to live in or near the many lakes and rivers of the countryside. Although the description of the elusive animal varies, most agree that it’s about the size of a large breed of dog, like a Great Dane, and is unmistakable if seen.

Kappa monster spies on Japanese women bathing

Descriptions of the Kappa are beyond bizarre. But to be fair, a duck-billed platypus would seem impossible if not for the fact that it’s been documented as a living creature by zoologists.

The Kappa enjoys no such official recognition and is dismissed by serious scientists. Some researchers in the fringe science of cryptozoology have sought out the creature, but most researchers’ efforts have been far less than satisfactory.

A Kappa, is depicted on this ancient Japanese scroll

The Kappa enjoys no such official recognition and is dismissed by serious scientists. Some researchers in the fringe science of cryptozoology have sought out the creature, but most researchers’ efforts have been far less than satisfactory.

Duck-billed platypus exist so why not the Kappa?

All who know of the Kappa, however, agree its most unusual physical characteristic is a rounded bowl shaped protuberance on the top of the skull. Supposedly that bowl contains a liquid or serum that endows the creature with an almost supernatural strength.

Another scroll showing Kappa shell

Folklore, however, goes on to claim that the bowl is also a potential weakness for it allows the

creature to be defeated by tricking it into bowing, whereupon the liquid will leak from the bowl and it will become weakened.

Obviously, this attribute is based on the Japanese culture of courtesy bowing and is doubtful if an animal will respond to a bow with one of its own.

Kappa described as part monkey, part lizard, part turtle

Other striking features of the animal cannot be forgotten as its said the Kappa looks like an uncanny amalgam of a monkey, lizard and turtle.

Most think the turtle reference comes from reports by those that have claimed to see a large, rigid shell covering most of its back. Another feature that makes the Kappa resemble a turtle is a mouth shaped like a tortoise beak.

A popular Japanese cartoon about a Kappa

Although virtually all Western scientists ignore reports of sightings of the creature, many Japanese take Kappa encounters seriously.

The animal is very famous throughout Japan and has been for many hundreds of years. Even some respected Japanese scientists lean towards believing the creature—or something like it—may exist.

This is due in part to the fact that countless eyewitness reports of the Kappa have been made over the centuries…and many of them are from very credible sources.

Another fact that tends to drive the creature from the realm of mere myth to the realm of possibility are the amazed and sometimes reluctant reports made by former skeptics and critics.

Reports of the creature have continued into the 21st Century.

Photographs have been released by witnesses claiming to have seen the creature. But like many of the photos of Loch Ness or UFOs, the photos are of poor quality, dark, blurry, or too distant to clearly make out distinct features.

Man dressed as a Kappa greets shoppers

Physical evidence has been found that believers embrace as proof that the Kappa exists. Yet once again the evidence is sparse and unconvincing.

Similar in some respects to the physical traces collected from reports of Bigfoot sightings, some have claimed finding Kappa tracks, pools of fluid left behind by the animal and even pieces of the creature itself.

Japan is a nation of shrines and some allegedly contain the mummified appendages—even bodies—of long–dead Kappas.

Artist’s caricature of the Japanese Kappa

Kappas are associated with earthquakes

It is believed by many in the Iwate Prefecture of Japan that Kappas often appear before a major earthquake.

People living in the Tono Valley near the “Kappa Pool” or “Kappabuchi,”—part of the Ashiarai stream near a temple known as Jokenji—keep a wary eye out for the creature.

Folklore claims that the region near the temple—especially the pool—has has Kappas living there for many centuries.

As far as anyone knows, no reports of Kappa sightings were made before the March 2011 earthquake and tsunami that struck the Fukushima Prefecture in northeastern Japan.

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