Three spooky Japanese words: yurei, yokai and gaikotsu

Japan’s three classic spooky words are 幽霊 (yuurei), a ghost, 妖怪 (youkai), a creature from folklore, and 骸骨 (gaikotsu), a skeleton. In English the first two are usually spelled yurei and yokai. Kanji by kanji, a ghost is a faint spirit, a yokai is something bewitching and strange, and a skeleton is bones and more bones.

幽霊 (yuurei): a faint spirit

幽 (yuu) means faint, dim or hidden away. The outside looks like 山, a mountain, though many scholars think it began as 火, fire. The two little twists of thread inside it, 幺幺, are there for the sound. On its own it turns up in かすか (kasuka), faint, which can be written 幽か.

霊 (rei) means spirit or soul. Its older form, 靈, is easier to read: the top half, rain falling in drops, gives the sound, and 巫 at the bottom, a shaman, someone who deals with spirits, gives the meaning. The form used in Japan today, 霊, squeezes everything under the rain into one simpler shape.

Together, 幽霊 is a dim, faint spirit: the ghost of someone who has died. The classic Japanese ghost wears a white burial kimono, has long black hair and no feet, and floats instead of walking. That look comes from prints and kabuki plays of the Edo period, and it has stuck ever since.

妖怪 (youkai): bewitching and strange

妖 (you) means bewitching or uncanny. 女, a woman, gives the meaning, and 夭 on the right gives the sound. It’s in 妖しい (ayashii), mysterious and alluring, and 妖精 (yousei), a fairy.

怪 (kai) means strange or mysterious, and also a monster. On the left is 忄, the heart in its narrow form, for a feeling, and 圣 on the right gives the sound. You’ll meet it in 怪しい (ayashii), suspicious, and 怪談 (kaidan), a ghost story.

So 妖怪 is something bewitching and strange. The word is the umbrella for the supernatural creatures of Japanese folklore, from the kappa that lives in rivers to the winged tengu. It came from Chinese, and before the Meiji era such beings were more often called by other names, such as 鬼 (oni) or 化け物 (bakemono).

A 幽霊 is the ghost of a person; a 妖怪 usually isn’t, though some people count ghosts among the yokai too.

骸骨 (gaikotsu): bones and more bones

骨 (hone, or kotsu) is a bone. It began as a drawing of bones, and flesh was added later. The 月 at the bottom isn’t the moon here: it’s a squeezed form of 肉, meat.

骸 (gai) is 骨 again, on the left, plus 亥, which gives the sound. The Shuowen Jiezi, a Chinese dictionary from around 100 CE, defines it as the shin bone. In Japanese it means a body or remains, as in 残骸 (zangai), wreckage.

So the video’s “bones + bones” is exactly right: 骸骨 is a skeleton.

How to use them

• この家、幽霊が出るらしいよ。

  Kono ie, yuurei ga deru rashii yo.

  They say this house is haunted.

• 日本には妖怪の話がたくさんあります。

  Nihon ni wa youkai no hanashi ga takusan arimasu.

  Japan has lots of stories about yokai.

• お化け屋敷に入ろうよ。

  Obake yashiki ni hairou yo.

  Let's go into the haunted house.

• ハロウィンに骸骨の仮装をしました。

  Harowin ni gaikotsu no kasou o shimashita.

  I dressed up as a skeleton for Halloween.

• 幽霊が出る (yuurei ga deru), “a ghost comes out”, is how you say a place is haunted.
• お化け (obake) is the everyday word for anything spooky, ghost or monster. It comes from 化ける (bakeru), to change shape, and お化け屋敷 (obake yashiki) is a haunted house at a fairground.
• 骨 has an everyday second meaning. Read こつ, it’s the knack of doing something, and it’s usually written in katakana: コツ.

Words with the same kanji

Remember it

On a dim (幽) night a spirit (霊) drifts past: 幽霊. By the river, something bewitching (妖) and strange (怪) is watching: 妖怪. And in the corner, a heap of bones on bones rattles: 骸骨.

The kanji in this lesson

Tap Draw it to watch the stroke order. Numbers show where each stroke starts.

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Sources

• Wikipedia: Yūrei
• Wikipedia: Yōkai
• Jisho (JMdict): 骸骨

Written by the Sumi team with the help of AI, then checked against JMdict and KANJIDIC2. How we write lessons. Spotted a mistake? Email brightsmilesolutionssupport@gmail.com.