Moon Mausoleum
An online magazine about the paranormal, haunted and macabre. We collect the ghost stories from all around the world as well as review horror and gothic media.
The urban legend of Inunaki Village in Japan is about a forgotten village of villagers refusing to conform to the Japanese constitution. They would do everything to protect themselves from the outside world, even killing the ones that trespasses.
The urban legend of Inunaki Village in Japan is about a forgotten village of villagers refusing to conform to the Japanese constitution. They would do everything to protect themselves from the outside world, even killing the ones that trespasses.
In 1999, Nippon TV, one of Japan’s biggest TV channels, received a letter from an anonymous person about Inunaki Village in the Fukuoka Prefecture all the way south in Japan. The anonymous letter was titled “The Village in Japan That Isn’t Part of Japan” and urged the TV channel to visit the place. In the letter it told about the legend about a couple that once went there, but never came back.
The Inunaki Village (犬鳴村) means the Howling village and is an urban legend that dates back to the 1990s. It is supposedly a forgotten village in Fukuoka Prefecture by the Mount Inunaki mountain pass and is easily missed as the path to the village is along a narrow path. And according to the mysterious letter to Nippon TV, the legend goes like this:
Sometimes in the early 1970s, a young couple was making their way to Hisayama on the other side of the mountain when the car engine broke down. They left their car and headed up to the forest to see if they found someone that could help. They passed a handwritten sign on the way that read “The Japanese constitution is not in effect past here.”
Eventually they reached a village, but when they walked through it it seemed abandoned. But as they walked among the abandoned village with the dark windows they saw a man and approached them. Something that they really shouldn’t have. In what is explaines as being a “crazy old man” he came to them and welcomed them to Inunaki village before he murdered them with a sickle.
What is it about this village? Supposedly it is a village that consists of residents that refuse to follow the rules of the Japanese Constitution. This is a statement from the village from all the way back to the Edo period when mistreated peasant chose to cut of the world and live in exile. There are also theories about that the village was taken by a horrible sickness and they closed down the village to people coming and going. Even to the point of murder.
The very name Inunaki is said to be of a haunted origin. According to the legend, a man killed his dog because it wouldn’t stop barking. But then the man and his whole family was murdered and the dog was just trying to warn his master about the approaching danger.
There used to be an actual real village called Inunaki Village from 1691 to 1889, but it has no connection to the legend that started in the 1990s. Or does it?
The whole area around these parts have been considered to be haunted for a very long time by now. Like the area around the Old Inunaki Tunnel for example which have been according to rumours ‘haunted’ long before the 90’s. According to legends, at night you can hear the screams from children coming from within the tunnel and mysterious finger and handprints on the windshield of your car after passing through the Inunaki tunnel.
The stories of the Inunaki tunnel is believed to be haunted because of the murder cases that have occured around the area for many years. It is already a pass with harsh weather wich causes many accidents every year. On top of this is the murders. Like when on 6th of December in 1988 found a factory worker named Koichi Umeyama burned to death inside the tunnel. In 2000, a dead body was also found in a nearby dam.
Another story related to the village is that of the telephone booth near the Inunaki bridge. Allegedly it gets a call from the Inunaki Village every night. If you are the unfortunate soul that answers the phone call you are cursed and transported to the village.
A movie was released in 2019 called Howling Village. This movie blew new life into the old legend and led to an increase in trespassing and vandalism in the area, especially in the tunnel. But the question remains, who was the anonymous writer of the letter to the broadcasting channel back then, and was there any truth to the haunted rumors that already surrounder the place around Mt. Inunaki back then?
1 Comment »