Minowaraji, also called Minosoji (蓑草鞋)

Minowaraji or Minosoji is one of Japanese yokai (ghosts, spirits and monsters) which is portrayed in Sekien TORIYAMA's yokai art collection book, "Gazu Hyakki Tsurezure Bukuro" (The Illustrated Bag of One Hundred Random Demons; the term 'hyakki' in its title is a pun on the usual hyakki, replacing the character for demon which is written as "鬼" in Japanese with a character for vessel written as "器," and sure enough, most of the yokais shown in this book are tsukumogami [a type of Japanese spirits that originate in items or artifacts that have reached their 100th birthday and become alive]).

In the portrayal, the Minowaraji has a straw raincoat as its torso and straw sandals (which are called 'waraji' in Japanese) as its legs. Some people insist that Sekien created it for fun, while others believe that it was a tsukumo-gami (a type of Japanese spirits that originate in items or artifacts that have reached their 100th birthday and become alive) transmuted from an old straw raincoat and straw sandals which had been possessed by the grudge of farmers upon whom heavy taxes had been imposed at prolonged poor harvest time. Since both straw raincoats and straw sandals were something to wear, they were considered to be possessed easily by the owner's unconscious feelings and thoughts.

Incidentally, straw raincoats were regarded as possessing magical power as many visiting gods ('raiho-jin' in Japanese, referring to other-worldly gods visiting with good luck) wore them. Besides, straw sandals are a magical item which was often used as a cursed object to avoid yokai. Such magical property supposedly transmuted into yokai quite easily.

[Original Japanese]