Fengxi (封狶), also known as Hōki in Japanese, is a boar-like monster in Chinese mythology. He is said to have two heads and lives in Morus forests. Some accounts refer to it as the ancient rain deity.
| Fengxi | |||||||||
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| Chinese name | |||||||||
| Chinese | 封狶 | ||||||||
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| Japanese name | |||||||||
| Kanji | 封豨 | ||||||||
| Kana | ほうき | ||||||||
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Description
Fengxi is depicted as a two-head boar with great force. Other depictions have it with four long tusks. He is very brutal and always terrorises the countryside.
According to Huainanzi, Fengxi destroyed a lot of villages and their farming lands while killing many people, which angered the Emperor Yao who sent the great archer Hou Yi to get it hunted in a morus forest.[1]
According to Jiaoshi Yilin and Lüshi Chunqiu, Fengxi is the ancient Chinese rain deity.[2][3] According to Records of the Grand Historian, when Fengxi appears, there will be rain soon.[4]
According to I Ching, as raining (云雨) stands for mating in ancient China, Fengxi might also be the ancient fertility deity.[5]
In popular culture
In One Piece, St. Topman Warcury, one of the Five Elders, can take the yōkai-like form of a Fengxi.[6]