Paranormal Urban Legends

Jiangshi

Jiangshi is a Chinese urban legend.It is a hopping zombie that kills you in your sleep to suck out your life force.This can be the scariest and the most horrifying urban legend in China.

Known by Jiangshi in Chinese culture,this creature is portrayed as a vampire,ghost or even a zombie who moves around by hopping with outstretched arms as if they are going to grab you.A Jiangshi is a corpse which has risen from the dead,or in other words,reanimated back to life.They are said to kill any living beings to absorb their life force which is also known as "qi" in Chinese culture.Just like vampires ,the Jiangshi comes out only at night and sleep in coffins or any other dark places during the day time.These ghosts can take a range of appearances appearing on duration they have been dead.Therefore a Jiangshi formed by a corpse of a recently deceased person may look like a human-like while a corpse that has been decayed over a long period would look horrible with rooting and dangling flesh.The Jiangshi are depicted in cultural artifacts as a stiff corpse or a creature dressed in the official garments from the Qing Dynasty.They wear a uniform like robe,a tall,rimmed hat with a round-top and a paper talisman hanging off their forehead.Jiangshi have long white hair and a greenish white skin with fungus or mound growing on their rotten flesh.Their limbs are said to be stiff so that they can't bend them and thus justifies the hopping and outstretched arms.

The origin of Jiangshi comes from a Chinese folk practice of transporting a corpse over a long distance.The tale goes that once a person dies far away from home,people would hire a Taoist priest to reanimate the corpse by a ritual,and the priest would teach the corpse to hop its way back home.The story also says that the priest would ring bells before the Jiangshi is transported in the night because it was believed to be a bad luck for the living to see a Jiangshi.It's said that this was all done because otherwise the souls of the people who die away from home would feel homesick.But in reality,the corpses  were arranged upright ,with the sides tied to bamboo rods and were carried by 2 men from the front and back.And this,when viewed from the distance appeared as if the corpse were hopping while  it was moved.

There are several methods to counter a Jiangshi such as use of mirrors,items made of peach wood,a roaster's call,hooves of black donkey,fire and many more.The use of mirror is quite popular as the lore says that Jiangshi's are scared of their own reflection.