Utsuro-bune
From the UAP Encyclopedia, the open encyclopedia of UFO and UAP history · 🛸 Case
Contents 4
| Type | Case |
|---|---|
| Also known as | utsuro-bune, hollow boat |
The utsuro-bune ("hollow boat") is a strange vessel said to have washed ashore with a young woman aboard on the coast of Hitachi Province, eastern Japan, in 1803. Some ufologists have described it as a UFO encounter, while historians and folklorists see it as part of a long Japanese tradition of legends about women arriving in round boats.[1]
The sources
The story appears in four texts written between 1815 and 1844, including Toen Shōsetsu, compiled by the novelist Kyokutei Bakin in 1825, which contains the most detailed version.[1] The accounts differ in details, including the date and place.[1]
The legend
According to Toen Shōsetsu, on 22 February 1803 fishermen towed ashore a vessel about 3.3 metres high and 5.5 metres wide, shaped like an incense burner. Its upper part seemed to be lacquered wood with barred glass or crystal windows, and its lower part was covered with metal plates. Inside were inscriptions in an unknown script and provisions. A young woman with red hair and pale skin, aged about 18 to 20, spoke an unknown language and clutched a box that she would let no one touch.[1] An old villager suggested she was a foreign princess exiled for an affair, and that the box held her lover's head. The fishermen put her back in the vessel and set it adrift.[1]
Interpretations
Ethnologist Yanagita Kunio studied the story in 1925 and 1962. He noted that round boats were not unusual in Japan and that similar legends of a woman found in a round boat and sent back to sea are common. The oldest versions describe a simple open boat; he suggested the windows and metal plates were added later to make a sea voyage seem more believable.[1] Researcher Kazuo Tanaka has since studied rare printed versions of the story.[1] Some ufologists, by contrast, have claimed the story is evidence of a close encounter with extraterrestrial life.[1]
References
- Utsuro-bune — Wikipedia · en.wikipedia.org · archived copy
This page was last edited on 31 October 2026. Articles are written in our own words from the sources listed under References; disputed claims are attributed to the people who made them.
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