The fondness of foxes for red beans and fried bean curd is their undoing in a number of stories. One tells of how three foxes thought that they had found a good way to indulge in their favorite foods when one of them saw three warts on the bottom of an old woman when she stooped to relieve herself in her garden. They came disguised as three police officers the next day and announced that a government official had heard of the woman’s three warts and wanted to see them for himself. The three officers had been sent to get the warts. The old woman was frightened, but to delay matters, she offered the policemen lunch. When she asked what they would like to eat, they replied that their favorite was sekihan (a festival dish made of rice and steamed with red beans) and fried bean curd.

A nineteenth-century ivory netsuke, a toggle used to attach a pouch to a belt, from the Edo Period.

After they had eaten their fill, they told the old woman that, as it was getting late, they would excuse her for the day, but would return to fetch her warts on the following day. They repeated the trick for several days. Finally a neighbor happened to pass the neighborhood shrine at night and heard loud goings-on. He saw three foxes dancing and singing about their sport with the old woman. He reported this and loaned his dog to the woman. The next day, when three “policemen” came for the warts—and their lunch of red beans and fried bean curd—the dog attacked and killed the three foxes that they were.

The fox is not the only animal that can change its shape, however. Many Japanese legends and folktales concern a shape-changing badger. The favorite of these tales concerns a badger who changes himself into a teakettle to fool a monk, but he is forced to change back to badger form and run for his life when he is put over the fire to boil water for tea.

One tale even has the fox and badger engaging in a contest to see which could appear in the best disguise. The fox returned to the contest site first in the guise of a youthful bride.