Episode 106: the Utsuro Bune and the Moon-Eyed People
I’d like to tell you the story of Utsuro Bune.
It began on February 22, 1803 on the Harayadori coast of the Hitachi Prefecture, in eastern Japan. Local fishermen, preparing for their daily catch, happened to notice a strange boat in the distance.
They watched it as the Pacific ocean’s current slowly brought it closer to them and as they saw that it was never going to make it to land, they tied a thick rope between their boats and this very odd vessel, and towed it safely to shore.
The 11 feet high by almost 18 feet wide vessel was very, very strange. The fisherman said it was shaped like an incense burner - so, very round with a domed top. The bottom half was made of a shiny metal. The top half was constructed out of brightly lacquered rosewood, filled with glass-paned windows. On the outside, the windows were protected by metal bars.
It looked nothing like their wooden fishing boats. In fact, it looked very much like what we’d call a UFO.
Once on shore, the curious fishermen peered inside- where they could see strange unknown writing all over the walls. One of the symbols closely resembled the modern-day Korean flag. There was no furniture - just two bed sheets, a bottle of water, and some cake and kneaded meat.
And then they noticed the young woman hiding inside. She was between the ages of 18 and 20 and she was rather short- just under 5 feet tall.
That in itself was rather startling- to find a lone woman floating along in this strange ship. But her appearance truly baffled them. Her eyebrows and hair were red- but her hair ended in some sort of white added-on extensions like some sort of animal fur. Her skin was pale pink. And her clothes were made out of some strangely smooth fabric unlike any they had ever seen before.
She emerged from the ship and spoke to them in an unknown language. She seemed kind and very polite, but no matter how they tried, they couldn’t communicate. And in some ways, she behaved a little strangely. The entire time they interacted with her, she clutched a pale box (about 24 inches wide) in her hands. She would not let them touch it or take it from her. She was unable (or unwillingly) to even try to communicate what was inside.
Intrigued, they brought her into town. It isn’t clear how long she stayed, but communicating with her seemed completely impossible. The townspeople became afraid of her- especially when an elder in the village speculated that she carried the head of dead lover in the box.
He said that perhaps she was a princess from a far away land who was accused of adultery. Her lover was beheaded, as he should have been, but she had fled her punishment in this fantastical boat, doomed to carry his head for all eternity.
That was enough to convince the townsfolk that the woman needed to be returned to her utsuro bune (which means hollow boat) and pushed back into the sea.
Afraid to investigate further, that’s exactly what they did.
The foreign woman floated away on the sea, never to be seen again.
There’s another version of the story which is slightly different - in the second version, the date is March 24, 1803, and the top of the craft was painted black. There were four barred windows and the bottom half was covered in metal most surely made of iron.
Although the color of her hair isn’t mentioned, it is described as very smooth and loosely flowing down her back. Instead of bed sheets inside the craft, it was luxurious carpets like no one had ever seen before. There was also a cup decorated in strange ornaments.
So- the story has a few small details changed, but it’s not the only account of a utsuro bune, or hollow boat, floating to shore in Japan. There’s also an account from May 11 of 1698. And an even earlier one, from the 7th century: this one also involves a fisherman and the young woman inside the round, hollow boat is a 13 year old girl. She was able to communicate and told the fisherman that she had escaped from an evil stepmother in India and had taken her chances on the sea. She presented him with cocoons to show that she came from far away- legend has it, that’s how silkworms first came to Japan.
So- that last once is most likely pure legend or folktale, and I won’t try to tell you it isn’t - but the Utsuro Bune story from 1803- well, that one has some stuff about it that we should look at.
For starters- there are 11 different documents, including four literary texts the Oushuku Zakki from 1815, the Toen Shōsetsu from 1825, the Hyōryū Kishū from 1835 and the Ume-no-chiri from 1844. The Ume-No-Chiri is the second version I shared- the one where she has flowing hair and the top half of the boat was painted black.
What’s interesting about them (according to expert and professor Tanaka Kazuo) is that all of these documents include drawings of the Utsuro Bune itself- all from the early to mid 1800s- and they all look like classic UFOs. He also points out that the 1803 account is special because it has a known date and a location. The Hitachi prefecture did exist, although today it’s called the Ibaraki Prefecture.
According to the nippon.com article “Utsurobune”: A UFO Legend from Nineteenth-Century Japan” published in 2020, Kazuo believes that the encounter really did happen - but he’s not convinced it was a UFO encounter. He speculates that the craft could have been a broken up Russian vessel - which would explain the woman’s red hair and her unknown language.
But it’s hard to look at the illustrations from the stories written in the 1800s and see a broken up Russian vessel - it’s much easier, frankly, to see a UFO - because that truly is what it looks like.
You could argue that one illustrator simply copied the ideas of an earlier publication - BUT- the illustrators relied on the description of the craft from the tale pretty closely.
Well, whether the Utsuro Bune was a UFO or not, historically, the Japanese government has been pretty decisive on the subject of UFOs - they have flat-out said for decades that they absolutely do not exist. And they’ve said it with downright conviction. So much so, that if you look at any list of World-wide alleged sightings over the last hundred years or more, Japan is commonly only listed once- for the Utsuro Bune incident of 1803.
Recently, that’s begun to change a little - and UFO sightings are starting to be taken with a little more open-mindedness.
For example, there’s the 1986 Japan Airlines cargo plane encounter that we covered in Episode 30. It’s possible that this encounter is little more well-known because it occurred over Alaska and not Japan itself.
Back in 2009, the former Prime Minister’s wife received some flak when she wrote in a book that she believed she’d had an alien encounter in the 1980s. She claimed that while she was sleeping, her soul was transported onto a triangular UFO that brought her to Venus. Her husband told her she was just dreaming.
But other sightings, with multiple witnesses, have barely registered a sentence or two in the media, quickly being stamped out by the Japanese Government. For example, in January of 2014, dozens of people witnessed mysterious lights over Okinawa. Then in July of 2015, 10 white globes were seen floating above Osaka and in November of 2016, there was a flashing green orb spotted in Niigata on the western coast of Honshu island.
But perhaps the International UFO Lab in Fukushima will change that. It’s certainly gotten a lot of attention from our government in the last couple of years- especially since they’ve collected over 400 in just the last three years alone- although they claim the nuclear reactor disaster 13 years ago is what brings the alien crafts to their corner of the world.
Just as a weird aside- I had sort of a Mandela effect reaction recently when I realized that disaster happened in 2011 - because I could have sworn you and I were together when it happened. But we didn’t even know each other in 2011 - but anyway- maybe it’s just a sign that I’m getting old because time is passing by so much faster!
So- according to the Mirror, the Iino-machi district of Fukushima is pretty small- just 5000 people live there. But many people credit the lack of nighttime lights for peoples’ abilities to spot anomalies in the sky.
The International UFO Lab is housed in a former amusement hall built on the side of Sengenmori mountain. Sengenmori mountain has been an anomaly itself for centuries - and it certainly has had its fair share of legends and stories told about it.
Today, some people believe that the 1,515ft tall mountain possesses a strong magnetic field - it is a known fact that compass needles go a little wonky when people are on the mountain.) Some also believe that several of the natural rock formations on the mountain all point in the same direction for a reason- that, together, these things act as a sort of beacon for alien visitors.
People certainly thought so back in 1972, when a cone-shaped object that emitted a bright white light hovered over the mountain. It would fly sideways, hover, then fly back over to where it started and hover before it just vanished out of the sky.
The UFO Lab opened in June of 2021. The director is Takeharu Mikami, the editor-in-chief of Mu magazine (which we’ve mentioned in other episodes.) Initially, they housed 935 declassified CIA documents pertaining to UAPs seen worldwide, but they very quickly began compiling sightings from much closer to home.
The majority of sightings are very similar- a white, silver, or translucent craft, between 3 and 12 feet wide was seen hovering between 10 and 30,000 feet from the ground. There’s no exhaust and when the hovering objects take off, they can reach speeds of mach 2, or 1,534 and a half miles per hour.
And according to an article published by the Japan News, out of the 452 reports the Lab has received in just 2022 alone, 149 of them were deemed completely authentic, including 125 photographs and 24 video clips showing confirmed UFOs.
Four of those items were made public in Japan - like a black oval object that was photographed in September 2018 over the Tateyama mountain range in Toyama prefecture.
The black object appears in just one photo in a series of shots taken one after another by the photographer.
A second photo that was made public was taken in August of 2021 by a visiting first grader. The child captured a classic saucer-like craft directly over the peak of Sengenmori mountain.
The funny thing is, our government has been compiling UFO reports in and around the Fukushima region of Japan since 1996, according to a New York Post article. And in the recently released Department of Defence “unidentified anomalous phenomena (or UAP) reporting system”, they’ve identified southern Japan as a hotspot. Interestingly, the specific hotspot areas are Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and now Fukushima - which are all sites of nuclear activity.
The article goes on to say that for the last 4 years, the Japanese military has been instructed to take photos and detailed notes about anything unusual they see in the sky. And the Japanese government has formulated protocols for what to do in the event of a UFO interaction - although their protocols are simply the exact same ones they have for intercepting or dealing with any foreign aircraft. At least- this was true as of 2021 - it may have changed since then.
So, in some ways, Japanese officials are slowly coming around to the idea of the existence of UFOs - or at least acknowledging it publicly. There are still the holdouts that vehemently deny it- which is fine- to each their own.
But whether the Utsuro Bune legend is based on any truth - or whether it was entirely made up- that will probably always remain a mystery.
The Moon-Eyed People
In 1841, farmer Felix Ashley had just purchased 6 acres of land in North Carolina. As he readied his field for planting, he unearthed something that intrigued him- a stone statue, depicting two humanoid figures. They were strange- they were armless and their oval shaped faces narrowed into pointy chins.
Their noses were long, their mouths just a slit. But it was their eyes- deep-set and round- that were really unique. He put the statue on a sled and brought it back to his homestead, where he leaned it up against his well house.
The statue, which has been on display at the Cherokee County Historical Museum in Murphy, North Carolina since 2015, stands 3 feet tall. It depicts two conjoined humanoid figures or two figures that are standing very close together.
Made out of a block of soapstone which was “pecked” with a harder stone, the two figures have no distinguishing anatomical features or appendages (like arms), but what they do have are very oval-shaped concave heads and eyes that are too big for their faces.
At first glance, it’s easy to call them “alien” looking- as in extraterrestrial, not from this planet. Plenty of people have.
Known for many years as The Moon Eyed People statue, the stone carving is as intriguing as the legend about the Moon Eyed People.
Although it’s only been on display at the museum since 2015, plenty of experts have weighed in on what the statue could represent.
Some say they are simply a humanoid representation of two conjoining rivers.
And then there are those who wonder if the Moon Eyed People statue is meant to represent the Melungeons - descendents of Welsh explorers and adventurers who may have arrived in Alabama as long ago as 1170 AD.
And, as I said, there are those who adamantly think the Moon Eyed People were aliens.
But one thing is for certain- stories about them have existed for centuries and there are some compelling theories that they were once very real.
According to NorthCarolinaGhosts.Com, the stories of the Moon-Eyed People began with the Cherokee who migrated into the Southern Appalachians, in the present day states of North Carolina and Georgia.
They told stories for centuries about a race of small pale-skinned men (possibly albino) with beards and pale blue eyes.
Their eyes were so pale that they struggled to see in any bright light- like sunlight- so they were strictly nocturnal.
When the Cherokee encountered them, they wanted very much to expel them from the land.
Knowing the invading Cherokee were coming, the Moon-Eyed People constructed a defense wall. This stone wall was 12 feet wide and stood 4 feet high in some sections.
The Cherokee waited until a night with a full moon, knowing that the Moon-Eyed People wouldn’t see very well.
Although impressive, the wall was no match for the Cherokee, especially in the moonlit night, and the war between them was easily won by the Cherokee.
Defeated, the Moon-Eyed People retreated to caverns underground, where they avoided the sunlight and their enemies.
Eventually, the Cherokee were able to run them out completely.
Fast-forward to 1782 and the arrival of frontiersman John Sevier.
Making his way through Georgia, Sevier came upon a man-made structure on top of a mountain.
According to The Archaeologist.org, it was an impressive military-like structure, covering 100 acres.
It was surrounded by a stone wall- 12 feet wide and anywhere from 2 to 4 feet tall. It was 850 feet long.
Sevier was intrigued and so he asked Cherokee Chief Oconostota what he knew about it.
The Chief, who was 90 years old at the time, told Sevier that the fort was built by the Moon-Eyed People- a race of pale skinned, blue-eyed people from across the great water. They lived in circular shaped homes made from upright logs.
They had been there for a very long time before the Cherokee arrived.
Ironically, it was Sevier who later became governor of Tennessee and played a major part in expelling the Cherokee from their lands between 1800-1805.
The next documentation about the Moon Eyed People is from 1797. American botanist, naturalist, and physician Benjamin Smith Barton, wrote about the Moon-Eyed People in his book New Views of the Origin of the Tribes and Nations of America.
Barton was a firm believer that the Mound Builders were in fact Native Americans and that the mounds were much older than his peers said they were. He also served as a mentor of sorts to Meriwether Lewis before Lewis and Clark set out on their exploration of the Louisiana Territory in 1803.
But anyway, he wrote in his book that a Colonel Leonard Marbury (who was an intermediary between the Cherokee and the US Government) said, quote,
“the Cherokee tell us that when they first arrived in the country which they inhabit, they found it possessed by certain ‘moon-eyed’ people who could not see by daytime.
These wretches, they expelled.” enquote.
Barton went on to speculate that these Moon-Eyed People were descendents of a race of albinos.
He cited a similar case in Panama, where a Welsh explorer named Lionel Wafer encountered an albino people who also struggled to see during the daytime and were nocturnal because of it.
Over the centuries, there were other references to the Moon-Eyed People in books and letters.
But let’s double-back to that stone fort Sevier found in 1782. There are in fact, several man-made stone structures all along the Appalachians, attributed to ancient cultures.
Fort Mountain, Georgia, is the one that Sevier came across.
Dated to 400 to 500 CE, the stone wall is just beyond the North Carolina border.
Today, it is part of The Fort Mountain State Park.
The wall, which spans 850 feet along the mountain ridge, is 12 feet wide and stands anywhere from 2 to 6 feet tall. It looks very similar to European style fortifications from that time period- which is interesting since Sevier once told a friend that the wall had been built by the Welsh. He even said that they constructed it in order to stave off the Cherokee, but that they lost and were driven off.
So were the Moon-Eyed People really Welshmen?
Sevier seemed to think so.
Is that even possible?
Apparently.
There are some experts who believe that the Moon-Eyed People tale is really one of the Cherokee ancestors coming into contact with Welsh explorers who arrived in the New World hundreds of years before Columbus.
Although it’s also considered a legend, the story of Prince Madoc of Wales kind of matches up. Or, at least, some experts think so.
In 1170, Prince Madoc and his brother Rhirid were tired of the civil war raging in their country and so they gathered a few followers and sailed for new lands.
They crossed the Atlantic Ocean and landed in what is now Mobile Bay, Alabama.
Madoc liked it so much that he returned to Wales and filled 10 ships with more followers- and when he returned to the New World, these men and women set up colonies along the Appalachians.
They settled in with their Native American neighbors and assimilated parts of the indigenous culture into their own.
Chief Oconostota told Sevier back in 1782 that he believed the mounds all throughout the area were actually constructed by the Welsh.
Even earlier, in 1608, as more Welsh settlers arrived in the area, they were surprised by how familiar at least one of the native tribe’s languages sounded. In fact, by speaking Welsh, they were able to communicate quite well.
They also recognized several of the stone structures along the Appalachians as Welsh (or at least European) in design and were surprised that native cultures had such a similar building style to theirs.
They also noted that some native people had pale skin and blue eyes.
As noted by Strange Carolinas.com, if you fast-forward to 1803 when Thomas Jefferson was setting up the Corps of Discovery to explore the Louisiana Territory, and writing policy that would eventually displace the native people to west of the Missisisippi, he referred to them as ‘Welsh Indians.” Interestingly, so did Lewis and Clark in their journals.
So, if the Moon-Eyed People were really Welshmen, where did they go after the Cherokee forced them out?
According to NorthCarolinaGhosts.com, they likely fled south to Florida and Alabama, where they continued to carry on traditions that were both Welsh and native American mixed together.
Now, there’s a lot of controversy over the Prince Madoc legend- especially since the wall at Fort Mountain predates his alleged arrival by at least 200 years.
And there hasn’t been any conclusive evidence to support that hundreds of Welshmen arrived in the New World before Columbus.
There are those who argue strongly for it and against it. But so far, there’s been nothing that’s indisputable.
Some experts argue that by turning the Moon-Eyed People legend into a white European settler thing, we’re just trying to find one more way of taking over a native legend and making it about us.
There are some experts who have looked back at Sevier journals and letters and argue that he never said they were “white” he said they were “pale skinned” which doesn’t necessarily mean the same thing.
But if we go back to the Cherokee County Historical Museum and take a look at the Moon-Eyed People statue, I have to add that there are two more entirely different possibilities.
First, there’s the idea that the Moon-Eyed People were ancient aliens. Due to the shape of their faces and big eyes, it’s true that visitors to the museum often say that they look alien. Plus their height is just 3 feet.
But for this episode, I won’t go into detail about that, other than to say that ancient alien supporters point out that they did live underground for some time and that they were possibly reptilian.
But we can leave that theory for another episode, I think.
Finally, there are some people who don’t think the statue depicts Moon-Eyed People at all.
They think the statue is really a representation of a completely different Cherokee legend - that of the Little People.
According to legend, the Little People of Appalachia are similar to fairies in Europe.
They were a small race of beings who loved singing, dancing, and drumming.
Sometimes their drums could be heard in the mountains and it was important that you never followed the sound because they don’t like intruders coming too close to their homes. If you do get too close, they will cast a spell that disorients a person and makes them lose their way. If they do manage to make it back to their own community, they will live in a dazed state for the rest of their lives.
The legend also says that if you find something in the forest, like a knife or some other small object, you should always ask the Little People if you can have it.
If you don’t, they will throw rocks at you all the way back to your home.
When the Little People cry, their tears turn into cross-shaped stones.
Examples of these stones really exist in Appalachia - they are often called “fairy stones” and are formed out of staurolite, a mineral full of iron, and aluminum . They are made up of hexagonal crystals that intersect at right angles, so they appear cross-shaped.
The Little People were said to be small - and since the Moon-Eyed People statue stands at just 3 feet tall,
it makes sense that the stone carving is meant to represent a pair of Little People.
Whether the statue is connected to Fort Mountain (or any of the ancient stone structures in the Appalachians for that matter) is also up for debate. They could be totally unrelated.
But it definitely makes for an interesting story and as of yet, an unsolved mystery.
