Hopping corpse
In popular Chinese mythology, hopping corpses (Traditional Chinese: 僵屍 or 殭屍; Simplified Chinese: 僵尸; Pinyin: Jiāngshī; literally "stiff corpses") are corpses whose touch can kill a living person instantly. They are said to be created when a person's soul (魄 Po) fails to leave the deceased's body.
It came from the myth of "The Corpses who Travel a Thousand Li" (千里行屍), which describes wizards who transport corpses over long distances to hop on their own feet back to their hometown for proper burial.
Some people speculate that hopping corpses were originally smugglers in disguise who wanted to scare off law enforcement officers.
Jiangshi is also pronounced Geung si, which is the Cantonese name for Vampire (it is usually translated as xi xue gui (吸血鬼) or "blood-sucking ghost" in Mandarin). Hence, a hopping corpse is also called a Chinese vampire. To distinguish between a Chinese vampire and a Western vampire a Cantonese speaker may use 吸血僵屍 (Cantonese Yale: kap1 hyut3 geung1 si1) for a "blood-sucking geung si".
Chinese vampires were a popular subject in Hong Kong movies during the 1980s; some movies even featured both Chinese and "Western" vampires. In the movies, hopping corpses can be put to sleep by putting on their foreheads a piece of yellow paper with a spell written on it (Chinese talisman or 符 Pinyin fu2). Generally in the movies the hopping corpses are dressed in imperial Qing Dynasty clothes, their arms permanently outstretched to catch and strangle victims. Like those depicted in Western movies, they tend to appear with an outrageously long Tongue and long fingernails. They can be evaded by holding one's breath, as they track living creatures by detecting their breathing. Their visual depiction as horrific Qing Dynasty officials reflects a common stereotype among the Han Chinese of the foreign Manchu people, who founded the much-despised dynasty, as bloodthirsty creatures with little regard for humanity.
It is also conventional wisdom of Feng Shui in Chinese architecture that a threshold (Chinese: 門檻), a piece of wood approximately six inches high, be installed along the width of the door to prevent a hopping corpse from entering the household.
References in works of fiction
"Geeonshe", a word based on the Japanese pronunciation of jiangshi, is used in some obscure games and trading card games as a term for creatures that combined the characteristics of Chinese and "Western" vampires.The hopping corpse has appeared in a handful of films from Hong Kong that have seen Western release, including the Geung si sin sang (aka Mr. Vampire) series featuring Lam Ching Ying.
In the video game Super Mario Land one of the minor enemies, Pionpi, has characteristics of the Jiang Shi.
Another video game, Phantom Fighter for the Nintendo Entertainment System, featured Kyonshies almost exclusively as enemies. As the Chinese hero Kenchi, you battled the hopping phantoms with punches and kicks, and even took control of a kyonshi infant by ringing a special bell hidden in some stages.
In the Fighting game Darkstalkers, the character Hsien-Ko (Lei-Lei in the Japanese version) is based off the Jiang Shi.
In the Role-playing game Shining Force III, Scenario 1, the inhabitants of Quonus Village have been cursed and transformed into hopping corpses named "kyon-shi", a Japanese pronunciation of Jiang Shi. They attack the player, and can either be killed or relieved of their curse and brought back to life with a holy Elbesem Orb. One of the kyon-shi, a dark wizard called Noon, becomes a playable character when rescued.
In the Anime and Manga Shaman King, the Tao family has a massive army of Jiangshi at the family's call. One certain Jiangshi the show focused on was Lee Bailong (a.k.a. Lee Pai-Long), who is a thinly veiled reference to Bruce Lee.
In the Novel Anno-Dracula by Kim Newman, a hopping vampire appears as a minor villain.
In the MMORPG "Ragnarok Online", monsters known as Munaks and Bonguns were heavily based on the Jiang Shi figure. Both of these creatures have a loathing for living alone and bounce around looking for a player to approach so they may attack. The difference between them is that the weaker Munaks are females clad in traditional red outfits and have long queues, while the more formidable Bonguns are males wearing blue and own shorter queues. While fighting these monsters, a player may even be lucky enough to find a Munak or Bongun hat which they can equip for a substantial advantage over most headgear in the game. These hats even include the yellow sheet of paper hanging over the face, though it should be noted that the paper seen on Bonguns has been somehow torn in half. Both monsters can also be tamed and kept as pets.
A Jiang Shi was featured in an episode of the children's cartoon show Jackie Chan Adventures. In this depiction the Chinese Vampire was depicted as feeding off his victim's CHI (life force) rather than drinking their blood. The victims could be revived by a magical chi transfer that temporarily left the revived individual with some of the personality of the chi donor.
The vampires became the main theme in three successive television series in Hong Kong, "My Date with a Vampire" (我和殭屍有個約會), which were loosely continued from two earlier series starring Lam Ching-Ying as his typical role of a taoist priest. Many of the international myths of vampires were incorporated into the program, including the idea that vampires are in classes, depending on what class of vampires bite them, as well as many Chinese legends, some of which are changed for the sake of entertainment, e.g. Pangu, the mythical creator of the world, was in fact a clan of people, and that all the vampires of the world can traced back to one of its members, who was not technically a vampire for he was never a mortal to start with. The vampires were also changed (at least the first five classes anyway) to resemble human beings, apart from the time they use their powers and drink blood. This also saw the transformation of vampires from stereotype villains to heroes.