The , also pronounced kanko, is a type of spirit possession in legends around various parts of Japan. It may be known otherwise as osaki especially in the Kantō region, and also considered equivalent to the izuna. It was believed to assume the guise of a small mammal and able to fit inside a pipe or bamboo tube, but normally only its keeper or user (kitsune-tsukai) was able to see it. The user, through the power of the kuda, was believed capable of divulging a person's past or foretelling his future; this soothsayer was also capable of performing curses, bringing calamity upon targets. In regions where the superstition was held, a prospering household could be accused of achieving its prosperity because it was a house possessed by the spirit (kuda-tsuki). The fox (and its analogues by other names) was said to multiply in number each time a marriage took place, following the bride to her place of marriage, thus disseminating into more households. Nomenclature The , which in Chinese fashion (onyomi) can also be read as kanko (old romanization kwanko), derives its name from being small enough to fit inside a tube, according to one explanation. It may also have earned its name due to its tail resembling a tube spliced in two. Folklorist Yanagita Kunio conjectured that the kuda alluded to a god's descent (verb: kudaru) from the mountain, this god Ta-no-Kami ("rice paddy god") being roughly equated with the Yama-no-Kami or "mountain god". Aliases The is a kindred sort of spirit, employed by the "fox-user" or , (although in modern standard Japanese, the word is pronounced īzuna and denotes the least weasel). The osaki fox is also identified as an equivalent spirit employed by the "fox-user" (kitsune tsukai). According to one summarization, the term is prevalent in the central region (Chūbu region, around Nagoya), whereas the appellation izuna tends to be used in the northeast (Tōhoku), and osaki in the northern Kantō region. Geography The kuda-gitsune lore is found in Nagano Prefecture, and Chūbu region and parts of the Tōkai region (Mikawa and Tōtomi Provinces of old), southern Kantō region, Tōhoku region, and so on. There are no legends of kudagitsune in Kantō besides the Chiba Prefecture and Kanagawa Prefecture, and this is said to be because Kantō is the domain of the osaki fox. These lore of the kanko (kuda-gitsune) are also said to be numerous in