Wiktionary
n. a mythical Japanese creature, typically birdlike and having a long nose
Wikipedia
are a type of legendary creature found in Japanese folk religion and are also considered a type of Shinto god ( kami) or yōkai (supernatural beings). Although they take their name from a dog-like Chinese demon ( Tiangou), the tengu were originally thought to take the forms of birds of prey, and they are traditionally depicted with both human and avian characteristics. The earliest tengu were pictured with beaks, but this feature has often been humanized as an unnaturally long nose, which today is widely considered the tengu's defining characteristic in the popular imagination.
Buddhism long held that the tengu were disruptive demons and harbingers of war. Their image gradually softened, however, into one of protective, if still dangerous, spirits of the mountains and forests. Tengu are associated with the ascetic practice known as Shugendō, and they are usually depicted in the distinctive garb of its followers, the yamabushi.
Usage examples of "tengu".
We have reports that someone has tampered with the Tengu Demon in the main shrine here and brought the death-curse on the late Emperor.
Great tongues of flame undulated eerily, lighting up the cavernous interior, and there in front of Kiyomori towered an image of the Tengu Demon, a spike protruding from either eye.
Kurama Mountain, and on nights when lightning flashes played through the clouds over this valley, they warned one another that the Tengu were holding their revels.
And no man dared venture into that valley to spy on them, for the beak-nosed Tengu would scent out the stranger and set him swinging from the tallest treetop or else tear him to pieces.
In all the villages around Kurama Mountain, where people had heard stories of the Tengu for generations, no one doubted that the demons still lived in the valley, for the Tengu still performed the most incredible feats: they hurled boulders down mountainsides, unleashed torrents which washed away rice-paddies, and rained down stones on near-by hamlets.
The Tengu below stared up at it in silence, with absorbed, adoring eyes.
And from that time on he needed no promptings from the Tengu as to what his future should be, nor was he ignorant of the dangers before him.
The Tengu seemed to have abandoned the search, and only the sound of the wind filled the valley.
His eyes on the hollow where the Tengu had gathered, he once more stealthily made his way toward them.
People take you for Tengu demons, but if you come with Ushiwaka, Kichiji believes that that will be enough to put his life in danger.
She invoked the Tengu to animate the carcass, and then she stitched it in.
She stitched the soul of the Tengu inside, but she promised to release it if it served her will nine years.
One night, not a third of the way through the contract, the Tengu turned on her and tore her apart.
And so the Tengu was driven to prowling the streets and mills of the textile quarter, looking for fresh meat to replace the rotting portions of its body.