Everyone has listened to at least one folk tale at least once in their lifetime. And probably have listened to scary tales. So what are the scary demons and evil spirits you never knew about? Keep reading! Folktales can be entirely fiction or some exaggeration or fiction based on real-life experiences. And folktales are not always fairytales and happy-ending stories like kids’ bedtime stories. Some folktales are scary as they bring up terrifying stories of scary folklore creatures. We call them ghost stories, devil stories, demon stories, or stories about Satan.
Whatever we call them, they are a real horror to listen to, tell, or even think about. And guess what? It gets more scary! Some scary demons in folklore have numerous scary tales in their accounts. And also, there are plenty of different stories and different versions of the same story about them. You know what is the scariest? The scariest thing about these evil spirits is that there are normal people like us who claim to have encountered these scary demons. And sometimes, people from two distinct regions around the world share the same story!
This article brings you the scary demons and the evil spirits from Sri Lankan folklore. They are called Yakku or Yakshayan in Sinhala, meaning devils or demons. Yaka, or Yakshaya, is the singular noun for male, and Yakinni, or Yakshani, is the singular noun for female, for devil and deviless. However, ghost is also a name for them in common use. In fact, these scary demons may update the list of your scariest folklore creatures or your list of evil spirits.
1. Mahasona: The evil spirit of a military leader from the 3rd century BC who leads thousands of scary demons
Mahasona or Mahasohona, is one of the most feared evil spirits in Sri Lanka. The Mahason ghost or Mahason devil, has a huge human body and the head of a bear. The bear’s head is facing the back of this ghost’s body. The body is covered with black body hair. And he is a huge figure. According to some versions of folktales, Mahasona gets taller and taller as he comes near you. And he lives in the graveyard. In Sinhala, the term for graveyard is ‘sohona’, and the term for gigantic or huge is ‘maha’. So, the giant ghost at the graveyards is ‘Mahasohona’.
The folk tale says that if you walk alone near the graveyard at night, if you eat pork and walk alone at night, or if you carry any flesh alone at night, Mahasona haunts you. This scary demon follows you, strikes you on your upper back and breaks your shoulders. Folktales say that he leaves the mark of his hand on the victim’s back and that area turns blue.
In another scary tale of this evil spirit, Mahasona I have heard that when you look back, turning your head back as you sense someone is following you, if it’s Mahasona himself who is following you, he snaps your neck. So the folktale says that you should lift your elbow to your side and look back, turning your head under your lifted arm. Whatever the different accounts say, this scary demon is the most feared evil spirit in Sri Lanka, even today in some rural areas.
2. Mohini: The most feared female evil spirit among all the scary demons
Mohini is one of the most feared and scariest ghosts in Sri Lanka to date and this one is the most common one to have claimed encounters with other evil spirits. There are plenty of scary tales around this evil spirit. And the Hindus in India worship Mohini as a goddess or an avatar of Vishnu. However, in Sri Lanka, Mohini represents a one-of-a-kind scary ghost.
According to the tales, Mohini hunts the men who travel at night. She appears on the streets, wearing a white saree and carrying an infant in her arms. When a man sees this evil spirit, she asks him to take the baby for a while so she can adjust her saree. It is said that she disappeared after that.
3. Reeri Yaka: The one and only scary demon who comes to our deathbed among all the evil spirits
Reeri Yaka, Reeri Yakkha, or Reeri Yakshaya in Sinhala is one of the scariest and most powerful folktale demon characters in Sri Lankan folklore culture. He is only second to the greatest demon, Mahasona himself. He has a human body and a monkey face. His red body riding on a bull with his sharp two teeth out makes his profile scary. He stands at your last breath, witnessing you die. In Buddhism, Vaswarthi Mara plays a role similar to Lucifer in Christianity. Mara is a god but he controls hell.
However, the form of Reeri Yaka that appears at people’s deathbeds witnesses the death and takes the spirits of the people to hell. When that happens, the folktales recognise the devil as ‘Maru Avataraya’ in the meaning of the Avatar of Mara. According to the folktales coming from Hinduism, only the god Vishnu himself can control this devil.
4. Kalu Kumaraya: The scary demon who does nothing else like other evil spirits but seduces women
Kalu Kumaraya is another type of scary demon character in Sri Lankan folklore culture. His name, Kalu Kumaraya in Sinhala, means the black prince. Some call him Kalu Kumara Devathawa, in the sense of the black prince god. I think they do it out of fear. However, this devil comes at night and takes the energy of young girls. He is a very handsome-looking black demon. He seduces young girls and he possesses young girls.
When the Kalukumara demon possesses a girl, her voice drastically changes, as do her facial features. It’s as if the girl has become a rough male all of a sudden. Because of this scary demon, mothers do not let their young daughters go outside after it gets dark alone, even now, proving him one of the scariest folktale characters.
5. Kalu Kumari: The female evil spirit who seduces men according to the folktale
Kalu Kumari is the opposite sex demon of Kalu Kumara and is one of the scariest folktale characters in Sri Lankan folklore. So, Kalu Kumari means the black princes. I have heard about this demon only once in my lifetime so far but that was enough to make me scared of her. This scary demon seduces men when they are sleeping.
Folk tales describe that this demon takes over, and the male person cannot move. If you are a male, this demon stares at you from above when you are sleeping. All of a sudden, you are awake but you cannot shout or move. You feel the fear and you start to shake rapidly. A similar demon character can be found in Mexican folklore and so-called real-life ghost encounters.
6. Sagini Yakinni or Sagini Yakshani: The scary demon who brings hunger
Sagini Yakinni is yet again one of the most feared demon folktale characters in Sri Lankan folklore. This female demon takes possession of children. When this evil spirit possesses a kid, he or she may crave food and eat surprisingly much. But the kid will become weaker day by day. No matter what you feed the kid, he or she will not be well. According to folklore, because of this, Saagini Yakinni is the one who consumes the food the kid eats.
7. Kinduri: The female evil spirit who takes revenge on men
One of the scary demons in Sri Lankan folklore includes another unique evil spirit: Kinduri. This scary folklore creature is a female demon spirit who goes around knocking on doors in the middle of midnight. This ghost appears as a pregnant woman and knocks on the doors. If a woman opens the door, she will just vanish into darkness. But if a man opens the door, it becomes the last door he opens. The man will die before dawn.
8. Wesamuni: The king of scary demons and evil spirits in Sri Lankan folklore
Wesamuni or Waishrawana, is the king of all the demons, according to Sri Lankan folklore. He is equipped with a huge iron club-like weapon similar to the medieval morningstar and a golden sword. However, King Wesamuni is considered a deity rather than a scary demon. He is considered one of the gods in the group of four gods in Sri Lankan folklore beliefs. As he is the closest servant of the king of gods, Shakra, the Shakra himself allowed him to rule all the yakshas, or demons. In some accounts, Wesamuni is said to be the commander of the demon army.
However, in general, all of the demons must get approval from Wesamuni before doing anything. Only Wesamuni himself can allow fellow demons to do anything. Also, all other demons are bound to do exactly whatever King Wesamuni commands them to do. No accounts are usually found claiming Wesamuni’s encounters with people, yet he is the king of all the scary demons.