Blue Flames, the Japanese, and Death

[ZeaLitY]

I've noticed in a few Goemon games and Chrono Trigger that blue flames are associated with death (namely the Northern Ruins, Magus's Lair). Is there any cultural background to this?

[swift]

When you burn sulfur, it produces a blue flame, and in the Christianism, sulfur is associated with the hell.

[Radical_Dreamer]

When you burn sulfur, it produces a blue flame, and in the Christianism, sulfur is associated with the hell.

Is that so? I don't recal sulfur buring a particular color from when I was burning things...for science! I do recal that chlorine burns a nice cool shade of green. But Christianity is not the dominant religion in Japan, so that may or may not be it.

[Leebot]

Seems to me that blue flames are commonly seen floating around ghosts and such in a lot of places. *shrug* They just seem ghostly.

[Aitrus]

Blue evokes coldness, something that we do not associate with fire.  That very contradiction makes blue fire something strange and unreal, feelings we already associate with the supernatural.

[Chrono'99]

I don't know what's the color of the "will o'the wisps" (you know, those gaseous lights seen over damp grounds), but maybe it has something to do with it.

[doulifee]

will o wisp are white i think.

maybe some gas from deceased, leaking from the ground, like hydrogen sulfur or something like that.

sulfur is blue, but inside a spectrometer if i remeber well. it's the absorbtion color of sulfur.

[Olan_Durai]

From what I remember in my studies of Chinese and Japanese mythologies, these blue flames are ghosts.  From what I recall, most ghosts usually appear as flames, and only rarely do they manifest themselves as apparitions.  I think that only those people who died under particularly tragic events or who had strong personalities in life have the ability to appear as apparitions (ghosts who have human forms).  If you examine manga, anime, and Japanese games you'll see ghostly flames in areas that are haunted.  I'll have to pour through all of my books, but I know I have read somewhere the exact reasons why these ghosts only appear as flames; but that'll take a long time.  Check out the following website, it has a few paragraphs about the associations between ghosts and fire in Japanese myth and folklore

http://www.mangajin.com/mangajin/samplemj/ghosts/ghosts.htm

Oh, by the way, this is my first post.

[ZeaLitY]

Oh, by the way, this is my first post.

And the next would be your last.

[Darth Mongoose]

In anime and manga, it is common to see ghosts with little whisps of blue flame or cloud floating around them. You may also remember that in Final Fantasy X, when Yuna is sending the souls of the dead by dancing in the famous FMV, the flaming torches on the jetty suddenly turn blue.

[ZeaLitY]

I think I've found the answer:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hitodama

I found that through Will o' the Wisps, and went to it right off by the Japanese name.

Hitodama (人魂) is the term for a ghost-like creature in Japanese mythology. It is normally depicted as a floating blue or green fireball, and it is said that it likes to play tricks.

The origin of the legend of the Hitodama comes from flourescent gases that can sometimes be seen above human graves. "Hito" is Japanese for "human", "dama" means "soul". Hitodama is the Japanese counterpart to the English "Will o' the wisp".