in the classical literature of the edo period, shinigami that would possess humans are mentioned. in the "ehon hyaku monogatari" from tenpō 12 (1841), there was a story titled "shinigami", but in this one, the shinigami was the spirit of a deceased one and had bad intent, and acting in jointly with the malicious intent already within people who were living, those people were led on bad paths, which caused repeat incidents to occur at places where there was previously a murder incident, for example by causing the same suicide at places where people have hanged themselves before, and thus these shinigami are somewhat like a possession that would cause people to want to die. close to this, according to the essay of the bakumatsu period titled "hogo no uragaki", there were the "itsuki" that made people want to commit suicide through hanging, as well as things told through folk religion such as gaki-tsuki and shichinin misaki.