Oh, you know Zozo. He’s that entity who allegedly pops up during Ouija board sessions to mess with people. You’re sliding a planchette across the table? Who knows, maybe you’ll run into him.
The first appearance of Zozo (and we’re diving right into paranormal folklore here, don’t hold me to it) is said to have occurred in 1816, when a young girl in Picardy, France claimed to fall victim to a severe demonic possession. This was according to the Dictionnaire Infernal, published in 1818 by Jacques Collin de Plancy, in which the author shared numerous illustrations of demons and anecdotes regarding their existence. The passage regarding Zozo – following short passages on an enchanted castle and Zoureg, a mysterious serpent – states simply:
“Zozo, demon qui, accompagne de Mimi et de Crapoulet, posseda en 1816 une jeune fille du bonrg de Teilly eti Picardie.”
The girl, or so she herself claimed, became the vessel for a number of demons, including Mimi, Capulet (or Grapoulet), and our alleged mysterious Zozo. However, it should be noted, here at the beginning of all things, that Collin de Plancy wrote that the girl “wanted to pass herself off as possessed,” and after being sent to a hospital, “there was no further talk of possession.”
It’s all right there in the book. But let’s speed up to modern times. When Ouija boards entered popular culture in the 20th Century, stories of Zozo seemingly began to rise, with numerous tales told of the Ouija entity and its strange effect on users of the board.
A Planchette Of Stories
Zozo is a complicated entity, or so it would seem. In most stories, it’s initially friendly, sometimes using a different name. Occasionally, it will appear in the middle of a conversation with another spirit and interrupt the communication.
The planchette is said to perform strange figure eights or “inverted Zs,” and answers become repetitive. The planchette on the Ouija board might also make repetitive movements through the alphabet, from Z to O and back again. And if you know anything about Ouija board lore, that’s a problem – it’s said that you shouldn’t go backwards in the alphabet (or in the numbers) on a Ouija board. Why? Because doing so is a method that demons and evil spirits use to open portals into our world and break through from the other side. Could the name ‘Zozo’ actually be a trick?
Heck, I don’t know.
It’s difficult to tell which stories about Zozo are authentic and which are, you know, stuff people made up on the Internet. Some tell of horrific incidents, while others involve possession, curses, and other bizarre phenomena. Some have even claimed that Zozo attached to them or their family, like a parasitic demon. If you’d like to take a quick break from urban legend horror, check out my post on demons and parasites in science fiction.
Oh, still here? Okay then. Here’s a little image I made of the alleged signs of Zozo. I promise it’s not haunted, so no need to apologize to it:
Strange, huh? Well, here are a couple anecdotes about Zozo that have appeared online. Reader beware, you’re in for a scare. Maybe.
“We called him Oz.”
In 2012, a user at Ghost-Space.com (now inaccessible, but may be found here) shared the story of a confrontation with a suspicious Ouija spirit. Her friend had been asking the board questions about her recently-deceased father, which it answered correctly. Then, it did the same with the user’s deceased mother. Eventually, the alleged spirit switched again, and they asked who it was that time. “The pointer went O Z O Z O Z O Z O,” they wrote, “We called him Oz. We asked him to blow out a candle to prove himself and before we completed the sentence the candle was out.”
The strange spirit also knew the exact time, when asked. However, it would later reveal a haunting truth – it had been the same spirit the whole time, posing as her friend’s father and her mother, answering questions correctly by reading their minds. Bad luck seemed to follow the encounter. Later, the duo would jump online to research their strange new friend “Oz,” and learned of the existence of Zozo. Were they one and the same?
Losing Control
A tale at Your Ghost Stories, published in 2012, shares yet another haunting experience. The poster, named April, had read stories about Zozo herself, but didn’t believe them at the time. She’d recently moved in with her sister, and to celebrate they’d had a few friends over and decided to have some fun with a Ouija board. Bad idea? You bet.
They placed their hands on the planchette, and April asked “Is there anyone there?” The board replied Yes. When they asked it to reveal its name, the planchette glided over to the Z, then the O. Then Z O Z O Z O Z O. They asked the spirit what it wanted. Hop on over to the original post to find out what happened next.
A Worldwide Phenomenon?
On March 24, 2009, a man named Darren Evans from Oklahoma shared his own story online. He’d long been fascinated with the occult, particularly Ouija boards, and had experienced many strange phenomena. He was also shocked, he said, “by how many times ZOZO showed up even in many different states and many different Ouija boards.” Inspired, others would also come forward and share their stories with him.
Evans would later go on to research the demon Zozo and become a self-proclaimed “Zozologist,” publishing a book on the topic titled The Zozo Phenomenon in 2016.
Let’s Wrap This Up
Is Zozo a demon? Well, now hold on just a second; you can’t go around throwing the label of ‘demon’ at any old spirit you see, can you? There’s an idea from some paranormal enthusiasts that Zozo is nothing more than an evil spirit pretending to be a demon. And as TLC might say, we don’t know want no scrubs, here. A scrub is a ghost who can’t get no love from me.
Anyway, a horror film titled I Am Zozo was released in 2012. The film was shot entirely on Super 8, but unfortunately its reception, according to Wikipedia, was “overwhelmingly negative.” The film is, as you’d expect, about the terrifying events that follow after a group of friends use a Ouija board on Halloween. Which, as we know, is never a good time to use a Ouija board or light a black flame candle.
Then again, “overwhelmingly negative” does seem to capture the usual Zozo experience, so maybe they nailed it!
Other fun Zozo factoids: The name Zozo features prominently in the game Final Fantasy VI, as a town where every resident tells lies. And the band Led Zepplin used the symbol “Zoso,” which some have connected to Zozo. Why? Again, I don’t know.
Movies and other media aside, while reading about Zozo, I couldn’t help but think of a final possibility: Could Zozo be a tulpa, a shared experience? Like the Philip Experiment on a much grander scale, or the Hat Man, or even the countless stories shared about the Slender Man. Zozo is an urban legend, but even as some kind of entity, it could very well be our own creation.
