Kunio YANAGIDA, a scholar of folklore, paid attention to the barrier stone called Uba-ishi at the start of a trail up Mt. Iwaki-san (or Ubasute-yama), a mountain where old women would be abandoned, and in "Imo-no-chikara" and "Bikuni-ishi" introduced a legend that a woman who crossed over the barrier stone would change into a stone.
民俗学者の柳田国男は姥捨山・岩木山の登山口にも姥石という結界石があるのに着目し、結界を越えた女性が石に化したという伝説を『妹の力』『比丘尼石』のなかで紹介している。