Two Asian systems give the northeast far more weight than the European compass rose does, and they arrive at opposite valuations of the same bearing.
In Vastu Shastra, the Indian tradition of building, the eight quarters are assigned to the dikpalas, the guardians of the directions, and the northeast belongs to Ishana, a form of Shiva. It is the most auspicious quarter in the whole scheme. The northeast corner of a plot is where water is placed and where the household shrine goes, the ground there is kept low and open, and the standard prescriptions treat building heavily on that corner as among the worst things that can be done to a site.
Japanese practice inherited an eight-quarter scheme through Chinese onmyodo and reached the reverse conclusion. The northeast is the kimon, the demon gate, the quarter through which malign influence enters. In the twelve-branch naming of the horizon it is ushitora, the ox-tiger direction, which is the reason the Japanese oni is conventionally drawn with ox horns and a tiger-skin loincloth. Temples were founded northeast of the capital to guard it on that side, and domestic layouts avoided putting a kitchen or a lavatory there.
Both are eight-quarter systems, both are used to site buildings, and both were formalised in cultures in long contact with one another. That they disagree this sharply about one bearing is a standing corrective to any attempt to build a single table of directional correspondence across traditions.