Month: December 2022

This week’s werewolf tidbit comes from David Booth’s Analytical Dictionary of the English Language, published in 1835, which talks about werewolves as part of an entry on wolves in general. The section is brief, but notable for being comparatively early: Sabine Baring-Gould’s influential book on werewolves would not be published until thirty years later.

One detail that stands out is that the author associates werewolves with grave desecration, an aspect of lycanthrope lore that is not particularly prominent these days, and consequently connects them to the ghouls of the Arabian Nights.

The animal of which we now speak has his part in classical fiction. Lupus, the Wolf, is one of the southern Constellations; and Lycaon was changed into a Wolf, when, at the termination of the age of Gold, Astrea ascended into heaven. Romulus and Remus were suckled by a She-wolf.

In the annals of superstition, a certain species of insanity, in which the patients are said to have imagined themselves transformed into Wolves, has the medical name of Lycanthropy; from the Greek lycos, a wolf, and anthropus, a man. This supersititon was also prevalent among the Gothic nations; for the Werewolf (Man-wolf) was a bugbear of general belief.

In latter times the Werewolves were considered as Sorcerers, who frequented Church-yards and fed upon human bodies, which they seized either alive or dead. They were connected with the Devil, who enabled them to assume the shape of Wolves, that they might the more easily gratify their horrid propensity. Men suspected of this practice were persecuted and tortured in Germany as later as the close of the sixteenth century; and we find that a similar superstition had prevailed in other nations. The Loup-garou of the French is the same monster; and the Goule of the Arabian Nights visited nightly the graves of the dead, to feed on human flesh. See Vampire.

Christmas is nearly upon us, and I decided to celebrate with an appropriately festive piece of werewolf folklore. The source this time is Olaus Magnus’ 1555 book Historia de Gentibus Septentrionalibus (A Description of the Northern Peoples), chapters 45-7 of which discuss lycanthropy. If any of this seems familiar, then chances are you’ve read Sabine Baring-Gould’s summary.

Olaus Magnus begins the section by citing Pliny’s description of a race of wolves descended from men that can be found in lands to the north. He then moves on to Prussia, Livonia and Lithuania where, we are told, substantial loss of livestock to wolves is a common problem The wolves responsible are not just any animals: rather, they are men who have been transformed.

On the night of the feast of the Nativity of Christ, says Olaus Magnus, a great number of these wolves arrive from disparate places to gather together in a location that they have chosen. They then terrorise human and animal alike, even trying to break down doors so that they can consume the occupants and any household pets. Meat is not the only substance on their minds: these wolves are also fond of entering the cellars of beer-makers and indulging in alcohol. This trait, we are told, is what distinguishes them from natural wolves.

Continue reading “Werewolf Wednesday: Olaus Magnus on Lycanthropy (1555)”

This week’s werewolf tidbit comes from Epistolae Ho-Elianae (Familiar Letters), specifically the collected edition of 1655. The volume is a compilation of letters (“Partly Historicall, partly Politicall, Partly Philosophicall”)  written by the historian James Howell.

One letter, purportedly sent by Howell in 1644 (I say “purportedly” as a long-running dispute surrounds the question of whether or not Howell fabricated his own correspondence), touches upon the topic of mental health. Towards the end of the letter, Howell uses lycanthropy as an analogy — giving us an idea of how the concept might have been discussed in the seventeenth century.

To Sir Ed. Sa. Knight.

Sir,
Wer ther a Physitian that could cure the maladies of the mind, as well as those of the body, he needed not to with the Lord Major, or the Pope for his unkle, for he should have Patients without number; It is true, that ther be som distempers of the mind that proceed from those of the body, and so are cureable by Drugs and Dyets; but ther are others that are quite abstracted from all corporeall impressions, and are merely mental; these kind of Agonies are the more violent of the two, for as the one use to drive us into Fevers, the other precipitate us oftentimes into Frenzies; And this is the ground I believe, which made the Philosopher think, that the rational soul was infus’d into man, partly for his punishment, and the understanding for his executioner, unless wisdom sit at the Helm, and steer the motions of his Will.

Continue reading “Werewolf Wednesday: Homo Homini Lupus (1655)”