Real Crime Stories/Paranormal Hauntings/Conspiracy Theories Book II

History of the Werewolf

In folklore, a werewolf (Old English:werwulf, "man-wolf"), or occasionally lycanthrope/ˈlaɪkənˌθroʊp/ (Greek: λυκάνθρωπος lukánthrōpos,"wolf-person"), is a human with the ability to shapeshiftinto a wolf (or, especially in modern film, a therianthropic hybridwolflike creature), either purposely or after being placed under acurse or affliction (often a bite or scratch from another werewolf)with the transformations occurring on the night of a full moon. Earlysources for belief in this ability or affliction, called lycanthropy/laɪˈkænθrəpi/, are Petronius (27–66) and Gervase of Tilbury(1150–1228).

The werewolf is a widespread concept inEuropean folklore, existing in many variants, which are related by acommon development of a Christian interpretation of underlyingEuropean folklore developed during the medieval period. From theearly modern period, werewolf beliefs also spread to the New Worldwith colonialism. Belief in werewolves developed in parallel to thebelief in witches, in the course of the Late Middle Ages and theEarly Modern period. Like the witchcraft trials as a whole, the trialof supposed werewolves emerged in what is now Switzerland (especiallythe Valais and Vaud) in the early 15th century and spread throughoutEurope in the 16th, peaking in the 17th and subsiding by the 18thcentury.

The persecution of werewolves and theassociated folklore is an integral part of the "witch-hunt"phenomenon, albeit a marginal one, accusations of lycanthropy beinginvolved in only a small fraction of witchcraft trials. During theearly period, accusations of lycanthropy (transformation into a wolf)were mixed with accusations of wolf-riding or wolf-charming. The caseof Peter Stumpp (1589) led to a significant peak in both interest inand persecution of supposed werewolves, primarily in French-speakingand German-speaking Europe. The phenomenon persisted longest inBavaria and Austria, with persecution of wolf-charmers recorded untilwell after 1650, the final cases taking place in the early 18thcentury in Carinthia and Styria.

After the end of the witch-trials, thewerewolf became of interest in folklore studies and in the emergingGothic horror genre; werewolf fiction as a genre has pre-modernprecedents in medieval romances (e.g. Bisclavret and Guillaume dePalerme) and developed in the 18th century out of the"semi-fictional" chap book tradition. The trappingsof horror literature in the 20th century became part of the horrorand fantasy genre of modern popular culture.

Names

The word werewolf comes from the OldEnglish word werwulf, a compound of wer "man" andwulf "wolf". The only Old High German testimony isin the form of a given name, Weriuuolf, although an early Middle HighGerman werwolf is found in Burchard of Worms and Berthold ofRegensburg. The word or concept does not occur in medieval Germanpoetry or fiction, gaining popularity only from the 15th century.Middle Latin gerulphus Anglo-Norman garwalf, Old Frankish wariwulf. Old Norse had the cognate varúlfur, but because of the highimportance of werewolves in Norse mythology, there were alternativeterms such as ulfhéðinn ("one in wolf-skin", referringstill to the totemistic or cultic adoption of wolf-nature rather thanthe superstitious belief in actual shapeshifting). In modernScandinavian also used was kveldulf "evening-wolf",presumably after the name of Kveldulf Bjalfason, a historicalberserker of the 9th century who figures in the Icelandic sagas.

The term lycanthropy, referring both tothe ability to transform oneself into a wolf and to the act of sodoing, comes from Ancient Greek λυκάνθρωπος lukánthropos(from λύκος lúkos "wolf" and ἄνθρωπος,ánthrōpos "human"). The word does occur in ancientGreek sources, but only in Late Antiquity, only rarely, and only inthe context of clinical lycanthropy described by Galen, where thepatient had the ravenous appetite and other qualities of a wolf; theGreek word attains some currency only in Byzantine Greek, featuringin the 10th-century encyclopedia Suda. Use of the Greek-derivedlycanthropy in English occurs in learned writing beginning in thelater 16th century (first recorded 1584 in The Discoverie ofWitchcraft by Reginald Scot, who argued against the reality ofwerewolves; "Lycanthropia is a disease, and not atransformation." v. i. 92), at first explicitly for clinicallycanthropy, i.e. the type of insanity where the patient imagines tohave transformed into a wolf, and not in reference to supposedly realshapeshifting. Use of lycanthropy for supposed shapeshifting is muchlater, introduced ca. 1830.