![]() Ovid’s Lycaon is the origin of the modern werewolf, as the physical manipulation of his body hinges on his prior immoral behaviour. ![]() His garments were changed to a shaggy coat and his arms His murderous longings were turned on the cattle he still was possessedīy bloodlust. …He tried to speak, but his voice broke intoĪn echoing howl. His description of the metamorphosis uses haunting language that creates a correlation between Lycaon’s behaviour and the physical manipulation of his body: Ovid’s passage is one of the only ancient sources that goes into detail on the act of transformation. ![]() In Ovid’s version, Lycaon murdered and mutilated a protected hostage of Zeus, but suffered the same consequences. A furious Zeus slayed the sons with a lightning bolt and transformed their father into a wolf. They served the corpse as a pseudo-feast and attempting to trick the god into eating it. In Fabulae, the sons of Lycaon sacrificed their youngest brother to prove Zeus’s weakness. Using wolf skins for warmth is not outside the realm of possibility for inhabitants of such a harsh climate: this is likely the reason Herodotus described their practice as “transformation”.Īn Athenian vase depicting a man in a wolf skin, circa 460 BC. The Neuri were from Scythia, land that is now part of Russia. In 425 BC, Greek historian Herodotus described the Neuri, a nomadic tribe of magical men who changed into wolf shapes for several days of the year. These stories of the transformed beast are usually mythological, although some have a basis in local histories, religions and cults. However, the werewolf as we now know it first appeared in ancient Greece and Rome, in ethnographic, poetic and philosophical texts. The earliest surviving example of man-to-wolf transformation is found in The Epic of Gilgamesh from around 2,100 BC. In reality, the werewolf is far older than that. You might think this snarling creature is a creation of the Medieval and Early Modern periods, a result of the superstitions surrounding magic and witchcraft. The werewolf is a staple of supernatural fiction, whether it be film, television, or literature. ![]()
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