“Without changing, something sleeps inside us, and seldom awakens. The sleeper must awaken." -Frank Herbert
“The devil is an angel too.”
- - - Miguel de Unamuno
“We invent what we love, and what we fear. “
- - - John Irving
“…Don't let us make imaginary evils, when you know we have so many real ones to encounter…”
-
- - Oliver Goldsmith
“…..Something wicked this way comes.”
- - - William Shakespeare "Macbeth
Change.
It is an inevitable thing. It will happen to everyone, and everything.
But some changes, are darker than others, and the point to which this article
addresses itself is one of the oldest ever recorded in human history, and whether it is fact or fiction, or something in between,
we will now examine it in its entirety, for better or worse.
--Please be warned that this article may contain graphic situations or extremely
violent historical documentations.—
WEREWOLF:
A Look At Lycanthropy, Shape Shifters,
and the Werewolf Phenomenon:
By: Anthony Milhorn
“A werewolf (also
lycanthrope or wolf man) in folklore and mythology is a person who shape shifts into a wolf, either purposely,
by using magic, or after being placed under a curse”, according to Wikipedia. However, the werewolf is more than any
simple monster, or imaginary fiend. Every culture has a word for a werewolf. Below are some of them:
Greek: lycanthropos
Spanish: hombre lobo
Romanian: vârcolac
Bulgarian:
varkolak, vulkodlak
Irish: faoladh, conriocht
French: loup-garou
It would seem that the werewolf is a world wide mono-myth. While the world is full of
shape shifters, this article will deal with the most familiar. The werewolf.
One of the oldest tales of a werewolf comes to us from ancient Greece,
starting with a man named Lycaon. King Lycaon, in Greek mythology,
was the son of Pelasgus and Meliboea, father of Oenotrus and the mythical first king of Arcadia.
He was the father of Callisto and, according to some, he raised her son Arcas. Lycaon had thrown a banquet one evening with
his 50 impious sons. When one of the guests coming to the banquet arrived, someone mentioned to Lycaon that the guest was
in fact, Zeus, king of the Gods. Lycaon, ever cynical, decided to test the guest’s divinity by serving him a special
meal.
A meal of human flesh. Some
say that Lycaon slew and dished up one of his own sons, Nyctimus.
Setting the meal before the
guest, Lycaon watched the reaction, and he did not have to wait long, for the guest was indeed Zeus. Pushing the plate away
in disgust, Zeus unleashed his fury at the deception upon the sons of Lycaon, and killed them with blasts of lightning. Turning
on the king, Zeus had a special punishment for the deceitful ruler.
Zeus commanded that Lycaon
would spend the rest of his eternity as a wolf, but could regain his human form, if Lycaon abstained from human flesh for
ten years.
Screaming, Lycaon was transformed and ran from
his palace and into the darkness of the woods beyond.
Thus we have the oldest, and perhaps best known
origin story for a werewolf, and something more.
The word “ lycanthropy”
comes, in fact, from King Lycaon.
This is
by no means the only origin story for the werewolf. In fact, there are as many origins and beginnings in every culture as
there are names for this creature. Many authors have put forward the idea that stories of werewolves (and vampires) may have
been used to explain serial killings in less enlightened ages. This theory is given credence by the tendency of some modern
serial killers to indulge in practices (such as cannibalism, mutilation and cyclic attacks) commonly associated with the attack
of a werewolf. The idea (although not the terminology) is well explored in Sabine Baring-Gould's seminal work The Book
of Werewolves.
A recent
theory has been proposed to explain werewolf episodes in Europe in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Ergot, which causes a form of food borne illness, is a fungus that grows in place of rye grains in wet growing seasons after
very cold winters. Ergot poisoning usually affects whole towns or at least poor areas of towns and results in hallucinations,
mass hysteria and paranoia, as well as convulsions and sometimes death. (LSD can be derived from ergot.) Ergot poisoning has
been proposed as both a cause of an individual believing that he or she is a werewolf and of a whole town believing that they
had seen a werewolf.
However, this theory is controversial and not well accepted.
Some modern researchers have tried to use conditions
such as rabies, hypertrichosis (excessive hair growth over the entire body) or porphyria (an enzyme disorder with symptoms
including hallucinations and paranoia) as an explanation for werewolf beliefs. Congenital erythropoietic porphyria has clinical
features which include photosensitivity (so sufferers only go out at night), hairy hands and face, poorly healing skin, pink
urine, and reddish color to the teeth.
There is also a rare mental disorder called
clinical lycanthropy, in which an affected person has a delusional belief that he or she is transforming into another animal,
although not always a wolf or werewolf. Others believe werewolf legends arose as a part of shamanism and totem animals in
primitive and nature-based cultures. The term therianthropy has been adopted to describe a spiritual concept in which the
individual believes he or she has the spirit or soul, in whole or in part, of a non-human animal.
Now that we know what a werewolf is, a man who
turns into a wolf and back, we shall examine some of the finer points to this rich folklore, which runs so much deeper than
films and cheap scare flicks portray.
Werewolf “Myths”
First, there are many “facts” about
werewolves. Such as a full moon brings about a transformation and that a silver bullet will kill a werewolf.
But is there any legendary
basis for these ideals?
The Full Moon: Real
or Not?
We see
it so much. The full moon makes a werewolf transform. But is it true?
In fact, werewolf transformations
have been known to happen at all times of the year, full moon or no. However, the full moon has much symbolic meaning. The
moon is called Luna. Full moons are traditionally associated with temporal insomnia and insanity (hence the terms lunacy
and lunatic). Psychologists have found that there is no strong evidence for effects on behaviour around full moon.
They find
that studies are not consistent, with some showing a positive effect, while others will show a negative effect. In one instance,
the December 23, 2000 issue of the British Medical Journal
published two studies on dog bite admission to hospitals in England
and Australia. The study of the Bradford
Royal Infirmary found that dog bites were twice as common at Full Moon, while the study of public hospitals in Australia found they were less likely at Full Moon.
Psychologists
point out that there is a difference between correlation and causation. The mere fact that two events happen at the same time
doesn't mean that there is a cause and effect relationship between the two.
In history,
as stated before, werewolf transformations were reported occuring at all times of the year, and not necessarily on the full
moon.
The Silver Bullet:
Death Of A Werewolf:
The general belief that silver can be used to
defend yourself against a werewolf comes from the story The Beast of Gévaudan from 1764 to 1767. A magician named Joan Chastel
blessed a silver bullet (throughout mythology silver is the only metal to "share" its magical property as a whole, in short
bless one you bless them all) and seriously wounded the werewolf. Even though it did not die it had been shown that silver
had become a powerful tool to aid the humans. The beast was neve captured and the story will dealt with below in detail later.
But silver, as the moon metal, has long been said to be able to cure or kill werewolves.
This is another untruth, as many werewolves in
folklore and personal stories seem to be as mortal when changed as when in human form, and just as easily injured.
There is a story of a knight
who was in love with a beautiful lady. On the way to her house, he was attacked by a large wolf. He used his sword and cut
off the wolf’s right front paw.
Thanking God for his survival, he continued to
his love’s house, a ways down the road.
When he arrived, he found his
love being tended to by a physician.
She was missing her right hand.
Knowing the truth about the woman, the knight
proceded to kill her and end the threat of a werewolf.
Or so says the story, found
in the book “ Werewolves” by Daniel Cohen.
So it seems that werewolves
aren’t as invincible as movies like Dog Soldiers lead us to think.
The Transformation:
As it appears? How do people become werewolves?
Common sense will tell you that any change of
the magnitude of a physical shift from one species into a completely different one in the span of a few minutes would be excruciatingly
painful. Having your bones, organs, tissues and body parts shrink, change, grow, vanish all together and move around seems
to be a rather unappetizing spectacle, and medically speaking, it is. The facial structure change alone would be enough to
drive a person into shock from sheer agony.
But, do these transformations actually occur?
Do people actually turn into wolves?
The short answer is actually
very surprising, as most shapeshifters and werewolves seem to claim that a physical, or P shift, is among the rarest and most
difficult of all.
That means that if they don’t
transform, then how can they be werewolves?
Astoundingly, there are many ways to accomplish the transformation according to lore, but first we will deal with the
most popular.
The physical change. What brough
it about? How did people become werewolves?
Historical legends describe a wide variety of
methods for becoming a werewolf. One of the simplest was the removal of clothing and putting on a belt made of wolf skin,
probably a substitute for the assumption of an entire animal skin which also is frequently described.
In other
cases the body is rubbed with a magic salve. To drink water out of the footprint of the animal in question or to drink from
certain enchanted streams were also considered effectual modes of accomplishing metamorphosis. Olaus Magnus says that the
Livonian werewolves were initiated by draining a cup of specially prepared beer and repeating a set formula.
Ralston
in his Songs of the Russian People gives the form of incantation still familiar in Russia. It is also said that the seventh son of the seventh son will become werewolf.
Another is to be directly bitten by a werewolf, where the saliva enters the blood stream.
According
to Christian belief, to become a werewolf is only possible through a curse, or through a pact made with the Lucifer, and voluntarily
submitted to, and that for the most loathsome ends, in particular for the gratification of a craving for human flesh. "The
werewolves," writes Richard Verstegan (Restitution of Decayed Intelligence, 1628), "are certayne sorcerers, who having
annoynted their bodies with an ointment which they make by the instinct of the devil, and putting on a certayne inchaunted
girdle, does not only unto the view of others seem as wolves, but to their own thinking have both the shape and nature of
wolves, so long as they wear the said girdle. And they do dispose themselves as very wolves, in worrying and killing, and
most of humane creatures."
Such were
the views about lycanthropy current throughout the continent of Europe when Verstegan wrote.
The ointments and salves in question may have contained hallucinogenic agents.
In Galician,
Portuguese and Brazilian folklore, it is the seventh of the sons (but sometimes the seventh child, a boy, after a line of
six daughters) who becomes a werewolf. In Portugal, the seventh daughter is supposed to become a witch and the seventh son
a werewolf; the seventh son often gets the christian name "Bento" (Portuguese form of "Benedict", meaning "blessed") as this
is believed to prevent him from becoming a werewolf later in life.
The belief
in the curse of the seventh son was so extended in Northern Argentina (where the werewolf
is called the "lobizón"), that seventh sons were abandoned, ceded in adoption or killed. A law from 1920 decreed that the
President of Argentina is the godfather of every seventh son. Thus, the State gives him a gold medal in his baptism and a
scholarship until his 21st year. This ended the abandonments, but it is still traditional that the President godfathers seventh
sons.
Being bitten
by a werewolf is also a historical way to become one, and not just a creation of the films. However it is reported to be a
very rare method, as the victim rarely survives the encounter. The methods for reverting the transformation were as varied
as the ways to initate it, often involving taking off the belt of skin, or washing off of the salve. When brought about by
a curse, the change back to human form was only possibly when a certain criteria of the curse had been met, such as in the
case of King Lycaon.
Several
Christian saints are known for having placed curses on people and turning them into werewolves. Omnes angeli, boni et mali, ex virtute naturali habent potestatem transmutandi corpora
nostra ("All angels, good and bad have the power of transmutating our bodies") was the dictum of St. Thomas Aquinas. St.
Patrick transformed Vereticus, a king in Wales,
into a wolf; and St. Natalis cursed an illustrious Irish family with the result that each member of it was doomed to be a
wolf for seven years.
In other
tales the divine agency is still more direct, while in Russia,
again, men are supposed to become werewolves through incurring the wrath of the devil.
So if physical
transformations are the most violent and rare, what about all these other werewolves? How do they change?
The answer
is a lot of ways. Below is a list and and a description of each:
Sense Shifting
Wild Shifting
Dream Shifting
Lucid Dream
Shifting
Astral
Shifting
Mental
Shifting
Phantom
Shifting
Auric Shifting
Physical
Shifting
Sense Shifting:
This type of shift is simply
when one or more of the normal five senses shifts into a lupine state, resulting in an increased ability in the changed sense.
Wild Shifting:
Wild shifts occur when
a shifter lets go and a more wild, primal instinct takes over. A lot of what happens while in this state usually happens involuntarily
and the shifter may have trouble holding back a growl or any other animal like urges. It can grow so intense at times that
the shifter may even feel might have to hold back a real physical transformation. Any shift where there's an amount of control
given up or lost to the "wild" instinct within is considered a wild shift.
Dream Shifting:
A Dream Shift occurs when
a lycanthrope becomes a wolf or werewolf in their dreams. The change is often involuntary, which means "it just happens".
Lycanthropes usually have less control over what they do in this form of shifting because, unlike Lucid Dream Shifting, they
are unaware that they are dreaming. A Dream Shift still happens in a normal dream, the only exception is that the dreamer
can shapeshift.
Lucid Dream
Shifting:
The difference between
Lucid Dream Shifting and Dream Shifting is that with Lucid Dream Shifting the lycanthrope is aware that they are dreaming
and therefor the change is usually voluntary. They know that they are dreaming and shapeshift by true will and desire. As
with regular lucid dreams, Lucid Dream Shifting experiences are just as vivid, sensual, and very realistic, the closest thing
you can get to a Physical Shift.
Astral
Shifting:
An Astral Shift occurs
when a lycanthrope enters a spiritual trance, travels out of body to the astral plane, and shifts there. Sometimes, it's hard
to tell the difference between Lucid Dream Shifts and Astral Shifts, lucid dreams being just as real, but Astral Shifts are
sometimes associated with "psychic" experinces as well, such as : dream sharing, telepathy, clairovoyance, precognition, and
psychokinesis. Astral Shifts are also said to be more spiritual in nature. This is what shamans and medicine men do in native
tribes.
Mental
Shifting:
Mental Shifting, as the name implies, deals with the mentality of a lycanthrope. This, of course, varies from person
to person, but there seems to be a common thread. The most common is an ability that I too have experienced. It is the ability
to shut out all human sapience, that constant dialogue playing in our heads, human thought. Then, the senses becomes acutely
heightened. It's a lot like what the Army calls "Condition Orange", only our instincts and reactions are more lupine.Mental
Shifting deals also with any shift that is felt but does not physically happen. A Phantom Shift (Described below) is one such
shift.
Phantom Shift:
This form of shifting is usually associated
with Mental Shifting, but is more specific as it deals only with the sensation of shifting or the feeling of being
their phenotype. For example, the shifter may feel like they have fur and the feeling is so real, so intense that they have
to check just to be sure they not P-Shifting! However, there will of course be no fur. This is where the term "Phantom Tail"
or "Phantom Muzzle" comes from. It's a Mental Shift in which the feeling is there, but the transformation and/or the attributes
of the phenotype cannot be physically seen.
Auric Shifting:
Aura shifting consists
of shaping one's aura. It's mainly done by instinct, but it can be shaped by will. It often happens when the shifter finds
themself in a dangerous environment. They'll shift, looking very much the same but their soul has changed shape, for added
protection. Much like how auras have different colors, it can be shaped into an anthropomorphic shape as well.
Physical
Shifting:
The rarest and possibly
impossible method for the change to occur. It involves the body changing, physically, into the wolf.
The Werewolf Trials:
Sightings and werewolf attacks obviously became so bad that people began to be arrested and tried, and in some cases,
tortured and executed for the crime of being a werewolf. Similar in time frame and methods to the Salem Witch Trials, the
Werewolf Trials were a virtual bloodbath as people were captured, brought to trial, tortured for confessions and publicly
executed. It was as if people believed that werewolves were everywhere. The trial records for the crime of lycanthrope
increased at an epidemic rate. In France
alone between 1520 and 1630 some 30,000 individuals were labeled as werewolves,
many of them underwent traumatic interrogation and torture.
Confessed or not, most of them suffered vile death at the stake.Methods of telling whether one was a werewolf or not were often brutal and completely useless, including the horrible
belief that a werewolf held his fur on the inside of his human skin while in human form. A case from the later 1500’s
shows that a man was brought to trial for werewolfism and refused to confess. To ascertain the “truth”, court
officials tortured the man, and systematically cut off his arms and legs, and disected them to see if he had fur growing on
the inside of his skin.
It was found that he did not, of course, but the poor man died
of shock and blood loss but was given an innocent verdict.
This went on and into the late 1600s, when the practice eventually, thankfully,
died out. But not before many innocent people were sent to their graves.
True Werewolves: The Dark Side Of Lycanthropy:
The Dark Man Cometh:
One of the most gruesome true accounts of werewolfism comes from France
in 1521, being the case of Pierre Burgot and Michael Verdun.
Nineteen years prior, in 1502, while Burgot
was desperately trying to gather his flock of sheep, badly frightened by a storm, he came across three men on horseback. Each
man wore black clothing, and each horse was as black as sackcloth. One of them assured him the future protection of his sheep
and gave him some money. In return, the stranger asked Burgot to obey him as The Lord. Burgot accepted the offer and agreed
to meet them again. In the second meeting the so-called Lord announced the full conditions of the deal; Burgot must denounce
God, the Holy Virgin, the Company of Heaven and baptism.
He did. Burgot forswore everything he believed in, and gave alligience to the man known
only as The Lord. For years, he served, doing The Lord’s bidding, until
at one meeting, The Lord gave him his reward; a magic ointment that would change him into the shape of a wolf at will. Instructing
Burgot to strip naked and rub the cream on his body, The Lord left, leaving Burgot and his new confidant, Verdun, with the substance. Eager to see if what they were told is true, the two men did
as told and were instantly transformed into ravaging monster wolves.
They went on a bloody rampage across the country side, and tore to pieces a seven-year-old boy, killed a woman and
abducted a four-year-old girl. The unfortunate girl was fully eaten up by two of them while still alive.
They committed their last
act and were caught in the process of mauling a small boy. The boy survived but he was the only victime to do so, albeit scarred.
During the trial, they confessed their crimes adamantly, proudly, and told everything to the judge. Appalled, the men
were summarily executed, ending their reign of terror. A drawing of the men was put up in local churches to remind the townspeople
that Satan’s influence is everywhere…
The Wolf Boy:
There
is a record of a child werewolf as well. He was Jean Grenier of Aquitaire. His story was more or less like that of
Burgot. When his father had beat him, he ran away from home and wandered around the countryside. One evening another boy named
Pierre La Tihaire took him to the depths of the woods. According to them, the Lord of the Jungle was there. He was
a tall black dressed dark man upon a dark horse. The Lord got off his horse and kissed Grenier with icy lips. In the second
meeting both of the boys submitted themselves to the acclaimed Lord who scratched tattoos on their thighs as brands. He brought
out a wine bag and gave them a drink. He also presented them wolf skins and an ointment. The Lord taught them how to rub their
bodies with the ointment before putting on the fur.
During
their reign of terror fifteen children including one from Grenier’s cradle disappeared. When finally Grenier
was caught in 1603, he confessed of eating them all. At that time he was fourteen, physically and mentally retarded.
Taking
into account of his age and limited mental capacity, the Judge ordered Grenier to be confined in a cloister for life. There
he refused to eat any regular food and devoured offal instead. Seven years later when a man called Pierre de Lancre visited
him, he had grown gaunt and lean. His deep-set black eyes were like fire balls, hands were like claws with bent nails and
teeth were like canines. Apparently he enjoyed hearing about wolves and readily imitated them. After one more year he died,
to be remembered forever in the anal of werewolves as the “boy lycanthrope”.
The Beast Of Gévaudan
The Beast of Gévaudan was a creature that terrorised the general
area of the former province of Gévaudan,
in the Margeride Mountains
in south-central France, from about 1764
to 1767, with its victims totaling well over 100. The Beast of Gévaudan was described as being a wolflike creature the size
of a cow with a wide chest, a long sinuous tail with a lion-like tuft of fur on the end, and a greyhound-like head with large,
protruding fangs. It was also noted making huge leaps approaching thirty feet in length (estimated from tracks).
The first attack that provided a description of the creature took place in May/June of 1764. A girl from Langogne was
working a farm in the Forêt de Mercoire when she saw a large, wolflike animal charge from the trees in a straight line toward
her but was driven away by the bulls from the farm's herd of cattle. More attacks followed over the next three years.
The victims were almost entirely children (of both sexes) and women. The widely accepted figures are fifteen women,
sixty-eight children, and six men (figures of those dead, another 30 wounded or mauled). The Beast’s preference towards
women and children is thought to be since women and children worked the country-side farms in small pairs or alone making
themselves easier targets. Men, however, tended to have objects that could be used as weapons, sickles, etc, and often worked
the fields in large groups.
On January 12, 1765, Jacques Portefaix and six friends,
were attacked by the Beast, drive it away by staying grouped together. Their fight reportedly caught the attention of King
King Louis XV, who gave 300 livres to Jacques and his six friends. The King then sent professional wolf-hunters Jean-Charles-Marc-Antoine
Vaumesle d'Enneval and the huntsman's son Jean-François, to kill the beast.
Following two more hunts and a very large grey wolf being brought down, people thought the attacks were over. But on
December 2nd, 1765, the Beast attacked again in la
Besseyre Saint Mary, severely injuring two children. Dozens more deaths are reported to have followed, all brutally mauled
with a peculiar feature: the hearts had been eaten out of the victims. The creature had a strange method of killing, often
ignoring the usual areas targeted by predators ; including the legs and throat. and instead concentrating on the head,
cutting it off and sometimes crushing it.
It also seemed to have a particular taste for humans, as even when cattle and other farm animals were more easily attainable
it often ignored them completely to attack the person tending them. A standing statement is that during many accounts, the
creature seemed to have a fear of cattle.
The killing of the creature that eventually marked the end of the attacks is credited to a local hunter, Jean Chastel,
at the Sogne d'Auvers. But some say that this is not the true beast and still believe the creature to roam the hills.
Various explanations were offered at the time of the attacks. They ranged from exaggerated accounts of wolf attacks,
to a loup-garou (werewolf), all the way to the beast being a punishment from God, to being an unholy creature summoned
by a sorcerer. Current opinions offer up the interesting theory that the attacks were actually a serial killer, or group of
serial killers, using wolf attacks to cover their own murders.
Also sometimes mentioned are the theories that the beast may have been a Dire Wolf, a marginally larger, extinct relative
of modern wolves; as well as the theory that the animal may have simply been an escaped captive exotic animal such as a hyena
or lion. Certain cryptozoologists believe that it may have been a mesonychid, while other individuals may think it is a creodont.
To this day, a statue reamain in the town to remember the dead and the young lives cut short.
Modern
Day Beliefs On Werewolves:
Clinical
Lycanthropy:
Clinical lycanthropy is a rare psychiatric syndrome that involves a
delusional belief that the affected person is, or has, transformed into an animal. It is named after the mythical condition
of lycanthropy, a supernatural affliction in which people are said to physically shapeshift into werewolves. The word zoanthropy
is also sometimes used for the delusion that one has turned into an animal in general and not specifically a wolf. Clinical
lycanthropy is a rare condition and is largely considered to be an idiosyncratic expression of a psychotic-episode caused
by another condition such as schizophrenia, bipolar disorder or clinical depression.
The
Spiritual Therianthropy Subculture
A widespread misperception is that people stopped claiming to be werewolves at the end of the Middle Ages. Not only
did it not stop, but there is an entire subculture of people in existence today who claim to be werewolves (or weretigers,
or werefoxes, or even stranger things).
"Claim to be werewolves" is a statement that
needs to be qualified, however. Most of these claims seem to involve a different variety of werewolf than the kind that probably
pops into your mind when you think "werewolf". In fact, very few of these people claim to transform in a physical way, though
most of them do claim to have characteristics that wouldn't seem out of place in the average werewolf novel, such as extra-keen
senses and a mystical affinity with the wilderness, while less than 5% claim to be able to physically shift. The spritual therianthropy subculture didn't really get going until the Internet made it much easier for
spiritual therianthropes to find each other. Then the lone indivuals and tiny groups of spiritual therianthropes (who had
always thought they were the only ones in the world who felt this way) began gathing at the newsgroup alt.horror.werewolves.
This was what was going on in the early 1990's.
During this time, alt.horror.werewolves was a kind of support group for spiritual therianthropes. There was an attitude of
optimism, and it was a gathering place for sober adults to come and talk about feelings and experiences which they had always
thought were taboo. It was a time of great acceptance, learning, and an unusual level of maturity. The terminology and slang
of the spiritual therianthropy subculture began to develop for the first time, and people began to classify and study all
the reports.
Most people in these groups are sincere, honest
kind people who believe they have the ability to shift into an animal form, and they have formed a way of life around this.
However, some, like role-playing gamers, and immature teenagers and nasty minded people, have began to flood the places these
people use to discuss their experiences with useless and often insulting spam. Regardless, the werewolf/shifter is not dead,
but merely in another form, alive and well, even in the 21st century.
Conclusion:
So, while the movie monster of the werewolf may not exist, werewolves as a creature were at one time heavily believed
in, and still are in some places. What are we to make of the stories of transformations, dream walks, and shamanistic voyages
to the netherworld where the lines between human and animal become blurred? We may very well never know. But as with ghosts,
demons and the other unseen denizens of this world, the werewolf still sparks something primal within each of us, as we realize,
that we, as organisms, are not so far apart from our animal nieghbors after all, and in that realization, we have the chance
to understand the mysterious ways in which Nature works.
Are werewolves real?
You decide.
