Were-Legends

[LV426]

Since I am doing wolf profiles in Misc this month I also thought I would add in some Werewolf Legends. Every day shall be a new legend and you can discuss and argue to your little heart's content. These will vary from region to region and are folktales recounted from the locals of that area or recorded in the mythos of various cultures. Some have been translated from their original versions and some are in the native dialect. Not all of these are wolf shifters, some shall be cats, bears, seals, swans, and and even cows, horses, and birds. There is even a tale of a were-pumpkin. I hope you enjoy them.


Werewolf Rock
Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm

In the meadow facing Seehausen near the Magdeburg village of Eggenstedt, not far from Sommerschenburg and Schöningen, there is a large rock, called "Wolf Rock" or "Werewolf Rock."

A long, long time ago a stranger sojourned near the Brandsleber Forest, which belonged to the Hackel and the Harz districts. No one knew who he was, nor where he came from. Known everywhere by the name "the Old Man," he would often show up without notice in the villages and offer his services, which he performed to the satisfaction of the country people. He was most often engaged to herd sheep.

It happened that a cute spotted lamb was born in a herd belonging to a shepherd named Melle from Neindorf. The stranger asked the shepherd repeatedly and fervently to give it to him, but the shepherd refused.

On shearing day Melle engaged the Old Man to help out. When he returned he found everything in order; all the work had been done, but neither the Old Man nor the spotted lamb were there. For a long time no one heard anything about the Old Man.

Finally one day he unexpectedly appeared before Melle, who was grazing his sheep in the Katten Valley. He called out sneeringly: "Good day, Melle, your spotted lamb sends his greetings!"

Angered, the shepherd grabbed his crook in order to avenge himself. Then suddenly the stranger changed shape and sprang at him as a werewolf. The shepherd took fright, but his dogs attacked the wolf with fury. The wolf fled. Pursued, it ran through forest and valley until it reached the vicinity of Eggenstedt. Here the dogs surrounded him. The shepherd called out: "Now you will die!"

Then the Old Man, again in human form, begged to be spared, offering to do anything. But the shepherd furiously attacked him with his stick, when suddenly a sprouting thorn bush stood before him. But the vengeful shepherd did not spare him, hacking away at the branches instead. The stranger once again turned himself into a human and begged for his life. But hard-hearted Melle remained unmoved. Then the stranger attempted to make his escape as a werewolf, but a blow from Melle brought him dead to the earth. A rocky cliff marks the spot where he fell and was buried, and will be named after him for all eternity.

[LV426]

The She-Wolf
Croatia
There was an enchanted mill, so that no one could stay there, because a she-wolf always haunted it. A soldier went once into the mill to sleep. He made a fire in the parlor, went up into the garret above, bored a hole with an auger in the floor, and peeped down into the parlor.

A she-wolf came in and looked about the mill to see whether she could find anything to eat. She found nothing, and then went to the fire, and said, "Skin down! Skin down! Skin down!" She raised herself upon her hind-legs, and her skin fell down. She took the skin, and hung it on a peg, and out of the wolf came a damsel. The damsel went to the fire, and fell asleep there.

He came down from the garret, took the skin, nailed it fast to the mill-wheel, then came into the mill, shouted over her, and said, "Good morning, damsel! How do you do?

She began to scream, "Skin on me! Skin on me! Skin on me!" But the skin could not come down, for it was fast nailed.

The pair married and had two children.

As soon as the elder son got to know that his mother was a wolf, he said to her, "Mamma! Mamma! I have heard that you are a wolf."

His mother replied, "What nonsense are you talking! How can you say that I am a wolf?"

The father of the two children went one day into the field to plow, and his son said, "Papa, let me, too, go with you."

His father said, "Come."

When they had come to the field, the son asked his father, "Papa, is it true that our mother is a wolf?"

The father said, "It is."

The son inquired, "And where is her skin?"

His father said, "There it is, on the mill-wheel."

No sooner had the son got home, than he said at once to his mother, "Mamma! Mamma! You are a wolf! I know where your skin is."

His mother asked him, "Where is my skin?"

He said, "There, on the mill-wheel."

His mother said to him, "Thank you, son, for rescuing me." Then she went away, and was never heard of more.



The two legends that I have posted up so far are of a man and woman who could turn into a wolf but neither of them ate people. It is interesting to note this because most concepts of werewolves are of the man slaughtering slavering beast type werewolves.

[LV426]

The mere concept of a werepumpkin is rather amusing. I would like to note that there are also stories of vampire pumpkins. It seems that not even vegetables are safe from becoming creatures of the night.


The Good Pumpkin Loup-Garou
As told by Pepe Boucher

In the past everybody had their own garden. Everyone liked his garden and took good care of it. Mais Jaques Cabaisser, he loved his pumpkins most of all. He fertilized the ground; be poured water. Nobody had pumpkins like Jaques. It paid him back by growing big. Many French had farms on both sides of the Oubache River and went across to work in them. Jaques went more often than the others. Ma foi! One Dark stormy night he started home, mais he never got back. His wife and children looked for him; his friends went over and looked for him. When the river turned to ice, everyone said Jaques was lost, frozen, and he will come no more to Vincennes.

The winter was long and cold. The river was frozen for more than three months. Christmas and New Year's was sad for Madame Cabaisser and her family with no kind father and husband. Many feared he had been bewitched.

That February the sun was so warm that the trees began to get leaves. The ice was all gone from the river when some men saw a big gold cup out in the center of the river. The men thought they saw come up from the cup, well you wouldn't guess it in years. It was Jaques Cabaisser riding on his best horse. Everybody looked and waited for him as he rode from the gold cup up the river bank to the group of people. He and his horse were covered with a net of gold. He laughed and threw a piece of gold in the crowd. Charlie Page caught it, for he was not afraid, and he said, "Jaques, if you aren't allowed to tell, ride on, but if you can tell, stop and entertain us."

Jaques laughed and replied, "Oh, it has only been ninety days and one, so I can talk. It was my good pumpkin loup-garou."

"Bien mon ami," drawled Jaques. "I went down to the farm on the other side of the river. When I tried to come back the ice was on top of the river. I thought I would die. Mais I lived and when the ice was gone--bien, you saw me come on my horse from my great pumpkin. Mais I tell you now it turned to gold on the outside, but inside it was good to eat. All the seeds turned to gold. I have my pockets full of golden seed."

Charlie Page interrupted. "I've got the one you threw when you neared land. We will pull in your good old pumpkin for you. I'll bet it will take many horses to pull."

Everybody was willing to lend a horse for the pull. Someone said they heard the wind say, "Don't pull to land!" (Pepe intoned these words in a shivery, shakey voice resembling the wind, wailing through the branches of a pine tree.) Mais the others laughed at him and pulled the good pumpkin to the land. It took fifty horses. When the first side hit the land it turned to a rotten pumpkin. Mais the horses were far up the bank and the man at the head of them cracked his whip, all the horses jumped and the entire gold pumpkin was pulled up on the bank. Every bit of it was merely pumpkin. Then the people remembered the golden seed, and when Jaques dropped it on the ground, it was still golden.

"When the pumpkin lay there it made a big hill of ripe pumpkin as large as a barn. Pourquoir you laugh?"

"Oh, Pepe, who could believe this story?" his listeners asked. "It is the most incredible of all. A pumpkin big enough to hold a man and his horse? Big enough to furnish them sustenance for three months and then have enough remaining to make a small hill out of its golden walls?"

To which Pepe replied, "Mais you must know it is a good loup-garou that saved the life of the man who took good care of it when it was just a petit pumpkin. You bet it gave good measure in its seeds, and there were more than 901 of them."

To all questions as to how the man and the horse got inside the pumpkin without the water flowing in and how they breathed encased in the golden waterproof shell, Jaques's response was, "You ask many questions like a lawyer. Well, I never ask. It is not the way. Oui I always raise huge pumpkins and all vegetables and I try to be kind and take care of all things that grow and live. And they repay me by growing large and being good to eat. You are Americans, that is the difficulty. I don't believe in all the idle stories, mais I like to make you laugh and ask questions. This is a compliment to my power when I tell unbelievable stories."

[LV426]

The Werewolf's Daughter
Slovakia

There was once a father who had nine daughters, and they were all marriageable, but the youngest was the most beautiful.

The father was a werewolf. One day it came into his head, "What is the good of having to support so many girls?" So he determined to put them all out of the way.

He went accordingly into the forest to hew wood, and he ordered his daughters to let one of them bring him his dinner. It was the eldest who brought it.

"Why, how come you so early with the food?" asked the woodcutter.

"Truly, father, I wished to strengthen you, lest you should fall upon us, if famished!"

"A good lass! Sit down whilst I eat."

He ate, and whilst he ate he thought of a scheme. He rose and said, "My girl, come, and I will show you a pit I have been digging."

"And what is the pit for?"

"That we may be buried in it when we die, for poor folk will not be cared for much after they are dead and gone."

So the girl went with him to the side of the deep pit.

"Now hear," said the werewolf. "You must die and be cast in there."

She begged for her life, but all in vain. So he laid hold of her and cast her into the grave. Then he took a great stone and flung it in upon her and crushed her head, so the poor thing breathed out her soul. When the werewolf had done this he went back to his work, and as dusk came on, the second daughter arrived, bringing him food. He told her of the pit, and brought her to it, and cast her in, and killed her as the first. And so he dealt with all his girls, up to the last.

The youngest knew well that her father was a werewolf, and she was grieved that her sisters did not return. She thought, "Now where can they be? Has my father kept them for companionship, or to help him in his work?"

So she made the food which she was to take him, and crept cautiously through the wood. When she came near the place where her father worked, she heard his strokes felling timber, and smelt smoke. She saw presently a large fire and two human heads roasting at it. Turning from the fire, she went in the direction of the ax strokes and found her father.

"See, said she. "Father, I have brought you food."

"That is a good lass," said he. "Now stack the wood for me whilst I eat."

"But where are my sisters?" she asked.

"Down in yon valley drawing wood," he replied. "Follow me, and I will bring you to them."

They came to the pit. Then he told her that he had dug it for a grave. "Now," said he, "you must die, and be cast into the pit with your sisters."

"Turn aside," father, she asked, "whilst I strip off my clothes, and then slay me if you will."

He turned aside as she requested, and then -- tchich! she gave him a push, and he tumbled headlong into the hole he had dug for her. She fled for her life, for the werewolf was not injured, and he soon would scramble out of the pit.

Now she hears his howls resounding through the gloomy alleys of the forest, and swift as the wind she runs. She hears the tramp of his approaching feet, and the snuffle of his breath. Then she casts behind her her handkerchief. The werewolf seizes this with teeth and nails, and rends it till it is reduced to tiny ribands. In another moment he is again in pursuit foaming at the mouth, and howling dismally, whilst his red eyes gleam like burning coals. As he gains on her, she casts behind her her gown, and bids him tear that. He seizes the gown and rives it to shreds, then again he pursues. This time she casts behind her her apron, next her petticoat, then her shift, and at last runs much in the condition in which she was born. Again the werewolf approaches. She bounds out of the forest into a hayfield and hides herself in the smallest heap of hay. Her father enters the field, runs howling about it in search of her, cannot find her, and begins to upset the different haycocks, all the while growling and gnashing his gleaming white fangs in his rage at her having escaped him. The foam flakes drop at every step from his mouth, and his skin is reeking with sweat. Before he has reached the smallest bundle of hay his strength leaves him. He feels exhaustion begin to creep over him, and he retires to the forest.

The king goes out hunting every day. One of his dogs carries food to the hayfield, which has most unaccountably been neglected by the haymakers for three days. The king, following the dog, discovers the fair damsel, not exactly "in the straw," but up to her neck in hay. She is carried, hay and all, to the palace, where she becomes his wife, making only one stipulation before becoming his bride, and that is, that no beggar shall be permitted to enter the palace.

After some years a beggar does get in, the beggar being, of course, none other than her werewolf father. He steals upstairs, enters the nursery, cuts the throats of the two children borne by the queen to her lord, and lays the knife under her pillow.

In the morning, the king, supposing his wife to be the murderess, drives her from home, with the dead princes hung about her neck. A hermit comes to the rescue, and restores the babies to life. The king finds out his mistake, is reunited to the lady out of the hay, and the werewolf is cast off a high cliff into the sea, and that is the end of him.

The king, the queen, and the princes live happily, and may be living yet, for no notice of their death has appeared in the newspaper.

[LV426]

Actual Court Case


The Tailor

Among other werewolf cases, the story of a tailor stands out for its peculiarity and horror. The man claimed that he woud turn into a werewolf and hide in the darkness of the forests and would lie in wait for a passerby. Whenever he could get a chance, he jumped out and killed the ill-fated man and would then consume parts of him before burying the man.

He had a tailor shop and used it as a cover to lure children to their deaths. He tempted them into his shop, and then killed them. In his cellars he stored their meat like butchers.Some barrels were used to stack up bones and “other foul and hideous things”. The records accumulated during his trial were so repulsive that the court decided that it would better destroy them.