Werewolves: Lycanthropy and Legend

Sabine Baring-Gould

• Publisher: Books on Demand
• Year: 2019
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9783748160199
• Topic: Social Sciences
• Subtopic: Folklore & Mythology
• Index: Social Sciences

IN Norway and Iceland certain men were said to be eigi einhamir, not of one skin, an idea which had its roots in paganism. The full form of this strange superstition was, that men could take upon them other bodies, and the natures of those beings whose bodies they assumed. The second adopted shape was called by the same name as the original shape, hamr, and the expression made use of to designate the transition from one body to another, was at skipta hömum, or at hamaz; whilst the expedition made in the second form, was the hamför. By this transfiguration extraordinary powers were acquired; the natural strength of the individual was doubled, or quadrupled; he acquired the strength of the beast in whose body he travelled, in addition to his own, and a man thus invigorated was called hamrammr.

Table of contents

• Werewolves: Lycanthropy and Legend
• CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTORY.
• CHAPTER II. LYCANTHROPY AMONG THE ANCIENTS.
• CHAPTER III. THE WERE-WOLF IN THE NORTH.
• CHAPTER IV. THE ORIGIN OF THE SCANDINAVIAN WERE-WOLF.
• CHAPTER V. THE WERE-WOLF IN THE MIDDLE-AGES.
• CHAPTER VI. A CHAMBER OF HORRORS.
• CHAPTER VII. JEAN GRENIER
• CHAPTER VIII. FOLK-LORE RELATING TO WERE-WOLVES.
• CHAPTER IX. NATURAL CAUSES OF LYCANTHROPY.
• CHAPTER X. MYTHOLOGICAL ORIGIN OF THE WERE-WOLF MYTH.
• CHAPTER XI. THE MARÉCHAL DE RETZ.-I. THE INVESTIGATION OF CHARGES.
• CHAPTER XII. THE MARÉCHAL DE RETZ.--II. THE TRIAL.
• CHAPTER XIII. MARÉCHAL DE RETZ.--III. THE SENTENCE AND EXECUTION.
• CHAPTER XIV. A GALICIAN WERE-WOLF.
• CHAPTER XV. ANOMALOUS CASE.--THE HUMAN HYÆNA.
• CHAPTER XVI. A SERMON ON WERE -WOLVES.
• Copyright