The Origins of the Myth of the Werewolf

Ancient cultures across the world ascribed shape shifting abilities to the most dangerous animals they came in contact with; in Africa it was the lion, in India it was the snake and tiger and in Europe it was the white wolf, suggesting that the myth might have come about from mans need to invent stories. 

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Scholars believe that certain types of mental illness also played a part in perpetuating the myth.  According to H. Sidky, author of. ‘Witchcraft, Lycanthropy, Drugs, and Disease: An Anthropological Study of the European Witch-Hunts’ (1997), this might include children suffering from some extreme types of autism that display wolf-like characteristics including solitary behaviour, a taste for raw food and a tendency to yell and bite.  There is also a rare mental condition called clinical lycanthropy, which causes a person to have a delusional belief that he or she is transforming into another animal, although not always a wolf or werewolf.

Accusations may also have been made at some people showing symptoms of diseases such as rabies, porophyria (an enzyme disorder with symptoms including hallucinations and paranoia), or hypertrichosis, a condition that causes excessive hair growth over the entire body.

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Hallucinogenic drugs may also have played a part in establishing the belief in the supernatural beings.  Plants such as henbane, datura, Solanaceae and many others can induce hallucinations that could have led people to believe they were, or they had seen, a werewolf.  Whole villages sometimes reported seeing the beasts and it has been suggested that they were having hallucinations brought about by the consumption of ergot, a fungus containing LSD that sometimes infected medieval crops.  This theory is hotly contested however as group hallucinations only tend to happen as part of rituals of a given culture and not when a collective of people become accidently and unknowingly intoxicated.

Some suggest that stories of werewolves and other ‘creatures of the night’ such as vampires may have been used to explain serial killings in less enlightened ages. The theory is given some credence by the tendency of some modern serial killers to indulge in practices commonly associated with the attack of a werewolf, such as cannibalism, mutilation and attacks revolving around natural events such as the cycle of the moon.

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Whether as a result of illness, drugs or the miss-deeds of man, the myth of the werewolf took root in European culture from at least the time of the ancient Greeks and is still expressed in modern culture through books and films across the world.  The reason why the myth has lasted so long in European culture may never be known, but it is likely that a combination of factors all played significant roles in perpetuating the myth of the werewolf.