Werewolf Studies
Werewolves have haunted human imagination for thousands of years, appearing in ancient mythology, medieval trials, religious belief, folklore, medicine, literature, and modern horror.
Werewolf Studies explores the history and meaning of lycanthropy from the earliest human relationships with wolves to the creature's transformation into one of popular culture's most recognizable monsters. Drawing together mythology, documented historical cases, psychology, biology, folklore, and speculative science, this book examines where werewolf beliefs came from, how they changed, and why they continue to endure.
Discover the legend of Lycaon, the wolf warriors of the Norse world, medieval beliefs about magical skins and enchanted belts, notorious werewolf trials such as those of Peter Stumpp and Gilles Garnier, and shapeshifting traditions from across Europe and beyond. Examine clinical lycanthropy, rabies, hypertrichosis, hallucinations, psychosis, and other real phenomena that may have influenced accounts of human transformation.
The book also approaches the werewolf as though it were a real organism. Could a human body physically transform into a wolf? How would its skeleton, muscles, metabolism, senses, and healing have to function? Could such a transformation survive the laws of biology?
Finally, Werewolf Studies considers what would happen if lycanthropy were real. Could werewolves remain hidden in a world of DNA testing, surveillance cameras, forensic science, and modern medicine? How would governments respond? Would an infected person be legally responsible for crimes committed while transformed? Could humans and werewolves coexist?
Part folklore study, part cultural history, part scientific investigation, Werewolf Studies examines the werewolf not merely as a monster, but as one of humanity's oldest ways of exploring the boundary between civilization and the animal within.
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