Wolves in folklore, religion and mythology

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Main article: Gray Wolf

[edit] Mythology

[edit] Turkic and Mongolian mythology

In Altaic mythology of the Turkic and Mongolian peoples, the wolf is a revered animal. The shamanic Turkic peoples even believed they were descendants of wolves in Turkic legends. The legend of Asena is an old Turkic myth that tells of how the Turkic people were created. In Northern China a small Turkic village was raided by Chinese soldiers, but one small baby was left behind. An old she-wolf with a sky-blue mane named Asena found the baby and nursed him, then the she-wolf gave birth to half wolf, half human cubs therefore the Turkic people were born. Also in Turkic mythology it is believed that a gray wolf showed the Turks the way out of their legendary homeland Ergenekon, which allowed them to spread and conquer their neighbours.^[1][2] In modern Turkey this myth inspired extreme-right nationalist groups known as "Grey Wolves". In Mongolian folk medicine, eating the intestines of a wolf is said to alleviate chronic indigestion, while sprinkling food with powdered wolf rectum is said to cure haemorroids.^[3] Some Mongolians believe that Chinggis Khan was the product of a union by a blue wolf and a deer. Mongol mythology explains the wolf's occasional habit of surplus killing by pointing to their traditional creation story. It states that when God explained to the wolf what it should and should not eat, he told it that it may eat one sheep out of 1,000. The wolf however misunderstood and thought God said kill 1,000 sheep and eat one.^[4]

[edit] Roman mythology

The Capitoline Wolf with Romulus and Remus. Musei Capitolini, Palazzo dei Conservatori, Rome.

According to the Roman tradition, a wolf was responsible for the survival for the childhood survival of the future founders of Rome, Romulus and Remus. The twin babies were ordered to be killed by their great uncle Amulius. The servant ordered to kill them, however, relented and placed the two on the banks of the Tiber river. The river, which was in flood, rose and gently carried the cradle and the twins downstream, where under the protection of the river deity Tiberinus, they would be adopted by a she-wolf known as Lupa in Latin, an animal sacred to Mars.

The comedian Plautus used the image of wolves to ponder the cruelty of man as a wolf unto man.

[edit] Norse mythology

Fenrir, bound by the gods.

Norse mythology prominently includes three malevolent wolves, in particular: the giant Fenrisulfr or Fenrir, eldest child of Loki and Angrboda who was feared and hated by the Æsir, and Fenrisulfr's children, Skoll and Hati. Fenrir is bound by the gods, but is ultimately destined to grow too large for his bonds and devour Odin during the course of Ragnarök. At that time, he will have grown so large that his upper jaw touches the sky while his lower touches the earth when he gapes. He will be slain by Odin's son, Viðarr, who will either stab him in the heart or rip his jaws asunder according to different accounts.^[5] Fenrir's two offspring will according to legend, devour the sun and moon at Ragnarök. On the other hand, however, the wolves Geri and Freki were the Norse god Odin's faithful pets who were reputed to be "of good omen."^[6]

In the Hervarar saga, king Heidrek is asked by Gestumblindi (Odin),

What is that lamp

which lights up men,

but flame engulfs it,

and wargs grasp after it always.

Heidrek knows the answer is the Sun, explaining

She lights up every land and shines over all men, and Skoll and Hatti are called wargs. Those are wolves, one going before the sun, the other after the moon.

But wolves also served as mounts for more or less dangerous humanoid creatures. For instance, Gunnr's horse was a kenning for "wolf" on the Rök Runestone, in the Lay of Hyndla, the völva (witch) Hyndla rides a wolf, and to Baldr's funeral, the giantess Hyrrokin arrived on a wolf.

[edit] Japanese mythology

In Japan, grain farmers once worshiped wolves at shrines and left food offerings near their dens, beseeching them to protect their crops from wild boars and deer. Talismans and charms adorned with images of wolves protected against fire, disease, and other calamities and brought fertility to agrarian communities and to couples hoping to have children. The Ainu people believed that they were born from the union of a wolflike creature and a goddess.^[7]

[edit] Native American mythology

Helmet and collar representing a wolf, at the Museum of the Americas in Madrid. Made of wood, shell and mane in the 18th century by tlingit indigenous people, from the North American Pacific Northwest Coast. Tlingit people admired and feared wolves because of their strength and violence.

Wolves were generally revered by tribes which survived by hunting, but were thought little of by those which survived through agriculture. Some tribes, such as the Nunamiut of northern and northwestern Alaska and the Naskapi of Labrador respected the wolf's skill as a hunter and attempted to emulate the wolf's ways in order to successfully hunt down prey. ^[8]

In the Cardinal directions of the Plains Indians, the wolf represented the west, while for the Pawnee, it represented the southeast. According to the Pawnee creation myth, the wolf was the first creature to experience death. The Wolf Star, enraged at not having been invited to attend a council on how the Earth should be made, sent a wolf to steal the whirlwind bag of The Storm that Comes out of the West, which contained the first humans. Upon being freed from the bag, the humans killed the wolf, thus bringing death into the world. The Pawnee, being both an agricultural and hunting people, associated the wolf with both corn and the bison; the "birth" and "death" of the Wolf Star (Sirius) was to them a reflection of the wolf's coming and going down the path of the Milky Way known as Wolf Road.^[8]

Wolf body parts were considered important additions to certain rituals. Pawnee warriors, known as Wolf People, dressed in wolf skin cloaks when scouting or hunting. Nez Perce warriors wore wolf teeth pushed through the septums of their noses. Cheyenne medicine men wrapped wolf fur on sacred arrows used to motion prey into traps. Arikara men wove wolf fur with bison fur in order to make small sacred blankets. Nuxálk mothers painted wolf gallbladders on their young male children's backs, so they could grow up to perform religious ceremonies without making mistakes as hunters. Hidatsan women experiencing difficult births would call upon the familial power of wolves by rubbing wolf-skin caps on their bellies.^[8]

Wolves were usually only killed for body parts used in rituals, or to stop them raiding food chaches or horses. Many tribes believed that killing wolves would cause game animals to disappear or bring retribution from other wolves. When the Kwakiutl killed a wolf, the animal would be laid out on a blanket and have portions of its flesh eaten by the perpetrators, who would express regret at the act before burying it. The Ahtna would take the dead wolf to a hut, where it would be propped in a sitting position with a banquet made by a shaman set before it. When men from certain Inuit tribes killed a wolf, they would walk around their houses four times, expressing regret and abstaining from sexual relations with their wives for four days.^[8]

Wolves were not always portrayed positively in Native American cultures. The Netsilik Inuit and Takanaluk-arnaluk believed that the sea-woman Nuliayuk's home was guarded by wolves. The Naskapi's believed that the caribou afterlife is guarded by giant wolves which kill careless hunters venturing too near. The Navajo people feared witches in wolf's clothing called "Mai-cob".^[8]

[edit] Religion

[edit] Christianity

A mosaic on the entrance of a Church in Denmark depicting the Good Shepherd protecting a lamb from a wolf

The Bible contains 13 references to wolves, usually as metaphors for greed and destructiveness. In the New Testament, Jesus is quoted to have used wolves as illustrations to the dangers His followers would have faced should they follow him (Matthew 10:16, Acts 10:29, Matthew 7:15)^[9]

Virgil leads Dante away from the She-Wolf in Inferno Canto 1 lines 87-88 as drawn by Gustave Doré for the elephant folio edition in early 1861

The Book of Genesis was interpreted in Medieval Europe as stating that nature exists solely to support man (Genesis 1:29), who must cultivate it (Genesis 2:15), and that animals are made for his own purposes (Genesis 2:18-20). By this perspective, nature was only acceptable if controlled by man, more specifically by a Christian culture. The wolf is repeatedly mentioned in the scriptures as an enemy of flocks: a metaphor for evil men with a lust for power and dishonest gain, as well as a metaphor for Satan preying on innocent God-fearing Christians, contrasted with the shepherd Jesus who keeps his flock safe.^[10] The Roman Catholic Church often used the negative imagery of wolves in order to create a sense of real devils prowling the real world. Quoting from Leviticus and Deuteronomy, the Malleus Maleficarum states that wolves are either agents of God sent to punish sinners, or agents of the Devil sent with God's blessing to harass true believers in order to test their faith.^[8]

However, legends surrounding Saint Francis of Assisi show him befriending a wolf.^[8] According to the Fioretti, the city of Gubbio was besieged by the Wolf of Gubbio which devoured both livestock and men. Francis of Assisi, who was living in Gubbio at the time took pity on the townsfolk, and went up into the hills to find the wolf. Soon fear of the animal had caused all his companions to flee, but the saint pressed on and when he found the wolf he made the sign of the cross and commanded the wolf to come to him and hurt no one. Miraculously the wolf closed his jaws and lay down at the feet of St. Francis. “Brother Wolf, you do much harm in these parts and you have done great evil…” said Francis. “All these people accuse you and curse you… But brother wolf, I would like to make peace between you and the people.” Then Francis led the wolf into the town, and surrounded by startled citizens he made a pact between them and the wolf. Because the wolf had “done evil out of hunger” the townsfolk were to feed the wolf regularly, and in return, the wolf would no longer prey upon them or their flocks. In this manner Gubbio was freed from the menace of the predator. Francis, ever the lover of animals, even made a pact on behalf of the town dogs, that they would not bother the wolf again.

In Canto I of Dante's Inferno, the Pilgrim encounters a She-Wolf blocking the path to a hill bathed in light. The She-Wolf represents the sins of concupiscence and incontinence. She is prophecised by the shade of Virgil to one day be sent to Hell by a greyhound.

[edit] Islam

Wolves are mentioned three times in the Qur'an, specifically in the Sura Yusuf.

12.13: "He said: Surely it grieves me that you should take him off, and I fear lest the wolf devour him while you are heedless of him."

12.14: "They said: Surely if the wolf should devour him notwithstanding that we are a (strong) company, we should then certainly be losers."

12.17: "They said: O our father! Surely we went off racing and left Yusuf by our goods, so the wolf devoured him, and you will not believe us though we are truthful."

[edit] Mormonism

John 10. 12: "But he that is an hireling, and not the shepherd, whose own the sheep are not, seeth the wolf coming, and leaveth the sheep, and fleeth: and the wolf catcheth them, and scattereth the sheep."

Alma 5. 59-60: "For what shepherd is there among you having many sheep doth not watch over them, that the wolves enter not and devour his flock? And behold, if a wolf enter his aflock doth he not drive him out? Yea, and at the last, if he can, he will destroy him. And now I say unto you that the good shepherd doth call after you; and if you will hearken unto his voice he will bring you into his fold, and ye are his sheep; and he commandeth you that ye suffer no ravenous wolf to enter among you, that ye may not be destroyed."

Gen. 49. 27: "Benjamin shall ravin as a wolf: in the morning he shall devour the prey, and at night he shall divide the spoil."

Isa. 11. 6: "The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them." This is repeated in chapter 21 of the Second book of Nephi.

Isa. 65. 25: "The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock: and dust shall be the serpent’s meat. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the Lord."

Jer. 5. 6: "Wherefore a lion out of the forest shall slay them, and a wolf of the bevenings shall spoil them, a leopard shall watch over their cities: every one that goeth out thence shall be torn in pieces: because their transgressions are many, and their backslidings are increased."

Ne. 30. 12: "And then shall the wolf dwell with the lamb; and the leopard shall lie down with the kid, and the calf, and the young lion, and the fatling, together; and a little child shall lead them."

[edit] Symbolism Within Music

With the ever expanding growth of Scandinavian based heavy metal, the wolf has been commonly used throughout visual and audio imagery. Bands such as Sonata Arctica (who use the wolf as their "mascot"), Marduk, Wintersun, and Wolf, who's logo contains the image of a wolf paw, have used the wolf throughout their lyrics. The symbol of the wolf has been reputed to represent varying degrees of power as well as connections to Scandinavian nations (such as Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden) and their natural habitats (snow, mountains, and forests). Additionally, images of wolves can be more violent, with the focus on their potential ferocity and ability to hunt.

[edit] See also

• Werewolf
• Wolves in fiction
• Little Red Riding Hood
• Wolf of Magdeburg
• Wolf of Gubbio

[edit] References