Slavic mythology volkolak. What is the difference between a wolf and a werewolf? What legends were told about the wolves

In OLKODLAKI - forest werewolves, taking the form of a wolf (dlaka - skin). Half-humans, half-wolves. Werewolf warriors from the retinue. Their images represent one of the options for expressing the danger that lay in wait for a person in the forest.

In a later interpretation, they become, taking the form of a wolf, people turned by witches or turned into wolves themselves through a conspiracy.

“You need to find a smoothly cut stump in the forest, stick a knife into it with sentences and roll over it - you will become a werewolf; having poked with a wolf, you need to run from the opposite side of the stump and roll over back; if someone takes the knife away, you will remain a wolf forever. "

Volkolak (wolkodlak) - in Slavic mythology, a werewolf who takes the image of a wolf: it is either, taking on an animal image, or a simple person, transformed into a wolf by the spell of witchcraft.
The Slavs have associated with the wolves the idea of \u200b\u200bcreatures devouring the sun and the moon.
According to Ukrainian folk belief, sorcerers or witches, wishing to turn someone into a wolf, throw a wolf's skin over him and whisper magic words at the same time.
The sorcerers and witches themselves, wishing to transform themselves into animals, throw a ring of bast over themselves or tumble through hoops.
To turn the wedding train into a pack of wolves, the sorcerer takes as many belts and wipes as there are faces on the train, whispers spells over the belts and sponges, and then belts them one by one, the belted ones immediately become wolves.
In Ukraine, there are two genera of wolves. The wolves turned from ordinary people, seem to be creatures not harmful, but suffering, unhappy, deserving complete compassion: they live in dens, prowl through the forests, howl like a wolf, but preserve the human mind.

The wolf, who transforms voluntarily, does not experience any suffering, uses this transformation for its own purposes, prowling like a wolf at night, and by dawn again taking a human form. In this distinction, two facts stand out very clearly, to which such widespread beliefs in the wolf can be reduced.

The suffering wolves are representatives of a special type of insanity, in which the sick imagine that they have been turned or can turn into wolves. This disease, known as lycanthropy, was widespread in Europe in the Middle Ages. In the beliefs about malevolent wolves, echoes of mystical ideas are visible, in which the wolf is the personification of the hostile forces of nature.
South Slavic beliefs associate the wolf with a ghoul (vampire). According to the beliefs of the South Slavs, the volkolak induces hunger, sucks blood from people and dogs, sometimes takes the form of a handsome guy and forces a young widow to enter into a marriage relationship with him, and the fruit of this relationship is children who, as a rule, do not have bones.

The Ukrainian bylich tells: “Two brothers were returning home from the field.
- And what, Gritsko, are you very much afraid of wolves? - asks the elder brother of the younger.
“I don’t know, I haven’t seen them before,” the brother replies.
- And now you'll see.
He went behind a grave near the road, took out two knives from his pocket, stuck them in the ground and rolled over his head between them. Before Gritsko had time to open his mouth, a huge wolf appeared from behind the grave. Gritsko got scared, rushed behind the grave, where his brother disappeared, but instead of his brother he found only two knives stuck in the ground. He pulled out the knives and ran home, because the wolf was running after him, howling piteously.
People often began to meet a strange wolf near the village - skinny, with watery eyes. One night Gritsk was awakened by the terrible barking of dogs. He came out of the hut, saw a wolf sitting in the corner of the barn, and the dogs rushed at him. After the son came the father, who quickly realized what kind of wolf it was. I went up to him, grabbed him by the collar and shook him hard. The skin on the wolf cracked, and his eldest son crawled out of it.
When everyone was already sitting at the table, his mother asked him:
- Son, what did you eat when you were a wolf?
“I licked the places on the trees that people took with their hands, and that's the only thing I lived.”
And here is another story: “There lived a husband and wife. They lived well, only the husband disappeared from time to time, not saying anything to his wife. One day they went to rake the hay. They worked, they worked. It was noon. The husband says to his wife:
- I have to leave for a while. And you climb on the heap and take the whip in your hands. If a wolf suddenly attacks you, beat him with this whip.
The husband said and went to the nearest grove, and the wife climbed onto the heap, took the whip in her hands and waited for her husband. A few minutes passed, when suddenly a wolf ran out of the grove where her husband had just disappeared and attacked the woman. She beats him with a whip, and he grabbed her by the dress with his teeth and pulls from the shock. Barely she fought back. The wolf ran back into the grove. The woman looked - and a piece of her hem was torn out. After some time, her husband returned. She began to tell him how the wolf attacked her, how she fought off him with a whip, and how he tore out a piece of her dress too. The husband did not say anything, they raked in the hay, loaded it onto a cart and drove home. And in the evening, at dinner, her husband began to tell her something funny and laughed, she looked - and a piece of her dress was stuck between his teeth. Then she understood who this wolf was. "

Every person who, during his lifetime, was in friendly relations with veshtits (witches), or evil pitchforks, or devils and who died without repentance, becomes a wolf after death: a certain devil spirit, entering the body of a dead man, animates him and forces him to cause all kinds of misfortune to a person.
However, the fate of a wolf sometimes awaits virtuous people in the afterlife. This happens when a cat, dog or chicken runs across the deceased while he is lying on the table. Therefore, the southern Slavs drive these animals out of their homes for the entire time the deceased is there. Children born from the marriage relationship of a wolf with a woman also turn into a wolf, and people who have incurred the anger and vengeance of a sorcerer or witch turn into a wolf. Then at night an evil spirit with a wolf's skin appears to them and orders them to put it on, after that they begin to prowl wolves at night, and at dawn, having taken off their wolf's skin, they again take a human form.
Volkolak most often looks like an ordinary wolf, and only a few features give him a werewolf. According to Russian beliefs, in the wolf, the joints on the hind legs are turned forward, like in a person, and not back, like in a wolf. Belarusians believe that a werewolf has a human shadow. Folk fantasy paints the image of a wolf with bright colors: a yellowish face, pitted with deep wrinkles, tousled hair standing on end, red, bloodshot eyes, bloodshot hands to the elbows, iron teeth - pitch-black, bluish mustache and saggy skin on the body - here appearance wolf.
To get rid of the visits of the wolf, he must be killed in his own grave with a hawthorn stake. But the difficulty lies in how to find the grave of the wolf. In most cases, they take a young stallion and go with him to the cemetery, where they force him to move from grave to grave until they notice that the stallion begins to move away from any grave, make jumps to the side and show signs of fear. This means that something terrible is hidden in the grave. The villagers quickly approach this grave, surrounding it from all sides, dig it up, and if they notice that the body of the dead man has not yet decayed, despite the fact that he has long been buried, or if the dead man has an appearance characteristic of a wolf, then turn it over a hawthorn stake is driven in between the shoulders. The villagers rush to burn both the corpse of the wolf, and the stake with which he was killed.

Since ancient times, many peoples have associated the image of a wolf with the cult of the deity of war. The ancient Greeks in Arcadia worshiped Lycaean Apollo, Lycea Zeus in the form of a wolf. The ancient Roman god of war Mars was served by warrior-priests.

They were called Sacranams or Amertines, and the wolf was their totem. The connection between the wolf and the deity of war is reflected in the myths about two wolves (Geri and Freki) who accompanied the ancient German war god Odin as his "dogs" (a similar idea is also noted in Georgian mythology). The Slavic god of war and ancestor was called the Fire Wolf Serpent.

Accordingly, the warriors of the ancient Indo-Europeans themselves were represented as wolves or were called wolves (In the Hittite, Iranian, Greek, Germanic and other Indo-European traditions) and often dressed up in wolf skins. In this case, the head of the wolf was worn on the helmet, and the rest of the skin covered the shoulders and back of the wolf (for that time it was an ideal camouflage suit in the conditions of rich flora and fauna). Such a wolf skin was worn by some units of the Roman legions: scouts, standard-bearers and the Praetorian Guard. Both the standard-bearers and the Praetorian Guard, as a ceremonial army, less than other units, changed the image of uniforms over time (such conservatism can still be observed today in the ceremonial units of troops of different countries, such as the Papal Guard, the Queen's Guard, etc. etc.).

The sagas say that the Scandinavian wolf warriors (berserkers) were so fierce, strong and skillful in the art of war that they went into battle without weapons (or rather, they used a shield and a sword only to get deeper into the enemy's ranks), fighting practically with their hands and legs (As is known from history, the ancient Balts were worthy opponents of the Vikings). According to the Hittite text of the address of King Hattusilis I (XVII century BC) to the army, his soldiers should be like a "pack of wolves." a similar idea of \u200b\u200ba wolf pack as a symbol of a military squad is known in the Caucasus among the Svans. In turn, those who used their connection with the totem of the wolf and their art of the warrior, committing crimes, were considered, as evidenced by Hittite laws, ancient German legal norms, as well as Plato, the worst criminals-wolves (Hittite hurikas, "criminal"; Old Norse Vargr, "outcast wolf"), which must be destroyed as soon as they are caught.

The idea of \u200b\u200btransforming a person into a wolf unites many myths about the wolf. V. Zadorozhgy writes: “Herodotus told a story about a certain Northern European tribe (neuri), whose members turned into wolves for several days every year. Many tribes in different parts of Europe suffered from such megalomania. For example, the Balts had warriors - the servants of the wolf god, who went into battle, literally gorged themselves (taking drugs was part of the ritual). During the battle, such warriors, in their hallucinations, considered themselves to be wolves. Some of them were irretrievably stuck in the form of a wolf - and then the wolf-man was killed so that he would not cause damage ... "

In the folklore of European peoples, echoes and beliefs about the connection of wolves with a wedding have been preserved. Here we meet both the groom, who turns into a wolf, and the sorcerer, who can turn all the wedding guests into a pack of wolves. The archaism of these beliefs is evidenced by the fact that in the European tradition the ability of the groom to turn into a wolf is associated with the ancient custom of marriage - stealing the bride. Here the connection is manifested: groom - warrior - wolf. Festive rituals, when people disguised themselves in wolf skins, walked with a mask or stuffed wolf, among many peoples of Europe (including the Balts and among the southern and western Slavs) were timed to coincide with the autumn-winter season (when, as we know, the harvest has already been harvested , the swamps are frozen, people are much less busy with household chores). It was at this time of the year that they played a wedding and went to war. In the traditions of many European peoples, December is called the "wolf month" (cf. Czech vlci mesic, Latvian vilku menesis, etc.).

Talivaldis Zemzaris wrote in the first half of this century, “Analyzing the specialized literature of the 16th and 17th centuries, I came to the conclusion that the issue of wolf lags should be especially relevant in Latvia, because several serious authors (theologian Olav Magnus, physician Gasapar Peyker, lawyer Boden, Johan Fishart and others) prove the reality of wolfdogs based on reliable information from Livonia and Prussia. " They are joined by prof. K. Straubergis: “In the numerous literary works of the 16th century about witchcraft, there is especially a lot of information about the wolf-lakers of Livonia, which at that time in Europe was famous as a country of sorcerers and witches. German cosmographer Seb. Minster, in his popular Cosmography (1550), referring to his Livonian correspondent Hans Hasenteter, writes that on this ground there are very many sorcerers and witches who, during interrogations in the Inquisition, often reported their ability to turn into a wolf ... "

Georg Sabin, commenting on Book VII of Ovid's Metamorphoses, where he speaks of lycanthropy, says: “Commoners are convinced that some people turn into wolves and back again once a year. Herodotus also writes about such people, speaking of the Neurs, the people of Scythia, and here the Prussians also have such ... "No. In turn, the Burgundian Hubert Languet goes even further and claims that it is in Vidzeme (Livonia) that is the land where, according to Herodotus, lived neurs who supposedly could turn into wolves.

Solomon Henning in his chronicle (1589) writes about the beliefs of the Kurlanders: “... the peasants must be weaned from their delusions, witchcraft, idolatry and turned to a true understanding of the essence and will of God. They are very much inclined towards paganism and worship the sun, stars, moon, fire, water, streams and almost all living creatures, only this was done openly before, but today it is happening secretly ... describe all the abominations that this people does in their numerous groves and burying their dead, it would be too long. Often and many times they turn into wolves and run (around) like wolf lags, as they are called. " In turn, from the materials of the Holy Inquisition, we read: "Here, the Livs know how to conjure, and if everyone who is engaged in this is burned at the stake, there will be no one left to work in the field."

In 1555, the Catholic bishop from Uppsala, Olav Menson (in the Latinized version of Magnus), who fled to Rome, wrote about wolfodlaks very widely, believing that this phenomenon is very characteristic of the inhabitants of Prussia, Livonia and Lithuania: “the class of wolves that people really are turned into a wolf - a class about which Pliny writes with conviction that these are invented fabulous creatures, in my opinion, are still found in large numbers in northern countries to this day ... at Christmas night, many wolves gather in a conventional place, into which people have turned from different volosts, and on the same night with terrible ferocity they attack both people and cattle ... They break into beer cellars, drink several barrels of beer, and stack empty ones one on top of the other in the middle of the hall: in this they differ from real wolves ".

Courland Superintendent Paul Einhorn wrote in his book that it cannot be denied that wolfhounds are people who, on behalf of the devil, take the form of a wolf and, running around, can harm livestock and people. Some explain this by "metempsychosis", that is, that the human soul passes into a wolf and directs its activities. The human body must remain in the same position, lying, otherwise the soul will not find its way back and will forever remain in the wolf. Others think that there is a "transmutation" - a person turns into a wolf in body and soul. Einhorn himself denies these explanations, joining the opinion that these are the tricks of the devil: who thinks that he is a wolf, although he is not a wolf, and to another it seems that he sees a wolf, although in fact he does not see him. In turn, the priest Himself. Early, opposing the Breslav doctor Johan Kanold, wrote in 1725: “Not a single educated person in Courland believes that they act like wolves (harm livestock, etc.). But in their fantasies and delusions, they consider themselves wolves, while others, because of the same delusions and stupidity, also consider them wolves, and therefore they run through the forest like wolves (of course, not real). " And the protocol of the interrogation of the Inquisition testifies: "He only feels that he is a wolf, but when he sheds a wolf's skin, he immediately wakes up."

This point of view on this problem is also characteristic of the ruling circles of that time, when the wolf lags were either denied as superstition or identified with the forces of evil. But this issue has another side, the point of view of the common people, the Latvian peasants, which has been little studied so far.

The surviving interrogation protocols at the trials against witches and wolf lags of the 16th-18th centuries can help us a lot in this. Unfortunately, as T. Zemzaris points out, not all periods of history and not all districts of Latvia are represented equally extensively in these materials important for history, because the old judicial archives of Courland and Livonia were either destroyed in the wars or abroad and are not yet available for study. But even from those fragments that were translated and published by K. Straubergs and T. Zemzaris, we can draw some conclusions.

Volkodlak is not quite ranked among the sorcerers, and, as we will see, it is even the opposite of such, although universal ideas reduce them to one thing, as can be read in the descriptions of wolfdogs (Olav Magnus, witches' processes, etc.). Therefore, among the judges, the prevailing conviction (adopted by the commentators) that the wolf lak is a creature - a servant of Satan. They tried to get such an answer, using well-known methods of interrogation, from the accused. But, in spite of the most terrible tortures, the accused rejected it, as, for example, in the trial of 1683 against Thomas Igund: “To whom did you harm? Nobody. Wolfdogs do good to people - they help those who have been offended by the witches, they try to fix everything for the better. ... So, they cured the stallion Kaln Pēteris, who almost died ... Latsis Jochim's child was already completely blue, but Thomas undressed him and healed him with his skill. "

It may seem incredible, but the Latvian peasants did not consider the wolf-lags to be representatives of the forces of evil. Rather, quite the opposite!
In 1691, Tis (Matis) from Malpils told the court: “The Germans have their own hell. After death, wolf lags are buried like all other people; their souls go to heaven, and the souls of sorcerers go to hell. Volkodlaki do not serve the devil, but fight against him - they take away what the sorcerers have stolen; The devil hates wolfdogs and, if possible, hits them like dogs, because they are the dogs of God and bring good to people ... They do not believe in the Bible teaching, they do not go to church. (Yew, who was already over 80, as evidenced by the court materials, was glorified throughout the district as a healer, and the peasants “worshiped him like an idol” - AB). He has nothing to do with the devil, because he is the dog of God and takes away from the devil what the sorcerers have collected for him and the devil is his enemy. ... He treated many ... collected various herbs ... gave them to drink. " P. Šmit in the collection “Latvian folk beliefs” gives a similar indication: “In the old days, wolves were called God's dogsbecause God himself loved them very much. For this, the wolves prayed and howled songs every morning at the appointed place. And Straubergis points out that "a very specific designation of wolfodlaks is the dogs of God."

“Latvian folk beliefs” says: “Whoever wants to become a wolf lak must go to the forest before sunrise on Janis (summer solstice), find a fallen oak tree, plunge two knives, undress naked and make three somersaults between the blades”. It seems to me that in this belief one can clearly see the parallels with the initiation rituals of young warriors ...

“To become a wolf lak, a person needs to go to a quiet, secret place where a stranger cannot wander ... transformation into a wolf lak occurs in different ways, of which the main thing is crawling under a tree, the top of which bent to the ground and took root” As is known from history, for example, in medieval Japan such places were used by formidable scouts and saboteurs - "wolves among people" - ninja.) "A wolf lak can be a woman or a man." “Volkodlak needs special clothing. ... They put on the skin of a goat or other animal. "

Del-Rio, who also wrote a lot about wolfhounds, reported: “Sometimes he (the devil) gives a man a wolf skin, which he must keep in the hollow of a tree. Sometimes he gives the wolf lags the image of a wolf, while they use ointments and verbal formulas. So the fact that those wounds that they received as wolves remain on their body even after turning back into a human was not at all surprising. After all, the haze of the wolf's image, which the devil let loose, slowly dissipates, and the wound remains on the real body ... When a person is ripe, the devil will give him a wolkodlak belt ”. And the ancient Germans believed that the werewolf had a special belt (schmachtrilmen). (An interesting coincidence: in East Asian martial arts systems, the instructor confirms the skill level of a fighter by giving him a belt that matches that level.

Protocols: “... Otherwise, a wolf lak is a person who temporarily turns into a wolf. ... The wolf claw has human eyes. … If you beat him, then he will suffer in the human form. If you hurt him, then the wound will remain for life. If a wolf lak is wounded so that it bleeds, he immediately becomes a man. " Volkodlak "runs like a wolf on all four, while he feels much stronger than usual." So, ending the citation of the protocols, Straubergis sums up the following: "Wolfodlers are not sorcerers at all, and although they consider themselves wolves and imitate the actions of wolves, in fact they are and remain people."

From "Latvian folk beliefs": "When the wolves stop howling, they choose a sovereign from among the elders, who lets each wolf know where to go to look for food, what to do on that day or night, and everything else"; "In order for a newcomer to be initiated into wolf lags, he had to do the following: cut his little finger with a dagger and sign with blood." In turn, from the court records, we learn: “The wolves, like the wolves, had their own leaders who knew everything. They took care of their subordinates, gave them instructions on how and where to become human again. " "Wolfdogs usually move in groups of 20-30 individuals each"; "They come from different volosts in an organized way"; “Volkodlaks also have their own meetings. There is a large rock on a small island in the Brasla River. Under the stone is a meeting place for wolf lags. ... One usually stands on guard with a sharp pole instead of a sword. " Usually wolf-lakers gathered together at the summer and winter solstices, which can no doubt be associated with pagan rituals.
So, the organized and similar to the military structure of wolf lags is very clearly manifested.

Let us resort to the help of Olav Magnus: “Between Lithuania, Samogitia and Kurland (isn't this the Neretta we have already mentioned? - AB) there is a wall in the ruins of an old castle, where once a year several thousand wolf-lags gather and test their this wall. Those who cannot jump over this wall, as is the case with obese, are beaten by the commanders with whips. … Among them there are many nobles. " (I would like to remind you that at that time most of the nobility of Lithuania and part of the nobility of Livonia came from the best families of the indigenous people.)

From the court records we learn that: “The wolf-lakers understood the language of animals, but they themselves could not speak it. They, like the wolves, were led by a leader ("forest father"). Without his knowledge, no one sat down to even touch a mouse. At different times they ate differently and not always with meat ”; “Sometimes wolves were not allowed to eat meat. For one month they ate strange sweet bread that falls from the sky ... for the next month they only swallow the wind ”(isn't this fast with breathing exercises?); “Where wolves howl, God feeds them. One peasant found this place on the trail and there is a strange white bean. This was the bread that God used to feed the wolves. After eating this, he became unusually healthy and vigorous for nine days. Likewise, wolfhounds can live for nine days without food and not feel hungry. "

In Europe, simultaneously with the destruction of paganism and the appearance of large regular military formations in all-metal armor, the formidable wolf warriors of the ancient pagans gradually disappeared, leaving only vague echoes of themselves in sagas, myths and chronicles. However, interest in this topic is not lost at the end of the twentieth century. One of the most famous lawsuits of the wolkodlaks in Riga in 1637 was against Janis Kuschis from Lielupe. By an interesting coincidence, the first who, four years ago, expressed the idea of \u200b\u200bthe closeness of the concepts of "wolfodlak" and "pagan warrior", was another Janis Kuschis, a veteran of the war in Afghanistan, lieutenant colonel and commander of a special forces battalion of the Latvian armed forces.
Research continues ...

Science and Religion, 1995, no. 8

Volkolak is a person who can turn into a wolf (bear). You can become a wolf voluntarily and against your will. Sorcerers often transform themselves into a wolf to gain the power of the beast. They are able to transform into a wolf and back into a human of their own free will. To do this, it is enough for the sorcerer to roll over a stump, or 12 knives stuck into the ground with a tip, while if during the time the magician was in the guise of an animal, someone pulls out at least one knife from the ground, then the sorcerer will no longer be able to return to human appearance.

A person can turn into a wolf and after a curse, then the damned is not able to regain his human form on his own. However, you can help him: in order to remove the curse from a person, he must be fed with consecrated food and a garment woven from nettles must be put on him, while the wolf will resist this rite in every possible way.

You can distinguish a wolf from a wolf by the hind limbs, the joints of a werewolf remain human and are like knees. In human form, the wolf can be distinguished by the hair on the head, which resembles wolf hair. During a solar or lunar eclipse, wolves are unable to restrain themselves and often fall into a rage against their will.

Wolfs live in forests near villages, during the day they live among people, and at night they hunt in the forest. But sometimes some individuals go far into the forest and prefer to live as hermits far from other people, fearing to harm them.

Abilities

Volkolak possesses tremendous physical strength, many times superior to human strength, as well as an impressive speed of movement: a werewolf is able to overcome several hundred kilometers per night.

Enemies

In the forest, the natural enemies of wolfs are large predators: bears and wolves, since often their hunting territories overlap, and skirmishes become inevitable.

How to fight?

The wolves do not have supernatural vitality, and they can be killed with ordinary weapons, however, after death, werewolves turn into and rebel again to take revenge on their killer. To prevent such an appeal from happening, the werewolf must shove three silver coins into its mouth at the moment when he dies, or pierce his heart with a hawthorn stake when the wolf is in human form.

Volkolak (wolf lak) - in Slavic mythology, a werewolf who takes the image of a wolf: this is either a sorcerer who takes an animal image, or a simple person, by the spell of witchcraft, turned into a wolf.

The Slavs associate the wolkolaks with the idea of \u200b\u200bcreatures devouring the sun and the moon.

The name comes from wolf + dlaka; the second word means unkempt, disheveled hair (Belorussian kodla), skin and is preserved in Serbian and Slovenian languages. In the Church Slavonic dictionary Archpriest. G. Dyachenko it is declared Old Slavonic, in M. Vasmer's etymological dictionary - Church Slavonic; both are doubtful, since this word is not recorded either in Old and Church Slavonic texts, or in Old Russian ones.

It is believed that since early XIX century, with the light hand of A.S. Pushkin, a distorted (from wolkolak, vurkolak) form of the name spread - ghoul, which soon became dominant in the literary language.

Ukrainian and South Russian beliefs

According to Ukrainian popular belief, sorcerers or witches, wishing to turn someone into a wolf, throw a wolf's skin over him and whisper magic words at the same time.

Sometimes the sorcerer puts a belt twisted from bast under the threshold of the hut; whoever steps over this belt turns into a wolf and can receive the previous human image only when the sorcerer's belt is frayed and burst, or when someone puts on a belt that has been removed from himself, on which he has previously tied knots and when imposed every time said: Lord have mercy.

The sorcerers and witches themselves, wishing to transform themselves into animals, throw a ring of bast over themselves or tumble through hoops.

To turn the wedding train into a pack of wolves, the sorcerer takes as many belts and wet as there are people on the train, whispers spells over the belts and washings, and then belts them one by one; those who are belted immediately become a wolf.

Against such a spell, you can only act by spells or conspiracies, which are called amulets. In the Kharkov province, the people believe in the power of these amulets so much that they do not consider it necessary for them to be pronounced by a healer: anyone who plays the role of a friend at a wedding can also read them.

In Ukraine, two genera of wolkolaks are distinguished. The wolves, transformed from ordinary people, seem to be creatures not malicious, but suffering, unhappy, deserving complete compassion: they live in dens, prowl through the forests, howl like a wolf, but retain human meaning. Volkolak, who transform voluntarily, especially sorcerers and witches, do not experience any suffering, use the transformation for their own purposes; prowling wolves at night, by dawn they again take on a human form. In this distinction, two facts stand out very clearly, to which such widespread beliefs in the wolf can be reduced.

Suffering wolves are representatives of a special type of insanity, in which the sick imagine that they have been turned or can turn into wolves. This disease, known as lycanthropy, was widespread in Europe in the Middle Ages; patients of this kind are still found in Russian villages; a similar disease is known in Abyssinia and Assam, only there the role of the wolf is played by a hyena and a tiger.

In the beliefs about malevolent wolves, echoes of mystical ideas are visible, in which the wolf is the personification of the hostile forces of nature. South Slavic beliefs connect the wolf with a ghoul (vampire). According to the beliefs of the South Slavs, the wolf leads hunger, sucks blood from people and dogs; sometimes he takes the form of a handsome guy and forces the young widow to enter into a marriage with him, and the fruit of this connection is children, who, as a rule, do not have bones. Every person who, during his lifetime, was in friendly relations with veshtits (witches), or evil pitchforks, or devils and who died without repentance, becomes a wolf after death: a certain devil spirit, entering the body of a dead man, animates him and forces him to cause all kinds of misfortune to a person. However, the fate of a wolf sometimes awaits virtuous people in the afterlife. This happens when a cat, dog or chicken runs across the deceased, while he is lying on the table. Therefore, the southern Slavs drive these animals out of their homes for the entire time the deceased is there. Children born from the marriage relationship of a wolf with a woman, as well as people who have incurred the anger and vengeance of a sorcerer or witch, also turn into a wolf. Then at night an evil spirit with a wolf's skin appears to them and orders them to put it on; after that they begin to prowl wolves at night, and at dawn, having taken off their wolf's skin, they again take on a human form.

Volkolak images

A person who is destined to become a wolf cannot be distinguished by good qualities during his life: evil forces control all his actions, teach him witchcraft and generally seduce him from the path of truth. He is usually cunning, powerful, remarkably ugly and very happy in all his deeds and undertakings; he dies instantly. Folk fantasy paints the image of a wolf with bright colors: a yellowish face, pitted with deep wrinkles; tousled hair standing on end; red, bloodshot eyes; hands covered with blood to the elbows; iron teeth - pitch black; bluish mustache and saggy skin on the body - this is the appearance of the wolf. But when he leaves the dark grave at night, he either turns into a bat, or takes a human form, retaining only his iron teeth. However, after the first rooster, he hurries to return to his grave. To get rid of the visits of the wolf, he must be killed in his own grave with a hawthorn stake. But the difficulty in doing this is how to find the wolf's grave. In most cases, the inhabitants of the area in which, thanks to the visits of the wolf, a strong mortality appeared, take a young stallion and go with him to the cemetery, where they force him to go from grave to grave until they notice that the stallion begins to back away from any grave, jump to the side and show signs of fear. This means that something terrible is hidden in the grave. The villagers quickly approach this grave, surrounding it from all sides, dig it up, and if they notice that the body of the dead man has not yet decayed, despite the fact that he has long been buried, or if the dead man has an appearance characteristic of a wolf, then turn it over a hawthorn stake is driven in between the shoulders. The villagers are in a hurry to burn both the corpse of the wolf and the stake with which he was killed.

There is an opinion that this is how the ancient Slavs encrypted thieves in fairy tales. According to the description, the "wolf" is very similar to modern thieves. In those old days, the best lair of a thief was a cemetery, and more specifically, a dugout disguised as a grave. It was dangerous for thieves to hide in the woods. To cross the threshold of the sorcerer is to enter the house of the so-called. "Thief in law". He turned you into a "wolf". By day you are a man, by night you are a robber. When the dugout - the "grave" of the thief was found with the help of a horse, for example, and dug up - he pretended to be dead, and for this it is said in the tale: if the corpse has not yet decayed, pierce it with a stake. And to pierce from behind ("supine" in Old Russian) so that the villagers do not understand that they are still killing a person. In addition, the apologists of modern thieves, as well as the thieves themselves, consider themselves wolves. Moreover, thieves today are divided into jackals, those who steal in small ways for vodka or drugs, their people often forgive, and those who receive great benefits. "Wolfs die quickly."