Post by MoMo on Mar 10, 2012 22:53:32 GMT -6
Woodwose-
Grouping: Cryptid
Sub grouping: Hominid
Country: Europe
Region:the UK and Continental Europe
Habitat: Woodlands and Mountains
The Woodwose or hairy wildman of the woods was the Sasquatch figure of pre-Christian Gaul, in Anglo-Saxon a wuduwasa.
Images of woodwoses appear in the carved and painted roof bosses where intersecting ogee vaults meet in the cathedral of Canterbury, in positions where one is also likely to encounter the vegetal Green Man. The Woodwose was a link between civilized humans and the dangerous elf-like spirits of natural woodland, such as Puck. The wildman, pilosus or hairy all over, often armed with a rough club, survived to appear as supporter for heraldic coats-of-arms, especially in Germany (Wilder Mann), well into the 16th century (illustration, below right).
A British example can be found on the coat-of-arms used as the public house sign for the Woodhouse Arms in Corby Glen, Lincolnshire. As this illustrates, various spellings of the word have been used over the centuries, for example woodhouse and wodehouse (pronounced 'wood-house', with the accent on the first syllable, as in the surname of the author P.G. Wodehouse; wodwo, the Middle English version, appears (as 'wodwos', the plural) in the 14th-century poem Sir Gawayne and the Grene Knyght; it was used by poet Ted Hughes as the title of a poem and, in 1967, a volume of his collected works.
King Charles VI of France and five of his courtiers were dressed as woodwoses and chained together for a mascarade at the tragic Bal des Sauvages (later known as the Bal des Ardents) at the Queen Mother's Paris hotel, January 28, 1393. In the midst of the festivities, a stray spark from a torch set their hairy costumes ablaze, burning several courtiers alive; the king's own life was saved through quick action by his aunt, the Duchesse de Berry, who smothered the flames in her cloak.
Woodwose in Christianity-
The woodwose was unsettling to Christian writers. Augustine of Hippo reports the Gaulish name of "Dusii" in City of God XV, ch. 23: "Et quosdam daemones, quos Dusios Galli nuncupant, adsidue hanc immunditiam et efficere, plures talesque adseuerant, ut hoc negare impudentiae uideatur." ...and perhaps the early 7th century encyclopedist Isidore of Seville has picked up Augustine's reference, for his Etymologies book viii:
Pilosi, qui Graece 'panitae', Latine 'incubi' appellantur - hos daemones Galli 'Dusios' nuncupant. Quem autem vulgo 'Incu-bonem' vocant, hunc Romani 'Faunum' dic**t — "Satyrs are they who are called Pans in Greek, Incubus (demon) in Latin, these daemons the Galls call Dusi. What vulgarly are called "Incu-bonem", these the Romans name "*Fauns".
Another variant of the Gaulish Dusi may lurk in the misunderstanding of fauni ficarii "fig Fauns" in Jerome's Vulgate translation of Jeremiah 50:39, describing the coming desolation of Babylon: "Therefore shall dragons dwell there with the fig fauns." Fig fauns exist nowhere except in dictionaries mentioning this passage. Is this a slip of the copyists for Jerome's fauni Sicarii ("fauns of the Sicarii", the ancient tribe of Gauls in Sicily)? Apparently, the King James' Version committee thought so, rendering the passage "Therefore the wild beasts of the desert with the wild beasts of the islands shall dwell there, and the owls shall dwell therein: and it shall be no more inhabited for ever; neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation."
Other early references-
Geoffrey of Monmouth, in his Life of Merlin (ca 1150), describes the agonized mourning of Merlin after a bloody battle, when
"a strange madness came upon him. He crept away and fled to the woods, unwilling that any should see his going. Into the forest he went, glad to lie hidden beneath the ash trees. He watched the wild creatures grazing on the pasture of the glades. Sometimes he would follow them, sometimes pass them in his course. He made use of the roots of plants and of grasses, of fruit from trees and of the blackberries in the thicket. He became a Man of the Woods, as if dedicated to the woods. So for a whole summer he stayed hidden in the woods, discovered by none, forgetful of himself and of his own, lurking like a wild thing."
A woodwose is described in Konungs skuggsjá (Speculum Regale or "the King's Mirror"), written in Norway around 1250:
"It once happened in that country (and this seems indeed strange) that a living creature was caught in the forest as to which no one could say definitely whether it was a man or some other animal; for no one could get a word from it or be sure that it understood human speech. It had the human shape, however, in every detail, both as to hands and face and feet; but the entire body was covered with hair as the beasts are, and down the back it had a long coarse mane like that of a horse, which fell to both sides and trailed along the ground when the creature stooped in walking."
Other Uses-
The term wood-woses or simply "Woses" is used by J.R.R. Tolkien to describe a fictional race of wild men in his stories, called also "Drúedain". According to his legendarium, other men, including the "Rohirrim", mistook the Druedain for goblins or other wood-creatures and referred to them as Pukel-men (Goblin-men).
His fiction might imply that (in his fictional timeline) the 'actual' Druedain of ancient Middle-earth, were the origin of the legendary Woodwoses of more recent folklore.
Both folklorists and cryptozoologists apply the term "wild men" to European woodwoses. "Wild men" has a wider definition than "woodwoses", it is also used for worldwide reports of hair-covered bipeds resembling Bigfoot, but tends to be most often applied to beings that seem more human than ape, or that have strong mythological or supernatural overtones.
Fear Liath-
Am Fear Liath Mòr (Scottish Gaelic pronunciation: [əm fɛɾ ʎiə mɔːɾ]; also known as The Big Grey Man of Ben MacDhui or simply The Greyman) is the name of a presence or creature which is said to haunt the summit and passes of Ben Macdui, the highest peak of the Cairngorms and the second highest peak in Britain. It has been described as an extremely tall figure covered with short hair, or as an unseen presence that causes uneasy feelings in people who climb the mountain. Evidence of the existence of this creature is limited to various sightings and a few photographs of unusual footprints.
It was traditionally seen as a supernatural being, but Am Fear Liath Mòr has been compared to the Yeti of the Himalaya and the Sasquatch or Bigfoot of North America. References to wild 'Greymen' in Scotland and similar creatures elsewhere in Europe, sometimes called Wudewas or 'Wood Men', date back to the 13th century, and are believed by some to represent relict hominids.
In 1925, the noted climber John Norman Collie recounted a terrifying experience he had endured while alone near the summit of Ben MacDhui some 35 years before. "I began to think I heard something else than merely the noise of my own footsteps. For every few steps I took I heard a crunch, and then another crunch as if someone was walking after me but taking steps three or four times the length of my own." Collie was unable to make out the source of the noises because of mist, and continued "... [as] the eerie crunch, crunch, sounded behind me, I was seized with terror and took to my heels, staggering blindly among the boulders for four or five miles." Other climbers have also reported similar experiences, many describing uncontrollable feelings of fear and panic, some actually seeing a huge grey figure behind them, and others only hearing sounds or even succumbing to inexplicable feelings of terror while in the area.
In the Matt Lamy book 100 Strangest Unexplained Mysteries, Lamy notes a sighting in the early 1990s in which three men caught sight of a bipedal creature with an eerie, inhuman, face in a forest near Aberdeen. Several weeks later, whilst driving through the area at night, the creature appeared again and ran alongside their car even at speeds of 45 miles per hour, seemingly trying to enter the vehicle.
Similar panic responses have been reported in many North American Sasquatch encounters, and explanations involving infrasound or pheromones have been advanced. Cryptozoologist Karl Shuker has expressed belief that the creature is the guardian of an inter-dimensional portal in his 1997 book, The Unexplained. However, hallucinations and panic brought on by isolation and exhaustion, or an optical illusion similar to the Brocken spectre, are very plausible explanations for the Big Grey Man legend. A Brocken spectre, or 'glory', can occur in certain atmospheric conditions when the sun is at a particular angle. The subject's shadow can be cast onto low lying clouds around them, creating the illusion of a large shadowy humanoid figure. This is the most commonly advanced theory to explain the reported sightings.
Wulver-
The Galley Trots or Wulvers are a peculiar kind of werewolves in the folklore of the Shetland Islands of Scotland.
Unlike most werewolves, the wulvers are not aggressive if left in peace. The most famous of that species spent most of his time sitting on a rock, still known as 'The Wulver's Stane', fishing, and was reported to have occasionally left fish on the window sills of poor families. The last reported sighting was early in the 20th century.
Their presence was once thought to indicate that valuable items or money was hidden somewhere in the nearby vicinity. There was also again the suspicion that to see a Galley Trot was an omen of approaching death.
Shug Monkey-
The Shug monkey is a cryptid or mythical creature reported from the area of Cambridgeshire between the villages of Balsham and West Wratting. Folklorists and investigators of the supernatural classify it as closely related to British hellhounds such as Barghest and Black Shuck, more distantly related to werewolves and the woodwose. Cryptozoologists classify it as either a cryptid canine or as a cousin of Bigfoot.
The myth is thought to have originated from Norse settlers.
Description-It has features of a dog and monkey. The head and general body build resemble a humanoid more than a canine, but the feet are like a dog and allegedly leave gigantic dog tracks. The stance is usually quadrupedal. Sometimes it is supposed to fade away like a ghost or apparition.