[Were-wolves in the Egyptian Sudan.]
In Sennar, a province of the Egyptian Sudan, the Hammeg and Fungi enjoy the reputation of being powerful magicians who can turn themselves into hyaenas and in that guise scour the country at night, howling and gorging themselves. But by day they are men again. It is very dangerous to shoot at such human hyaenas by night. On the Jebel Bela mountain a soldier once shot at a hyaena and hit it, but it dragged itself off, bleeding, in the darkness and escaped. Next morning he followed up the trail of blood and it led him straight to the hut of a man who was everywhere known for a wizard. Nothing of the hyaena was to be seen, but the man himself was laid up in the house with a fresh wound and died soon afterwards. And the soldier did not long survive him.[766]
[The were-wolf story in Petronius.]
But the classical example of these stories is an old Roman tale told by Petronius. It is put in the mouth of one Niceros. Late at night he left the town to visit a friend of his, a widow, who lived at a farm five miles down the road. He was accompanied by a soldier, who lodged in the same house, a man of Herculean build. When they set out it was near dawn, but the moon shone as bright as day. Passing through the outskirts of the town, they came amongst the tombs, which lined the highroad for some distance. There the soldier made an excuse for retiring behind a monument, and Niceros sat down to wait for him, humming a tune and counting the tombstones to pass the time. In a little he looked round for his companion, and saw a sight which froze him with horror. The soldier had stripped off his clothes to the last rag and laid them at the side of the highway. Then he performed a certain ceremony over them, and immediately was changed into a wolf, and ran howling into the forest. When Niceros had recovered himself a little, he went to pick up the clothes, but found that they were turned to stone. More dead than alive, he drew his sword, and, striking at every shadow cast by the tombstones on the moonlit road, he tottered to his friend's house. He entered it like a ghost, to the surprise of the widow, who wondered to see him abroad so late. "If you had only been here a little ago," said she, "you might have been of some use. For a wolf came tearing into the yard, scaring the cattle and bleeding them like a butcher. But he did not get off so easily, for the servant speared him in the neck." After hearing these words, Niceros felt that he could not close an eye, so he hurried away home again. It was now broad daylight, but when he came to the place where the clothes had been turned to stone, he found only a pool of blood. He reached home, and there lay the soldier in bed like an ox in the shambles, and the doctor was bandaging his neck. "Then I knew," said Niceros, "that the man was a were-wolf, and never again could I break bread with him, no, not if you had killed me for it."[767]
[Witches like were-wolves can temporarily transform themselves into animals.]
These stories may help us to understand the custom of burning a bewitched animal, which has been observed in our own country down to recent times, if indeed it is even now extinct. For a close parallel may be traced in some respects between witches and were-wolves. Like were-wolves, witches are commonly supposed to be able to transform themselves temporarily into animals for the purpose of playing their mischievous pranks;[768] and like were-wolves they can in their animal disguise be compelled to unmask themselves to any one who succeeds in drawing their blood. In either case the animal-skin is conceived as a cloak thrown round the wicked enchanter; and if you can only pierce the skin, whether by the stab of a knife or the shot of a gun, you so rend the disguise that the man or woman inside of it stands revealed in his or her true colours. Strictly speaking, the stab should be given on the brow or between the eyes in the case both of a witch and of a were-wolf;[769] and it is vain to shoot at a were-wolf unless you have had the bullet blessed in a chapel of St. Hubert or happen to be carrying about you, without knowing it, a four-leaved clover; otherwise the bullet will merely rebound from the were-wolf like water from a duck's back.[770] However, in Armenia they say that the were-wolf, who in that country is usually a woman, can be killed neither by shot nor by steel; the only way of delivering the unhappy woman from her bondage is to get hold of her wolf's skin and burn it; for that naturally prevents her from turning into a wolf again. But it is not easy to find the skin, for she is cunning enough to hide it by day.[771] So with witches, it is not only useless but even dangerous to shoot at one of them when she has turned herself into a hare; if you do, the gun may burst in your hand or the shot come back and kill you. The only way to make quite sure of hitting a witch-animal is to put a silver sixpence or a silver button in your gun.[772] For example, it happened one evening that a native of the island of Tiree was going home with a new gun, when he saw a black sheep running towards him across the plain of Reef. Something about the creature excited his suspicion, so he put a silver sixpence in his gun and fired at it. Instantly the black sheep became a woman with a drugget coat wrapt round her head. The man knew her quite well, for she was a witch who had often persecuted him before in the shape of a cat.[773]