Lubin The Undead WereWolf?

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Lubin The Undead WereWolf?

Post by lycancomplex »

I heard a myth that when a werewolf dies he becomes a lubin,"an undead ghoulish werewolf ''. Does anyone have any information about this myth?
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Re: Lubin The Undead WereWolf?

Post by Vilkacis »

lycancomplex wrote:I heard a myth that when a werewolf dies he becomes a lubin,"an undead ghoulish werewolf ''. Does anyone have any information about this myth?
I can't seem to find much:

The word "lubin" is French and related to "goblin." Lubins (or lupins) are creatures similar to werewolves, but predominately female and not as aggressive as the loup-garou. (Source -- Look under Goblin and Werewolf.)

Another site says they look like wolves and can talk, and agrees that they are shy.

Here's one that's closer to what you described (Source):
People in Normandy believed in lupins or lubins, wolf like beings that talked at night in graveyards in an unknown language.
Another site elaborates (Source):
In Normandy tradition tells of certain fantastic beings known as lupins or lubins. The pass the night chattering together and twattling in an unknown tongue. They take their stand by the walls of country cemeteries, and howl dismally at the moon. Timorous and fearful of man they will flee away scared at a footstep or distant voice. In some districts, however, they are fierce and of the werewolf race, since they are said to scratch up the graves with their hands, and gnaw the poor dead bones."
Here's a slightly different take:
Felix Liebrecht speaks of the ways of certain ghostly werewolves, the "Lubins," that haunted medieval Normandy. These timid ghosts hunted in a pack, but to little point, for instead of turning on the intruder, they would disperse at the slightest noise, howling: "Robert est mort, Robert est mort." [n8 Liebrecht, Zur Volkskunde, p. 257n.].
(There's a little bit more information about it if you look at the page where I got that.)


Anyway, they don't all agree, but that's all I could find. If you're serious about this, I would suggest looking further into this Felix Liebrecht.

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Post by lycancomplex »

What about the myth that when a werewolf dies he becomes a undead werewolf? THE LUBIN :?
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Post by Jamie »

The idea that lubins are aggressive, or that they are undead, is entirely the result of faulty research on the part of writers, as far as I can tell. Every time I've checked sources on that stuff, I've come across the same source material just quoted, about shy, prodominently female werewolves with their own secret language who like to gather in graveyards.
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Post by lycancomplex »

Is there proof that lubin were usually female.
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Post by Jamie »

lycancomplex wrote:Is there proof that lubin were usually female.
In folklore, there is no such thing as proof, there are only general trends that are seen in the authentic beliefs of people belonging to this culture or that culture. There are always individuals within a culture who hold beliefs that buck the trends, and there are always different beliefs that can be found if you focus on a different village, region, nation or continent.
I'm getting my information about lubins from books like "The Werewolf" by Montague Summers. Most other books I've examined seem to go back to Summers as the source, and Summers references a 19th-century book written in French that has an entire chapter written about lupins/lubins. And, yes, when the longer quotes are included, it does generally mention that lubins are usually thought of as female. This goes along with oldtime European views of meek females, so I guess that might be the ultimate source of such beliefs. But as to proof, it really has no place in folklore except as to separating fakelore (beliefs made up by the researcher) from genuinely held beliefs.
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Post by Kavik »

lycancomplex wrote:What about the myth that when a werewolf dies he becomes a undead werewolf? THE LUBIN :?
I recall hearing / reading that when a werewolf dies it will almost always rise again as a vampire, but this is the first suggestion I've heard connecting the idea with the Lubin.
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Post by dnl »

I think that came from the move Draculer. There are no legands I have read that talk about it.
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Post by Scott Gardener »

I've read the werewolf dying becoming a vampire bit myself. I can't quote the sources, as it's been a few years, but it was more than one, so I've generally considered it legitimate.

There's also the Eastern European Vlkolak, which is kind of a bit of both. There's enough overlap there that Dracula in Bram Stoker's original novel has some werewolf qualities, like convergent eyebrows and hair on his palms.
Taking a Gestalt approach, since it's the "in" thing...
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Post by Kavik »

dnl wrote:I think that came from the move Draculer. There are no legands I have read that talk about it.
Well, the only books I have in front of me are Brad Steiger's (flawed) The Werewolf Book and Brian J Frost's The Essential Guide to Werewolf Literature. Both discuss the idea of the Greek Vrykolakas, which is a term used for both a vampire and a werewolf. Further, Frost's book, on page 14 states "Even then the werewolf's reign of terror may not be over; in some parts of Eastern Europe it is believed that a man who has been a werewolf in his life becomes a vampire after death." He goes on to note that Wilhelm Hertz' scholarly 1862 work Der Werwolf sites a German legend that a werewolf, upon burial, will revove, devour its own flesh, and rise from the grave to suck the blood out of cattle and humans to satisfy its hunger.
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Post by Jamie »

Kavik wrote:
dnl wrote:I think that came from the move Draculer. There are no legands I have read that talk about it.
Well, the only books I have in front of me are Brad Steiger's (flawed) The Werewolf Book and Brian J Frost's The Essential Guide to Werewolf Literature. Both discuss the idea of the Greek Vrykolakas, which is a term used for both a vampire and a werewolf. Further, Frost's book, on page 14 states "Even then the werewolf's reign of terror may not be over; in some parts of Eastern Europe it is believed that a man who has been a werewolf in his life becomes a vampire after death." He goes on to note that Wilhelm Hertz' scholarly 1862 work Der Werwolf sites a German legend that a werewolf, upon burial, will revove, devour its own flesh, and rise from the grave to suck the blood out of cattle and humans to satisfy its hunger.
Steiger's book is quite flawed. Just try looking up the entries that refer to werewolf bites. He has one entry saying that folklore werewolves do create more werewolves through bites, while a different entry explained that they do not and why people mistakenly have often passed on this piece of fakelore. When a book contradicts itself, you know it's trouble.
If I remember right, the Greek Vrykolakas literally translates as "werewolf" but is not applied to werewolves despite its entymology. Scolars think that it was once the word for werewolf, but was applied to vampires when werewolves began being referred to by other names.
I'm going by memory here, I might be thinking of a different word. I've seen better explanations in vampire books than in werewolf books. I'm thinking that "Werewolf and Vampire in Romania" by Harry Senn may have a bit about this. It certainly has a lot of information about werewolves and vampires in eastern Europe in general, not just in Romania.
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Post by Kavik »

Jamie wrote:Steiger's book is quite flawed. Just try looking up the entries that refer to werewolf bites. He has one entry saying that folklore werewolves do create more werewolves through bites, while a different entry explained that they do not and why people mistakenly have often passed on this piece of fakelore. When a book contradicts itself, you know it's trouble.
If I remember right, the Greek Vrykolakas literally translates as "werewolf" but is not applied to werewolves despite its entymology. Scolars think that it was once the word for werewolf, but was applied to vampires when werewolves began being referred to by other names.
I'm going by memory here, I might be thinking of a different word. I've seen better explanations in vampire books than in werewolf books. I'm thinking that "Werewolf and Vampire in Romania" by Harry Senn may have a bit about this. It certainly has a lot of information about werewolves and vampires in eastern Europe in general, not just in Romania.
Oh, I know Steiger's book is messed up, but the sheer volume of info in it that I haven't found elsewhere made it worth getting (yes, I realize that buying a book for data which is suspect is bad logic and encourages the publishers to spew out more inaccurate books; sometimes I just gotta buy the werewolf stuff to encourage publishers to spew out more werewolf stuff). Frost is much better, and has at least two books on the subject.

I'm not familiar with Harry Senn. He wrote a book titled "Werewolf and Vampire in Romania" that doesn't talk about Romanian werewolves and vampires?
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Post by Jamie »

Kavik wrote:
Jamie wrote:Steiger's book is quite flawed. Just try looking up the entries that refer to werewolf bites. He has one entry saying that folklore werewolves do create more werewolves through bites, while a different entry explained that they do not and why people mistakenly have often passed on this piece of fakelore. When a book contradicts itself, you know it's trouble.
If I remember right, the Greek Vrykolakas literally translates as "werewolf" but is not applied to werewolves despite its entymology. Scolars think that it was once the word for werewolf, but was applied to vampires when werewolves began being referred to by other names.
I'm going by memory here, I might be thinking of a different word. I've seen better explanations in vampire books than in werewolf books. I'm thinking that "Werewolf and Vampire in Romania" by Harry Senn may have a bit about this. It certainly has a lot of information about werewolves and vampires in eastern Europe in general, not just in Romania.
Oh, I know Steiger's book is messed up, but the sheer volume of info in it that I haven't found elsewhere made it worth getting (yes, I realize that buying a book for data which is suspect is bad logic and encourages the publishers to spew out more inaccurate books; sometimes I just gotta buy the werewolf stuff to encourage publishers to spew out more werewolf stuff). Frost is much better, and has at least two books on the subject.

I'm not familiar with Harry Senn. He wrote a book titled "Werewolf and Vampire in Romania" that doesn't talk about Romanian werewolves and vampires?
:grinp:
The Harry Senn book does talk about Romanian werewolves and vampires, but it also talks about other werewolf and vampire beliefs, and about Eastern European folklore in general (including even a bit about dragons and fairies). I remember that this book had a whole bunch of stuff about the relationship between the folkloric werewolf and the folkloric vampire, and that it was extremely scholarly, well-researched and one of the most accurate pieces of werewolf nonfiction I've read. Therefore, I believe there's a good chance that the werewolf/vampire entymology question is resolved, or at least discussed, within it. It is an exceptionally rare book that usually costs about $70 on those rare times that it is available. Interlibrary loan is your best bet.

As to Steiger, I must plead guilty to buying a copy too. I'm ashamed of myself, but there it is. The book makes me mad as heck sometimes, but it does have enough information to be (barely) worth the price for a werewolf research fanatic like myself.
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Post by Kavik »

Jamie wrote:The Harry Senn book does talk about Romanian werewolves and vampires, but it also talks about other werewolf and vampire beliefs, and about Eastern European folklore in general (including even a bit about dragons and fairies). I remember that this book had a whole bunch of stuff about the relationship between the folkloric werewolf and the folkloric vampire, and that it was extremely scholarly, well-researched and one of the most accurate pieces of werewolf nonfiction I've read. Therefore, I believe there's a good chance that the werewolf/vampire entymology question is resolved, or at least discussed, within it. It is an exceptionally rare book that usually costs about $70 on those rare times that it is available. Interlibrary loan is your best bet.

As to Steiger, I must plead guilty to buying a copy too. I'm ashamed of myself, but there it is. The book makes me mad as heck sometimes, but it does have enough information to be (barely) worth the price for a werewolf research fanatic like myself.
The best thing about Steiger's book is the timeline, which he stole most of from Adam Douglas' The Beast Within. :P

Harry Senn's book is a source for Jamie Hall's Half Human / Half Animal, which I found pretty useful (even though its werewolf section is all-too brief). I may have to seek it out myself, as I'm not overly fond of Interlibrary Loans (I usually only get a week, non-renewable, with the book, and for my purposes I prefer more regular access, being a therianthropologist and all that).
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Post by Jamie »

Kavik wrote:
Jamie wrote:The Harry Senn book does talk about Romanian werewolves and vampires, but it also talks about other werewolf and vampire beliefs, and about Eastern European folklore in general (including even a bit about dragons and fairies). I remember that this book had a whole bunch of stuff about the relationship between the folkloric werewolf and the folkloric vampire, and that it was extremely scholarly, well-researched and one of the most accurate pieces of werewolf nonfiction I've read. Therefore, I believe there's a good chance that the werewolf/vampire entymology question is resolved, or at least discussed, within it. It is an exceptionally rare book that usually costs about $70 on those rare times that it is available. Interlibrary loan is your best bet.

As to Steiger, I must plead guilty to buying a copy too. I'm ashamed of myself, but there it is. The book makes me mad as heck sometimes, but it does have enough information to be (barely) worth the price for a werewolf research fanatic like myself.
The best thing about Steiger's book is the timeline, which he stole most of from Adam Douglas' The Beast Within. :P

Harry Senn's book is a source for Jamie Hall's Half Human / Half Animal, which I found pretty useful (even though its werewolf section is all-too brief). I may have to seek it out myself, as I'm not overly fond of Interlibrary Loans (I usually only get a week, non-renewable, with the book, and for my purposes I prefer more regular access, being a therianthropologist and all that).
Actually, I wasn't able to afford a copy of the Harry Senn book, but needed to own one, so I finally photocopied the whole book. At 5 cents a page it was economical in comparison to the really expensive market price, and it was legal too (according to copyright law, researchers may photocopy ONE copy of anything, if they only use it for research purposes and don't share it with others; without said exception, I'd be pretty bad off, because some books I need to refer to again and again, and they are so rare they are super-expensive, or even not available at any price).
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Post by Kavik »

Jamie wrote:Actually, I wasn't able to afford a copy of the Harry Senn book, but needed to own one, so I finally photocopied the whole book. At 5 cents a page it was economical in comparison to the really expensive market price, and it was legal too (according to copyright law, researchers may photocopy ONE copy of anything, if they only use it for research purposes and don't share it with others; without said exception, I'd be pretty bad off, because some books I need to refer to again and again, and they are so rare they are super-expensive, or even not available at any price).
I've done that a few times, mostly back in college. The only thing I've photocopied for werewolf research purposes was Alexandre Dumas' The Wolf Leader (hasn't been published in English in 50 years) ... which I used InterLibrary Loan to acquire.
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