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Rhuen wrote:However this is not to say I know little of the center countries, I know a great deal regarding the nordic influenced lore as well as those spread during the Roman Empire. But little on things other than late christian era in regards to werewolves "all I could find on the subject were court cases really, all of which can be seen as false accusations, or caused by some sort of madness"

Professional folklorists see a big gap between werewolf trial records and werewolf folklore. Unfortunately, comparatively little of the werewolf folklore has made it into books that are devoted to werewolf legends, partly because no comprehensive work written by a professional folklorist has ever been devoted to werewolves ("In Search of the Swan Maiden" by Barbara Fass Leavy is devoted to all kinds of animal shapeshifters, with most of the shapeshifters being female because she wants to interpret it as a gender studies thing; "Were-Wolf and Vampire in Romania" by Harry A. Senn is professional but not comprehensive, because its scope is regional and because it spends more than half of its short length discussing vampires, dragons, fairies or other non-werewolves; and nearly every other book was written by authors with little or no training in folklore studies).
This means that, if you want to read many werewolf folktales that are not connected to the werewolf trials, you have to get a book on, say, Polish folktales and find the one little werewolf folktale hidden somewhere in the back, then you need to track down a book on French ghosts and goblins, and maybe you'll be lucky enough to find two werewolf folktales, and so on and so forth.
I must warn you, though, most werewolf folktales have little detail and are kind of nonsensical; they are not like the werewolf trial records, which are detailed and combine statements from multiple actual people.

Rhuen wrote: on the fairies thing, christian influence is a pain to get past in such things. They even made up some sillyness about Pixies being the souls of lost pagans who refused to convert to christianity.
They even diminished their power from grand almost god like beings of nature to minor imp like fiends.

This happens constantly in folklore, and is not limited to Christianity, or even to religions. Any change in society's outlook will generally change the interpretation given to mythic creatures and phenomena. This is not to say that the new interpretations always stick or that they are accepted by everyone, or that a bunch of competing Christianized explanations don't appear - because all these processes occur also. When Japan changed from Shinto to Buddhism (yes, I realize that Shinto is still the official religion and now lives in harmony with Buddhism, but most scholars consider it a shadow of its former self, as it was severly changed in the encounter of the two religions and had to absorb a lot of Buddhist ideas to survive), many of the interpretations of the legends changed. This also happened when ancient Persia changed from paganism to Zoroastrianism (this was long before Islam). All the old gods were reinterpreted, along with much of mythology (however, later some of the demonized gods were rehabilitated and accepted back into the Zoroastrian religion).
You can also see this process in work today, even on this very board. When people want to believe (or hypothetically believe) in folkloric creatures, they first try to reconcile them to science, the current dominant paradigm. Today, if people can't reconcile a mythical creature with science to their satisfaction, they are more than likely to discard the idea that said creature might be real.
It is also probably wrong to think of the "original" (for example, in Europe, pre-Christian) version as the one true correct version (though it may very well be closer to the original ideas that spawned such creature). Why? Because there is a strong liklihood that the earliest version we know of was also a product of its times, and may have been considerably changed from an even earlier version that was interpreted under yet another paradigm.

I guess if it had a thick tongue...but I don't really like my wolves to talk in the things I write. Sometimes I do, I guess, but other times the Gestalt form communicates with canine language or thought speech.

(I have little regard for science in my books...just enough for it to be interesting, but thought speech is just so cool! )

I can talk when I'm in wolf form but I guess nobody understands it lol

right....

Amarok wrote:I can talk when I'm in wolf form but I guess nobody understands it lol

neoritter wrote:You sound like your personally hurt by all that. Anyway, saying their fiction is actually worse than saying they're the minions of Satan. Because the former takes anyway any power that the old gods, or demons in older Christian terms have, while the latter acknowledges their existance and at the same time gives them some level of power of man. I don't find it hypocritical or contradicting to change gears I call it smart religion making. What better way to prevent people from worshipping other gods then by saying they aren't real.

Christianity isn't the only religion to really do this either. Its kind of a common theme to denounce gods of an opposing religion, either by making them fictional or by making them into demigods with very little power.

Don't point the finger at a religion when its human condition.

Me and religions don't get along. Good intentions turned to dark practices.
Some higher power talks to one guy to help him get his life turned around out of the kindness of its heart and suddenly he goes and tells his buddies and they all like the idea, so start to add their own stuff to what the higher power said, and eventually someone uses it to control those of like beliefs, twists them and goes on a domination campaign and many many generations latter the lies survive and helpful teachings mostly die out.
So many atrocities, lies, and twisted goods to form horrible evils. and all because some higher power felt sorry for one stupid little guy lost in the desert. (one out of many views of religions in my twisted book or theological outlooks)


But enough on those weird ideas.
its common practice, out with the old in with the new. One of the good things of a polytheist system was that it would tend to combine local and tribal gods into the state gods or incorporate them in some way, usually as lower gods than the state god.
A few angels made the list from old gods "mostly as fallen angels and demons though"
it makes it hard to look up data on old gods when they keep being covered up. Although I have learned that many of the demons in demonology that have no mentions in the Bible are demified versions of old world gods. Like Asmodai.

Lupin wrote:

Amarok wrote:I can talk when I'm in wolf form but I guess nobody understands it lol

ANEURYSM

Rhuen wrote: Me and religions don't get along. Good intentions turned to dark practices.
Some higher power talks to one guy to help him get his life turned around out of the kindness of its heart and suddenly he goes and tells his buddies and they all like the idea, so start to add their own stuff to what the higher power said, and eventually someone uses it to control those of like beliefs, twists them and goes on a domination campaign and many many generations latter the lies survive and helpful teachings mostly die out.
So many atrocities, lies, and twisted goods to form horrible evils. and all because some higher power felt sorry for one stupid little guy lost in the desert. (one out of many views of religions in my twisted book or theological outlooks)

Thats sorta how it works. But you've extended the blame a little too far back. Now was it wrong for some higher power to help the guy out? No. Was it wrong for the guy to try and help his friend? No. It begins to become wrong when they add their own stuff. The real evil is occuring in later stages. You can't blame God or gods for it really. Neither can you blame religion. I like to think religion is like a sword. You can protect people with it but you can also do some pretty evil things with it. Now is the sword evil? No. The person that wields the sword is the source of the good or evil that it does. Same with religion.

But enough on those weird ideas.
its common practice, out with the old in with the new. One of the good things of a polytheist system was that it would tend to combine local and tribal gods into the state gods or incorporate them in some way, usually as lower gods than the state god.
A few angels made the list from old gods "mostly as fallen angels and demons though"
it makes it hard to look up data on old gods when they keep being covered up. Although I have learned that many of the demons in demonology that have no mentions in the Bible are demified versions of old world gods. Like Asmodai.

Now, the Bible isn't there to teach about demons and devils. Its a moral guide to living so to speak. The Koran is not the only book you look to if you want to learn about the religion. You need to read the supporting material. Same with the Bible. The Bible is not the end all of Christian myth or truth if you are Christian (truthfulness is not the issue here). When it comes to religion I prefer established hierarchy so that learned theologists or scholars can comment on whats wrong or not. I feel there's less chance of perversion. But, as we can see with the early Catholic church, there are abuses. We're all human. The guy who wrote the Bible was human. Same with every religious author. God may be infallible. But humans are not.

I do not blame any god for its best intentions or the best intentions of the people it/they have tried to guide. Its their descendents who twisted the teachings and those who refuse to let the stories just be stories and listen only to the good intentions that I blame.

"but this is all WAY off topic"

Anywho back to how werewolves could talk.

Yes, Please. Let's put this religious discussion aside for now. Such topics need to be handled very carefully, and preferably not as off topic distractions.
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Hmm...I'm suprised I have not been more involved in this topic.

I prefer that werewolves don't speak when they have a canine muzzle, (due to the logical difficulties in doing so) but rather would resort to using body language and rudimentary vocal signals instead...perhaps venturing an attempt at single words or simple phrases under specific situations, though allways sounding very difficult to understand, and attempted very, very rarely, if ever.

It emphisises the "Man trapped within the beast" vibe, and it just makes alot more sense to me.


On the other hand, when it is not neccesary for the characters abilities to make sense (such as in cartoons, comic books and mystical/fantastical settings), I don't mind so much for them to retain that ability, even in full wolf form. It's just when I'm meant to take it seriously that it feels out of place to hear them speak, IMHO.


I have a difficult time trying to imagine what it would sound like to try to speak with a wolves voicebox and mouth. I'd think it would sound either squeaky/whiny, growly, or whispery (basicly, like a dog trying to speak)...anything but elequent and clear really... especially since I don't think canines can properly form the "Mmm" sound with thier lips. "Nnnn" I think might sound more like "NGH" and sharp "K" sounds might not be possible without *coughing* them out.


Overall, if speaking from a biological perspective primarily, I doubt that the ability to speak human tongue would have been a critical enough survival need, or had enough time to have have evolved into the lycanthope genome by now.
(Considering how young human language is compared to the age of either wolf or human species)

...of course...when talking about hybrid "Gestalt" forms, I suppose thier speaking capacity would vary greatly depending on how much WOLF and how much HUMAN is in the form trying to speak.

"WolfMan"/"TeenWolf" werewolves could speak quite clearly I would think, while Werewolves with heads that look like the werwolves in "VanHelsing" would have great difficulty making any sounds other than what one would normally hear from a very large canine.

I agree. The more wolf the werewolf is, the more whining, choking sounds would come out instead of words.
The werewolf could probably talk if it absolutely needed to (1 or 2 words), but there would not be too much need to put that much effort into forming words unless in a dire situation.

(They'd probably bite their tounges trying to speak too. Ouch...)

I like the idea of talking werewolves. Hearing a werewolf say something would probably help others see that the human element is still present and thus shed a bit of the mindless, slobbering killing machine image (wow, that's a lot of adjectives).
This could make a "good" werewolf character easier to accept and relate to; on the other hand, a talking werewolf antagonist may appear that much more twisted and evil, because we all know what atrocities even simple men are capable of.

Considering the thought that a werewolf would speak through the use of body language and such, would this be a language that would be picked up instinctively as another aspect of the transformation, or would it be something that must be learned? I've always wondered that.

CrewWolf wrote:Considering the thought that a werewolf would speak through the use of body language and such, would this be a language that would be picked up instinctively as another aspect of the transformation, or would it be something that must be learned? I've always wondered that.

well a dog raised alone can somehow automatically comunicate with other dogs even if it never saw one for the first few years of its life. I would it may be instinctive on that level of communication.

IMO, werewolves should be able to speak. Certainly not eloquently, but with lots and lots of practice an experienced werewolf should be able to make some rudimentary conversation in gestalt form. After all, several people have already pointed out the talking dogs example. So evidently, canine muzzles can form sounds that sound like human words (maybe not all consonant sounds, but a lot of them anyway). Combine that ability with human intelligence (general consensus around here is that werewolves maintain their human minds in their gestalt and wolf forms, though it does come with a crapload of new instincts) and you have a creature that can learn to talk...albeit very badly.

Most likely, humans who are listening to two gestalt werewolves talk wouldn't be able to understand it. But since the two werewolves would be accompanying their rough speech with gestures and body language and they could also take into account context clues if certain words are a little hard to make out, they would at least be able to understand each other.

I find the idea of talking werewolves decent in real life, but crappy in a movie. (Unless of course, such a werewolf movie is not aiming for a serious style)
I'd say it'd be really hard to incorporate werewolf dialog in a movie without fudging its serious style.

But if you were a werewolf and you HAD to talk to someone, albeit with a human, chances are, if you knew how to move your mouth and tongue correctly, you'd speak. Screw movie style.

Well it depends.. if the werewolf will remember being human, have conscious thoughts- not just a mindless beast. If the werewolf can remember being human while transformed then it should be possible that they can speak.. however with the extended muzzle and various other factors I would have to wonder how. Although since the werewolf is part human, then they retain the basic human shape.. it should be possible for them to speak because they would still have their voice box

KitWolf wrote:Well it depends.. if the werewolf will remember being human, have conscious thoughts- not just a mindless beast. If the werewolf can remember being human while transformed then it should be possible that they can speak.. however with the extended muzzle and various other factors I would have to wonder how. Although since the werewolf is part human, then they retain the basic human shape.. it should be possible for them to speak because they would still have their voice box

Once again, I am inclined to agree with KitWolf, more or less.

I definitely think that Werewolves (except in "Mindless beast" stories) would remember how to speak while in Gestalt or Full wolf form. I never considered it something that they would temporarily forget how to do or anything like that.

My primary reason for usually thinking that they cant is the shape of the head and mouth. I think it would come out sounding so garbled, and be so difficult to annunciate anything clearly, that most simply would not bother trying in those forms, but use other forms of communication instead, such as rudimentary body language and wordless vocal signals. Never underestimate how much you can say to someone else with just the look in your eyes, a nod of your head, a shrug of your shoulders and a pointing finger or other simple hand motions. Add in the emotional indicators in wolfish ears and a tail and a werewolf could easily master wordless conversation without even having to learn anything they don't already know.

...but talking werewolves also somehow just seems silly to me. It demystifies it quite a bit when they become less like beasts and more like regular humans in Wolves skin. ...even when sometimes that might be exactly what they are underneath. If they start talking, suddenly they feel more like Anthropomorphic cartoon characters rather than Werewolves.

IMHO

As long as the lycanthrope is able to say the letters L, T, R, M, Z, etc etc, a language school for lycanthropes is fine too. It'd be like riding a bike -- unless there's a mental handicap to hinder the learning part.

I think Werewolves in Gestalt form should not be able to form coherent sentences

A few words here or there with practice, but if not it's all wolf language and body language

Laters

Faolan Bloodtooth wrote:I think Werewolves in Gestalt form should not be able to form coherent sentences

A few words here or there with practice, but if not it's all wolf language and body language

Laters

I wouldn't be too keen if there was some sort of "alien" language that lycanthropes have to speak with. Mainly because i think "This isn't a bloody Tolkienian Elvish language program, for pete's sake!". If compatibility is the issue and one sees potential solutions, then don't make something anew, and make it more compatible instead.

（･∀･)つ⑩ <( IMPROVISE!! )

Yes werewolves would be able to talk. Just because the body has changed to a new form that would not take away it's speak. The vocal cords would change too, but it would more likely make the voice deeper an more rough for both male an female werewolves.. Imho of course

ABrownrigg wrote:My question about talking is this... why would they want to? I mean in werewolf form.. Why would they want to communiate like a human.. when they can have their own language that normal humans can't understand.... and why would a werewolf want to 'talk' to a human anyway.. if it were another werewolf in human form, tthen they could understand them anyway. Seems like even if they 'could' have a rudimentary speech.. it would be a strain on their throats.

I don't know how old this post is, but if this hasn't been responded to yet, I think it deserves to be.

The biggest problem with a werewolf language is that, to the best of my knowledge, there isn't one. The pack would have to create their own language, and frankly, I think creating an entirely new language that would require a completely different set of mouth parts and vocal chords would be harder than trying to speak English.

First of all, creating a new language to be spoken with human parts is difficult and time-consuming enough as is, and the people that do that earn a living at it. A small group of people with day jobs and the burden of being monsters in a media-frenzied society would never have that kind of time on their hands. The only way I could picture a werewolf in the Freeborn situation making their own language would be by making it up as they go, and that would lead to more problems than it would fix.

Werewolf 1: "Bark bark-yip bark snarl arroo-o-o-o."
Werewolf 2: "What's that mean?"
Werewolf 1: "Please pass the mustard."
Werewolf 2: "And why the hell would I ever need to say that in were form?"

Second, since the werewolf language can only be spoken with a set of werewolf parts, and the language we do all our thinking in is spoken with human parts, if he wanted to teach the other pack the language, he'd need to either shift in and out repeatedly, or learn to speak English in his were form anyway.

Werewolf 1: "Bark bark-yip bark snarl arroo-o-o-o."
Werewolf 2: "What's that mean?"
Werewolf 1: "Pthllourr pthss blth mrruthturrrd."

A pack like the pack in Freeborn would never have the time or patience required to create and teach their own language. The only alternative I could think of would be if they designated barks and yips as code for coordinating hunts, fights etc. (anything where they needed to work together but couldn't just shift out and talk it over). Sort of like what they do in football, only instead of the quarterback yelling "Green 61!" to coordinate the rest of the team that already knows the corresponding routine, it would be the alpha going "yip-yip-arou" and the rest of the pack responding to it.

If Were's talk, my suspicion is that they'd use a sort of pidgin-english language, with a lot of gesturing to refine the subject.
OR- They'd talk just like everybody else: provided they retained the human raised palate. As to the labials and fricatives, there are other mouth parts that could be employed to get the approximate sound across.
The Wolf's voice box, relative in size to the human's voice box; is longer, and the vocal cords are longer as well: so their voices would deepen in Gestalt form.
They might be liable to spraying their words more than saying them: reference Sylvester the cat in cartoons...
They'd probably be able to understand each other, simply on the basis of familiarity. Humans would have a bit of listening to do to get the clearest sense of the words.
IMHO....
And Werewolves having to Pantomime their communications is just plain funny...

I figure werewolves trying to talk in wolf form might nickname their accidental language either "lycanthropese" or "Okami-speak," in reference to the muttering the characters in the wolf-based video game "Okami" make while text appears as subtitles.