The Beast of Gevaudan

The Beast of Gevaudan

Of all the werewolves in history, the Beast of Gevaudan is perhaps the most intriguing. We can assume from the accounts some creature actually terrorized the people of the French village of Gevaudan from 1764 to 1767. Theories speculate the animal may have been a hyena, a wolf-dog or even a leopard. The number of victims varies depending on the account but it may have been as many as six hundred. French officers were sent to kill it but failed. It was finally shot and killed by a local hunter, Jean Chastel. The carcass was brought to the castle of Marquis d’Apchier, where it was stuffed.

You can see why such a tale would be irresistible to Horror writers. Élie Berthet as earlier as 1858 put it in the novel La Bête du Gévaudan, presenting the beast both as wolf and madman who thinks he is a werewolf. In 1904 Robert Sherard would borrow from Berthet for Wolves: An Old Story Retold. Modern writers like Patricia Briggs and Jim Butcher have tapped into the Gevaudan story for their urban fantasy.

The Beast of Averoigne

Oddly, the Pulp magazines did not use the Gevaudan legend for werewolf tales. The exception in part is Clark Ashton Smith who wrote one story in his Averoigne series about a beast. “The Beast of Averoigne” appeared in Weird Tales, May 1933. This creature is not a werewolf despite the fact that Averoigne is often called “werewolf-haunted”. Averoigne is Smith’s version of Auvergne. His creature is of extraterrestrial origin.

Smith moves his tale back in time to 1369, when a red comet passes the Earth, depositing the beast. The tale is told by Luc le Chaudronnier, an astrologer and sorcerer. Brother Gerome of the Benedictine monastery is the first to encounter the monster. He discovers animals like stag and wolves devoured. Later the beast strikes at the cemetery at Ste. Zenobie, sucking the marrow out of victims’ bones. Later it moves in on the holy brothers and sisters of the abbey. Men-at-arms are called in and fight the beast:

One of the men-at-arms was borne to the ground, and I saw above him, in a floating redness as of ghostly blood, the black and semi-serpentine form of the Beast. A flat and snakish head, without ears or nose, was tearing at the man’s armor with sharp serrate teeth, and I heard the teeth clash and grate on the linked iron…

Le Chaudronnier defeats the monster by crushing a ring that belonged to Eibon and releasing a demon. The beast is defeated and changes:

The body and members of the Beast were loathfully convulsed, and they seemed to melt in the manner of wax and to change dimly and horribly beneath the flame, undergoing an incredible metamorphosis. Moment by moment, like a werewolf that returns from its beasthood, the thing took on the wavering similitude of man. The unclean blackness flowed and swirled, assuming the weft of cloth amid its changes, and becoming the folds of a dark robe and cowl such as are worn by the Benedictines. Then, from the cowl, a face began to peer, and the face, though shadowy and distorted, was that of the abbot Théophile.

The werewolf-like transformation produces a secret villain in the classic werewolf mold.

In the Comics

“The Wise Beast of Gevaudan: A True Story” appeared in Crime Detective Comics #5, November-December 1948. It was written by an unknown author. Despite the “A True Story” the events in this comic don’t tally with the accounts. The wolf is adopted as a pup then goes on a rampage. This comic is available for free at DCM.

Boris Karloff, Tales of Mystery #17, March 1967 had a text story called “The Beast of Auvergne” written by an unknown author. This account is closer to the known facts but adds the element of the beast walking on its hind legs like a man, building on the werewolf aspects of the story.

Brotherhood of the Wolf

Brotherhood of the Wolf is a 2001 French film directed by Christophe Gans. The events at Gevaudan are investigated by Chevalier de Fronsac and Mani of the Iroquois. The Chevalier falls for the beautiful Marianne de Morangias but falls foul of her brother, Jean-Francois. (Remember the brother and sister in Moon of the Wolf? A bit of a hint there.) The plot borrows from history, adds a werewolf element with silver bullets but mostly resembles The Hound of the Baskervilles in that the resolution does not involve the supernatural, only the appearance of such. If you can figure out which character is Stapledon, you will figure this one out too.

Conclusion

The Beast of Gevaudan remains an intriguing mystery. The stuffed carcass of the animal has not survived to the present day so speculation continues as to what it really was. The werewolf myth so easily attaches itself to this incident, making it a required chapter in most books on werewolves. Strangely, S. Baring-Gould did not include it in his The Book of Werewolves (1865). Elliott O’Donnell’s Werwolves (1914) doesn’t either. These were the two primary sources of werewolf lore for many years. That colorful character, Montague Summers, brings it to our attention in a chapter of The Werewolf in Lore and Legend (1933). He mentions The London Magazine‘s  (January, 27, 1765) reporting of the beast. I first came across it in Nancy Garden’s Werewolves (1973) when I was a kid.