All language subtitles for Historys.Greatest.Mysteries.S07E03.1080p.WEB.h264-EDITH_track3_[eng]

[dramatic music]

[screen whooshes]
[wolf howling]

- [Laurence] Tonight,

a legendary monster that
transforms from man to beast

whenever there's a full moon.

- [Andrew] The Werewolf isn't
just a movie monster,

it's one of humanity's
oldest nightmares.

- [Ryan] Is this all
in our head?

Or is this something
that is truly

happening to the public?

- [Lynne] In one town in France,

over 100 people killed.

Young children decapitated
and disemboweled.

- [Ryan] In her dying breaths
she says she was attacked

by something wolf-like,
but not a wolf.

- Now, we explore the top
theory surrounding the werewolf.

- [Troy] That's just not the
behavior of an ordinary wolf.

A wolf would not have
been decapitating people.

- [Andrew] By donning
the animal's skin

you become the animal,

you gain access to its fury.

- [Brian] Could a condition that
makes you froth at the mouth

has you hallucinate and

attack other humans,

get you branded a werewolf?

Certainly won't help.

- [Laurence] Do real
facts lie behind

the enduring stories
of werewolves?

And why is the idea
of this creature

still so powerful today?

[dramatic music]

- [Laurence] The werewolf is
one of our oldest

and most gruesome
monster stories.

At the Full Moon,

a person transforms into
a bloodthirsty beast,

stalking its victims,

then ripping them apart with
razor-sharp teeth and claws.

- The next morning,

the individual awakens
and they've returned

to their true human self

with no memory of what
transpired the night before.

- The werewolf exists in an
interesting place culturally.

Nobody goes out
hunting for werewolves

the way people go ghost hunting,

but it's an incredibly
familiar type of folk character

and we see it often in films,

in books, and comic books,

usually in sort of a real
over the top kind of way.

- [Laurence] But this legend
remains deeply ingrained

in cultures across the globe.

The question is why?

- [Troy] The epic of Gilgamesh

is the oldest form of
literature that exists,

and it includes
a werewolf story.

When the goddess, Ishtar,
[graphics beep]

transforms a former
lover into a wolf

and then allows him to be torn
apart by his own sheep dogs.

- [Andrew] Hundreds of years
later, we get another legend,

this one from ancient Greece.

This is the story
of King Lycaon,

a Greek king who tries to
challenge the authority of Zeus.

He does so by trying to
trick the king of the Gods

into eating a stew that
contains human flesh.

- [Ryan] So Zeus sees this
because he is all powerful and

he goes, "If you're gonna
act like a beast,

then I'm gonna turn
you into a beast."

And then in front of
all of his guests,

he begins to radically transform

[suspenseful music]
into a wolf.

- [Andrew] These early stories
are just that-stories.

Now it's possible
that like all myths,

there may be some
basis, in fact,

but we don't have
any of that evidence.

For evidence of
actual werewolves,

we need to go a little
bit forward in time.

The Medieval France.

- [Laurence] In 1764,
Gevaudan is a quiet,

remote province in
southern France.

380 miles south of Paris,

it's not a place known
for generating much news.

- [Lynne] Overall, a very quiet,
very peaceful place to live.

Until 1764, when suddenly some

really frightening
stuff starts happening.

So the first incident that
takes place is in the summer.

A teenage shepherd is out with
her flock of grazing cattle,

when a monstrous wolf

bursts out of the brush at her.

Now, her bulls
actually protect her.

They charge this animal,
they fend it off,

and she goes back
into town with reports

of this enormous creature.

- [Andrew] What she describes is
unlike any natural phenomenon.

She describes a
wolf-like creature,

but the size of a calf
with a red coat of fur,

and fangs and fiery red eyes.

And then, she utters a phrase

that stokes fears
among the locals.

Like a wolf, yet not a wolf.
[suspenseful music]

Just weeks later, we
have another attack

on another young girl
with her dying breath,

she describes the creature
that attacked her.

Wolf-like but different.

With huge fangs, more teeth
than a regular wolf would have,

and walking on its
hind legs like a man.

- [Ryan] And then they find
a young shepherd boy

who's dead in the hills.

And now people are
starting to think,

"There's something
going on here.

We have a bigger problem
than just wolves."

- [Laurence] Even though the
attacks

are largely taking
place in daylight,

locals believe they're
being perpetrated

by a loup-garou, a werewolf.

They begin to call it
the Beast of Gevaudan.

And the killings are
just getting started.

- [Andrew] What follows are
attacks on more victims.

Individuals out tending
to their flocks.

Many of them are children

and many of them are
discovered not only dead,

but mutilated, partially eaten.

- [Ryan] The Beast of
Gevaudan will go on

to be the most compelling
werewolf case ever.

What it does is it points

to the most obvious
explanation for werewolves

[screen whooshes]
[graphic beeps]

- [Kinitra] At this time, there
were hundreds of thousands of

wolves in continental Europe.

And remember, they
are raising livestock

which attracts wolves.

So they are living
in close proximity

to these very dangerous animals.

[wolf howling]

- [Andrew] According to some
estimates

between the 1300s and the 1700s,

wolves in France kill as
many as 10,000 people.

Many historians look
at this and say,

"Okay, we've got a huge
population of wolves.

These wolves are
often in conflict

with people and their
livestock."

That's the explanation.

This isn't a supernatural beast.

It is a natural menace.

- [Laurence] But the
Beast of Gevaudan story

seems to go far beyond
the typical conflicts

between wolf and
man at the time.

- [Troy] As the killings
continued,

the authorities were
obviously very concerned,

so they put a bounty out.

On October 8th 1764, a
group of hunters were out

and managed to corner the wolf.

They opened fire, they hit it.
[gunshot booms]

It went down.

But then the beast just
simply got up and ran away.

- [Kinitra] A few months later,

a 10-year-old is
attacked by the beast,

but his friends surround him

and beat it back
with their sticks.

And the 10-year-old
boy survives.

- [Andrew] The stories keep
coming.

The young woman is
crossing the river Desges

when she's attacked
by a monster.

She says that she impales
the creature with a spear,

and yet it still runs away.

- [Ryan] This is obviously
getting to be a

much bigger deal.

So the king's own
huntsman joins the fight.

He actually shoots
it and drops it,

and it is a abnormally
large wolf for the time.

So the news goes out
from Boston to Brussels.

We killed the beast.

- [Troy] But the celebration
turns out to be a little

premature because
the murders continue.

In fact, they're even more
vicious than they were before.

[suspenseful music]
[wolf howling]

People are being eaten,

ripped apart, torn
limb from limb,

decapitated.

There's no question that
it's still out there

and it's still killing people.

- [Laurence] 30 more people
are killed in attacks.

Soon the death toll
nears a hundred.

- [Erica] It's just absolute
terror that's hard to describe.

Maybe this isn't an
average mortal beast.

In fact, it might
be supernatural.

You might need to be using
some supernatural tactics

to take this wolf down.

- [Andrew] Undeterred a French
nobleman

forms yet another hunting
party to go after the beast

and joining that party is
a man named Jean Chastel.

This party like parties
before locate the beast.

Now, Chastel loads his pistol,

says a prayer,

aims and fires.
[gunshot booms]

Hitting the monster.

The monster stays down, dead.
[dramatic music]

- [Troy] Over the years,
a legend has grown.

It said that that one
bullet killed the monster

and it's believed to have
been a silver bullet.

- [Lynne] There's no actual
evidence that he used a silver

bullet, but this is the
beginning of that motif,

that if you're going to take
out a supernatural creature,

the way to do it is with
a solid silver bullet.

- [Ryan] So in 1767, they do an
autopsy on the decomposing body.

What they find is that yes,

it was just a really large
wolf with very unusual markings

and that when they
got into the stomach,

they actually found
human remains.

- [Laurence] So was
the Beast of Gevaudan

simply a large wolf?

If so, how does that explain
the stunning death toll

and details provided
by the eyewitnesses?

- [Andrew] How do we square that
with so many of the observations

about it being the
size of a horse,

about it walking on
its two hind legs,

about bodies being
found decapitated.

[wolf howling]
- [Lynne] Because of this,

some theories that maybe
this wasn't a typical wolf,

have come to light,

so some people have suggested
this could be a dire wolf

that's an extinct species,

supposedly extinct for
about 10,000 years,

but much larger
than a normal wolf.

- [Troy] In the end, the
people of Gevaudan

living in the 18th century as
they were continued to believe

that it was a
supernatural creature.

To them, it made
a lot more sense

that they couldn't
kill this thing

because it was something
malevolent, something evil.

- [Laurence] The story
of the Beast of Gevaudan

is so widespread and terrifying

that from the 18th
century onward,

the French public believes
all wolves must be eliminated.

[dramatic music]
- [Ryan] By the 1800s,

the government has put a
bounty out on wolf's heads,

and as a result
of this, by 1930,

they're almost all but
extinct in the region.

But the curiosity about
werewolves continues.

- During the first millennium,

Nordic folklore describes
a father and son

who discover magic wolf pelts

that allow them to become
wolves for 10 days.

They roam through the
woods on a killing rampage

until the father attacks the son

leaving him with a mortal wound.

- [Lynne] In Scandinavia in
the first millennium,

there is a documented real
phenomenon taking place

that makes the
werewolf transition

maybe not seem so implausible.

A good starting point is
in the Viking culture.

[dramatic music]
[screen whooshes]

- [Erica] So in Scandinavia
in the 9th century,

you have this viking
warrior culture

and particularly a
group of warriors

that worship the God Odin

and they were often
meant to protect royalty.

They're known as Berserkers.

- [Troy] The Berserkers were
sort of an unusual bunch.

Before battle, they would strip
themselves completely naked,

dye their bodies
with a black dye,

and then would sort of
psyched themselves up

into a state of ferocity.

But there was one subculture
of Berserker warriors

who did dress
themselves as wolves.

- [Lynne] One of the secrets to
their fighting ability

was this insane rage that
would take over their body.

A madness would come over them.

They were described
as fighting almost

in a trance-like state,

often described as
either being naked,

or as wearing bear skins,
or sometimes wolf skins.

- [Andrew] The donning of the
animal skin, the bear skin,

which is where we get
the word Berserk from,

is not simply an armor.

It's actually a mindset.

You're becoming like the
animal that by embodying it,

you avail yourself of
its power, of its fury.

- [Lynne] We see stories of
these fighters training in the

woods, but it's possible that
one of their best weapons

is actually the use of
hallucinogenic substances.

[dramatic music]
[graphic beeps]

- [Laurence] Some
scholars now theorize

that the berserkers' drug-
induced transformation

from men into monsters
could be the basis

of the werewolf legend
as we now know it.

- [Erica] It's thought that
potentially the berserkers

were ingesting Amanita muscaria,

which is the mushroom
that's sort of

the "Alice in
Wonderland" mushroom.

[dramatic music]
When ingested,

there's psychoactive properties
that would cause a person

to enter a feeling of
just kind of invincibility

and ferocity.

- [Troy] After that feeling
of being invincible

and bloodthirsty
would wear off,

that mushroom then
acts as a sedative.

They wouldn't even remember

what they had done
on the battlefield.

- [Laurence] A later
ruler of Norway,

King Olaf Haraldsson is
said to use berserkers

in one of the most famous
battles in the country's history

at Stiklestad in 1030.

But the Berserkers
days are numbered

because such
animalistic behavior

runs counter to the growing
faith of Christianity.

In fact, Olaf himself
will be canonized

as Saint Olaf for his campaign
to spread the religion.

- [Lynne] As Christianity became
a more major religion in Norway,

the sort of Hagan
feel of the berserkers

is something that
fell out of favor.

And if they fell out of favor
with the rise of Christianity,

it was the church that
brought back an emphasis

on the possibility of
werewolves in the 16th century.

- [Laurence] In the 1500s,
the Catholic church in Europe

embroiled in political
power struggles

and under threat from a
new Protestant movement

is on a campaign to
maintain its supremacy.

- [Lynne] As part of this effort
to really maintain control

over what people understand

to be the morally
correct way to live,

we can see a lot
of fear mongering.

- [Andrew] 200 years before the
famous Salem Witch trials,

we had a similar type of
trial happening in Europe.

These were werewolf trials.
[suspenseful music]

Oftentimes individuals were
accused of horrific acts,

often killing and
eating children,

and so these individuals would
be put on trial by the church

and under extreme duress,
indeed under torture,

they would often confess to
being just that - werewolves.

[screen whooshes]
[graphic beeps]

- [Lynne] At this point in the
1500s across Europe,

the Catholic church really is
the dominant moral authority.

Telling people what's right,
how to live correctly,

really setting the moral tone.

- [Andrew] The church exerts
its influence

by claiming that it
offers you protection

from demonic influences
here on earth,

the most serious threat the
church said, were werewolves.

[graphics beeping]

- So in Germany in 1589,

the werewolf executions
are in full tilt

and they come across a
gentleman named Peter Stumpp.

They put him on a rack

and they slowly remove
all of his flesh.

Then they behead him

and they actually burn
him on a funeral pyre.

- [Troy] It was a warning not
only to any werewolves,

but it was also the
warning to the people

that only the church had
the power to protect them.

- [Laurence] But there
may be another factor

that puts unwitting
people in the crosshairs

of the werewolf hunting church.

- [Andrew] Some historians have
observed

that many of the greatest
incidents of werewolf activity

happened in lowland areas.

They tend to be
wet, damp, moist,

and they note that those
conditions give rise

to a certain fungus
that when consumed

can have odd effects.

- [Laurence] This
fungus known as ergot

grows on grains and
contains chemical compounds

that are not only poisonous,
but also psychoactive.

- [Andrew] When grains infected
with ergot are consumed,

some of the symptoms
include rapid heart rate,

blurred vision, kind of
a state of agitation,

all of which could be seen

as part of the werewolf
transformation.

- [Troy] To make matters
even more compelling

is once the poisoning
effects wear off,

you'll have little memory
of the things that you did

while you were poisoned.

- [Andrew] It's not hard to
imagine

that if in your village
something terrible happens,

especially to a small child

that you wouldn't begin looking
about for someone to blame.

The person behaving
irrationally, uncontrollably,

who's spasming, seemingly
undergoing some kind of

demonic transformation,

that's an obvious
person to blame.

- [Laurence] There
are conflicting views

on just how many
Europeans are persecuted

in the heyday of
werewolf trials.

One source from 1611 claims

the number is 30,000
in France alone.

Some historians today argue,

the total number in
Europe is much less,

perhaps several hundred.

- [Lynne] What we might be
seeing here

is really sort of
a cyclical effect

where these sort of afflictions

may really have
increased the idea

that there are people
becoming werewolves.

- [Laurence] Winter 1573,

it's a cold night
in rural France

and laborers are headed to a
tavern for an evening meal.

The entire party is on
edge for good reason.

- [Lynne] In the bushes, under
the light of a full moon,

they hear some rustling sounds.

They at first think
might be an animal.

They hear sort of a growling
sound coming from it.

[animal growling]
But as they get closer,

they realize that what
they're seeing is a person.

- [Troy] His name is Gilles
Garnier.

He is a recluse who
lives outside of town,

and they also realize
that's not a dead animal

that he's eating.

It's the body of a small child.

[dramatic music]

When they confront Garnier,

they find his blood
all over his face,

it's dripping from his chin,

and he admits that he's a wolf

and that he's been killing
and eating children

for some time now,

as many as 14 in
the last few months.

He honestly believes
he's a werewolf.

- [Andrew] It's cases like
Garnier that lead many

historians to believe that the
explanation for werewolf stories

is not the supernatural,
not curses or the full moon,

but something entirely natural.

It's to be found in deranged
but very human predators.

[screen whooshes]
[suspenseful music]

- [Kinitra] Further questioning
leads to some answers

as to why Garnier would
commit such a heinous act,

and he says the
devil made him do it.

And the devil helped him
by giving him an ointment

that turned him into a wolf.
[dramatic music]

- [Troy] Back in those days,

Garnier was believed to be
a supernatural creature,

but today, we would
call him a serial killer

who engaged in cannibalism,

someone like Albert
Fish or Jeffrey Dahmer

who would eat their victims.

We don't think of
them as werewolves.

We think of them
as a serial killer.

- [Andrew] What we have is
arguably a climate of fear.

One person makes a claim and
then others get on board,

and suddenly the story
takes on a life of its own

and the boundaries
between fantasy

and reality begin to blur.

Now the the truth is,
we'll never know for sure

in this particular case

because Garnier is found
guilty of being a werewolf.

And is burned on a pyre.

- [Laurence] In Bedburg,
Germany 16 years

after Garnier's trial,

Peter Stumpp is also
accused of being a werewolf.

- [Troy] Stumpp was being
interrogated by the authorities.

He made a full confession.

He said that he was
transformed into a wolf

using a belt that had been
made from a wolf's skin.

- [Erica] Peter Stumpp confesses
to killing 14 children

as well as two pregnant
women with their babies.

- [Lynne] One key difference
here

is that when he transforms
into being a human,

he retains the knowledge
of what he's done.

Just as with Garnier, his
confession leads to execution.

He's tortured, he's burned,

and then the news of it
is reported far and wide.

- [Andrew] The church creates
a broad sheet,

announcing that it has
captured and executed,

the werewolf of Bedburg.

That broad sheet is
widely circulated.

It's reprinted hundreds of times

making Stumpp's case the
most famous werewolf trial.

- [Lynne] And so these sorts
of stories really got

a lot of spread in culture,

letting people know exactly
what a werewolf does

and what will happen
to someone who is one.

- [Andrew] It's entirely
possible that Garnier and Stumpp

did commit the crimes
they were accused of

even though their confessions
were extracted under torture.

And what's interesting is
that in those confessions,

they claim that they did commit
the crimes, but as werewolves.

So it's not just a
confession to a crime,

it's a confession to
a supernatural crime.

- [Laurence] Could
accused serial killers

like Garnier and Stumpp

actually believe
they were werewolves?

A rare psychological condition

recognized in the late 19th
century might provide an answer.

- [Andrew] There is a condition
called clinical Lycanthropy.

This comes to us from the
Greek, lykos, meaning wolf.

And anthropos, meaning human.

In this case, individuals
do claim to believe

that they transform into wolfs.

They describe a
physical transformation.

Teeth turning into fangs,

the nails turning
into claws, hair growing,

the body contorting
into a wolf-like state.

- [Lynne] If we're looking for
a documented phenomenon

that could really tie
all the pieces together

of the werewolf
belief, serial killers,

with diagnosed
clinical Lycanthropy,

really hits the
nail on the head.

- [Brian] It's very hard to know
how prevalent this is

if you're just looking at
the scientific literature,

a colleague and I
only found 25 cases

of people who believe
they turned into wolves.

I'm guessing it's more frequent

than the scientific
literature would suggest.

- [Andrew] We have a 2020 case
of a young boy in France

who believed himself
to be a werewolf.

He would refuse to go to
school during the full moon.

There were reports of him biting

or scratching his classmates.

- [Troy] Doctors feared

it had something to do
with the internet.

That he had been delving
deep into online chat rooms

and things where people
were talking about

another world of
living as a werewolf.

But even without the internet,

people have been suffering
from this condition

for centuries.
[suspenseful music]

- By the mid 19th century,

as the wolf population plummets,

there's less fear of
encountering a werewolf

in a dark forest.

But in 1855,

a chilling story from
France reignites the terror

and the legend.

[graphic beeps]
- In 1855,

a article comes out in
the "Brooklyn Daily Eagle"

about a couple in rural France,
and it's really disturbing.

This couple was getting
married and before the wedding

the groom started
acting really strange.

The night after the nuptials,

they hear this
horrible screaming

coming from the bed chamber
of the bride and groom.

[person screams]

- [Andrew] Their family
rushed to the room,

and upon opening the door,

they see the husband
standing above the wife,

blood dripping down his mouth.

He's consuming her.

He's eaten part of her chest.

But just as the villagers
get to the man, he too dies.

- [Laurence] Suspicion only
grows when authorities learn

that the man had
been recently bitten

by some sort of vicious canine.

- [Ryan] Back then, people would
not have the knowledge

to understand what was
happening to this gentleman.

But now, we understand
that there is something

which can affect
humans and animals

that could have very well been
what he was suffering from.

[screen whooshes]
[graphic beeps]

- [Troy] Now rabies has been
around

since the beginning
of recorded time.

As far as we know the
first mention of it

was in a Babylonian
text from 2300 BCE.

So it's something that has
been part of world history

but not always understood.

- [Ryan] Rabies can affect
animals and humans.

And in animals, they
become more aggressive,

they lose their
fear of the things

normally they're cautious about.

- [Lynne] In humans, more
severe cases of rabies

are known as furious rabies.

We see things like
seizures, hallucinations,

strange vocalizations,

and even things like
foaming at the mouth.

- [Troy] And because people came
down with these conditions

after they were bitten by
some rabid animal like a wolf,

they would just assume that
it was a curse being passed on

from a werewolf.

- [Laurence] With Louis
Pasteur's development

of the rabies vaccine in 1885,

the number of post bite
fatalities in humans

drops significantly.

- [Lynne] Rabies may have played
a pretty significant role

in the development of
the werewolf legend,

but there are other
conditions as well

that could have played
a role in suggesting

the same sort of
wolf-like behaviors.

- [Ryan] There's a famous
story that we all know,

which is "Tarzan"
about Lord Gracestoke.

Him and his parents marooned
off the coast of Africa,

the parents die and he's
left to fend for himself.

He's raised by the apes

and he begins to run
around on all fours

and speak like
them, act like them,

exhibit all their behaviors.

- [Lynne] Tarzan, the character
is obviously fictional,

but the concept of
actual feral children,

children raised in the
wilderness by animals

has been around for centuries,

and these certainly
could have played a role

in the stories about
people behaving like

or even transforming
into wolves.

[screen whooshes]
[dramatic music]

- [Ryan] These feral children
don't exhibit violent

tendencies, but even though
they're not aggressive,

their mysterious origins,
they're wild - like tendencies

really fuels the idea that this
is maybe a perfect template

for where we get
the modern werewolf.

- [Andrew] Northwest India,
1867,

a hunting party is
out in the jungle

when they come upon a cave
guarded by a single wolf,

but as they look closer,

they realize that this
wolf is not a wolf at all.

It's a boy.
[suspenseful music]

- [Troy] When an actual wolf
then emerged from the cave

and approached the
hunters, they killed it.

And believed they were
rescuing this boy,

not understanding that he had
been raised by those wolves.

- [Andrew] The hunters deliver
him to a group of missionaries.

You know, the missionaries
name him Dina Sanichar.

They try to teach him to speak.
They're never able to do so.

So what we have here is a
real-life "Jungle Book."

A real-life Mogley, man-cub.

- [Laurence] The
story of Dina Sanichar

is not an isolated one.

There have been around a
hundred documented cases

just like it.

- [Troy] There were other
cases of feral children

being raised by animals,
different kinds of animals,

leopards, lions,

goats, but most of them
seem to revolve around

dogs and wolves because they
are such social animals.

- [Lynne] What we see in these
stories,

there's not that violence,

there's not that aggression,

but we see at a
really basic level,

the general belief that a human
animal hybrid is possible.

[suspenseful music]
- [Laurence] In 1884,

Phineas Taylor Barnum travels
the world with his circus.

He calls it "PT Barnum's
Greatest Show on Earth."

Among his sideshow
performers is a young boy

with a very
startling appearance.

- [Troy] His entire face, except
for his eyes and ears,

were covered with
a fine, silky hair,

and whenever he would perform,

he would bark and
growl like a dog.

Now, this was just
his stage act.

He was actually a
brilliant young man

who spoke five
different languages,

but he made his money

by pretending to be half
man and half animal.

- [Ryan] Jo-Jo's real name
was Fedor Jeftichew,

and he suffered from a
condition we know of these days

as Hypertrichosis, which is
basically excessive hair.

It can cover just the face

or it can consume
your entire body.

- [Lynne] Some experts believe
that this condition

documented rarely but
consistently since the 1500s,

could play a role in the
ongoing belief in werewolves.

[suspenseful music]
[graphic beeps]

- [Troy] Fedor was born in
Russia.

His father had the
same condition,

his father had performed
in sideshows as a wild man.

After his father passed away,

Fedor went on to perform alone
which is how he met PT Barnum,

who offered him a handsome
contract to come to America

as Jo-Jo the Dog-Faced Boy.

- [Andrew] Jeftichew is a
popular attraction for Barnum

for nearly 20 years.

Even though Jeftichew
grows incredibly homesick,

Barnum won't let him
out of his contract.

- [Lynne] Barnum's shows draw
in hundreds of thousands

of visitors per year,

and likely for many of them,

this is the first
time they've ever seen

a person with Hypertrichosis.

The condition didn't even
have that name at the time.

And the posters, the
advertisement for the show,

really encouraged
people to believe

that this was an
animal-human hybrid.

- [Laurence] Jo-Jo is
part of a long history

of Hypertrichosis sufferers

being cast as wild
animal human hybrids,

including werewolves.

- [Troy] In the late 1500s,

there was an Italian naturalist
named Ulisse Aldrovandi

and he documented this entire
family who lived in Bologna,

who were covered in
a thick black hair

over their entire bodies.

- [Lynne] Aldrovandi's book was
titled "The History of

Monsters," and the name that it
gives to this condition

is werewolf syndrome.

Even though now we have
the name Hypertrichosis,

the name Werewolf
syndrome also sticks.

- [Erica] In the last 300 years,

there are only 50 documented
cases of Hypertrichosis,

but in many ways, it's
rarity may have made it

more alarming and all
the more sort of shocking

for people who witnessed it.

- [Laurence] While not
nearly as common as rabies

or as well publicized
as feral children,

Hypertrichosis may
have played a key role

in the development
of the werewolf myth.

- [Troy] That may be why
one of the oldest

variations of the
werewolf legend

involves a creature
that doesn't transform

back into a human,

but remains half
human and half beast.

- [Laurence] Through
the centuries,

a handful of famous cases

reinforced the idea
of werewolf syndrome.

[screen whooshes]
[graphic beeps]

- [Andrew] In 1840, some Mexican
herdsman

discover a young mother
hiding a daughter in a cave.

The daughter is striking
in her appearance.

She's covered with hair,

including what looks
like a long beard

growing from her face.

- [Troy] The mother explained
that she was hiding the little

girl whose name
was Julia Pastrana

because villagers believed
that she was the new Ali

who was a shape-shifting
werewolf.

As the story goes, the young
mother died soon after,

and Julia ended
up in an orphanage

where she became a subject
of both ridicule and fear.

- [Kinitra] But she has such
a sweet disposition.

She has such a
beautiful singing voice.

She is eventually
adopted by the governor

of the state of
Sinaloa in Mexico,

and she works as a live-in maid.

- [Lynne] While she's working as
a maid in this governor's house,

she begins to sing opera,

and as her talents grow,
she gets recognized.

She meets an American
entrepreneur,

he encourages her
to travel to the US,

and by 1854, she makes
her debut on Broadway.

- [Laurence] Despite
Pastrana's gentle demeanor

and sophisticated performances,

she's still viewed as
some kind of monster.

- [Troy] One newspaper article
refers to her as "it,"

and even doctors who examine her

will say that she
is only half human,

and these are doctors, let
alone the general public

who sees her as this
human animal hybrid.

- [Lynne] Her career continues
and she actually has success

traveling around the
world and performing,

and in 1860 in Moscow,

she gives birth to a baby boy.

Unfortunately, her child
only survives for 35 hours,

and after he passes
away, so does she.

- [Ryan] So for Julia, instead
of having a dignified burial,

they put her in a box and
display her at these events.

And it isn't until
years later in 2013

where she is finally
given a burial.

- [Troy] The condition that
Jo-Jo and Julius suffered from

gave them an
animal-like appearance,

but both of them were known
for being very pleasant,

peaceful people,

so they weren't anything
like the werewolf legend,

but the fact that people saw

that there could be
what they thought

was a human animal hybrid,

it kept the story of
the werewolves alive.

- [Laurence] Around the time
of Julia Pastrana's death

thousands of miles away
in the American west,

another alleged form of werewolf

is set to stalk
the desert brush,

and this beast is
not so peaceful.

- [Troy] In the 1860s, a
conflict began in the American

southwest between the Navajo
and Ute nations.

The Ute had allied themselves

with the American military
against the Navajo,

and the Navajo were
angry about this

and decided to
have their revenge.

[person vocalizing]
- [Andrew] As retaliation,

the Navajo are said to
unleash a terrifying curse

upon the Ute people in
their ancestral homeland,

what is now present day Utah,

and that curse comes in
the form of a monster,

the skinwalker.
[suspenseful music]

- [Troy] According to
Native American lore,

skinwalkers were
a type of witch

that could transform into an
animal, specifically a wolf.

And they did so using magic

and the pelt of the animal
they wanted to transform into.

The Navajo called
them Yee Naaldlooshii,

which roughly translates to
He who walks on all fours.

- [Andrew] In wolf form, skin
walkers are super strong, very

fast, almost impossible to kill.

Folklore has it that the
only thing that can kill them

is a bullet or a knife that's
been dipped in white ash.

It's said that the only
way to become a skinwalker

is to kill a member
of your own family.

- [Lynne] When you put all of
these qualities together,

the transformation into animals,

people becoming like wolves,

some people believe that
this is a clear connection

to the longstanding historical
belief in werewolves.

- [Andrew] By the late 19th
century, many Utes have come to

believe that the skinwalkers
are powerful, dark, magic,

and so many abandoned
the Uinta Basin

and refuse to go back there.

Over time, that land
is parceled and sold.

In the 1990s, a couple acquire
a 512 acre parcel of land.

- [Ryan] Almost immediately,
they begin having strangeness

happening around the house,

which gets worse until
they start to notice

wolves on the land

that are three times
larger than any wolves

that they've ever seen
or they can find in text.

- [Lynne] According to the
legend,

these are skinwalkers.

And some say that these are
skinwalkers specifically sent

by the Navajo to
clear out this land.

- [Laurence] Skin walker
sightings aren't limited

to the supposed cursed
territory in Utah.

One Native American
family in Arizona reports

terrifying forces on their land.

- [Lynne] As the family tells
the story,

they're seeing what
looks sort of like these

long shadows that are
circling around their house.

- [Andrew] The family hears
noise coming from the

son's bedroom.

They open the door and
see the son being attacked

by some kind of creature,

which they describe as
walking on two legs,

but with eyes that
burn like fire.

- [Lynne] In this family's
belief tradition,

they describe this
as a skinwalker,

but with the details provided,

this could easily be
the story of a werewolf.

- [Laurence] When
European settlers

brought their werewolf
legends to the Americas,

they could have heard
Native American stories

of the skinwalkers.

After all, both are
tales of shape-shifting,

malevolent beings.

That's why some experts believe

that the skinwalker may have
been a significant influence

on popular werewolf mythology.

- So it's easy on one level to
imagine how werewolf legends

would take root in
a pastime before

large technology education
research about viruses,

but you also have werewolf
stories that are contemporary.

In Wisconsin,
there's this sort of

America's Beast of Gvauden

is known as The
Beast of Bray Road.

- [Lynne] This is a hybrid of a
dog, man who's seen consistently

in the wilderness,
often at dusk,

often doing exactly what we hear

of werewolves and
skinwalkers do,

menacing people,
approaching their houses,

looking in the windows,
threatening their well-being.

- [Erica] This becomes sort of a
part of the community identity.

The local brewery has a
beer named after the beast,

it's on T-shirts.

- [Lynne] At least for the
beast of Bray Road

the one thing it hasn't
done, is kill anyone,

at least not yet.
[wolf howling]

- [Andrew] How do we explain the
endurance of the werewolf myth?

In the werewolf, we find
something truly terrifying

because the werewolf
tells us that

the true monster
is not out there,

but is in here
inside any one of us.

[suspenseful music]
[werewolf howling]

- The legend of werewolves
has endured for centuries

by way of folklore, fear,
and perhaps misunderstanding.

Whether this creature is a
product of our imagination

or something much darker,

the werewolf symbolizes
the fine line

between civilized society and
our most primal instincts.

I'm Laurence Fishburne,

thank you for watching
"History's Greatest Mysteries."