What is a Wendigo? Forest cannibal. Is it possible to escape from a bloodthirsty monster?

Our legend today is WENDIGO.

Wendigo is the curse of the North American continent, a cannibal monster that lives in forests and feeds on human flesh. Wendigo can imitate a human voice and lure its prey into the forest, it moves very quickly and cannot be killed by a shot. Wendigos live a long, very long time and they have an amazing ability to self-heal - any wounds quickly heal, bones grow together and soon the forest cannibal goes hunting again. How many people disappear in the forest every year: mushroom pickers, tourists, hunters, foresters - where are they all? Where did you go? Did you die when you got lost in the thicket or became prey to a wendigo?
No one knows.
But if you like to go to the forest overnight, remember: do not leave the fire at night.
Fire is the only thing the Wendigo is afraid of.

The Ojibway Indians (as well as the Algonquins, Dakotas and Eskimos of Alaska) can tell you a legend about an evil cannibal spirit that lives in the forests and in the North. In their stories, this is not just a cannibal, but the embodiment of Hunger itself, which is capable of turning entire tribes of people into gatherings of cannibals devouring each other with one touch or even simple presence.
This is the Wendigo, which is said to be found today in the forests and mountains of the northern United States and Canada.
The Indians still associate the disappearance of their hunters and ordinary people of the forest states with the gluttony of the Wendigo.
Indian legends recorded by missionaries and explorers as early as the 17th century,
The Wendigo is described as a werewolf or a cannibalistic devil.
And there is some truth in this. The Indians themselves claim that the Wendigo spirit inhabits anyone who has at least once tasted human meat. But the Indian tribes starved more than once, really starved, and then it was difficult to resist saving one’s life at any cost - for example, in a moment of extreme hunger, eating one’s fellow tribesman.

Legends about the appearance of the Wendigo
The Indians themselves, speaking about the emergence of the Wendigo, admit that there are several versions.
The first of them has nothing to do with cannibalism, it is rather about self-sacrifice.
When the native tribe is pursued by enemies and the family is in mortal danger, the best warrior of the tribe voluntarily agrees to a terrible sacrifice: he gives his soul to the spirits of the forest. Having turned into a terrible monster, he helps the tribe win, but then, when the threat is eliminated, the monster warrior cannot become human again. His sacrifice is accepted - and he goes into the forest forever, where he finally turns into a wendigo, and his native tribe begins to hunt him: after all, a wendigo is a mortal danger to people.
There is another opinion. They say that a wendigo becomes a shaman who is overly keen on black magic. And, although they claim that shamans know how to be wendigos without becoming cannibals, nothing is known for sure about this.
But here is another version, no worse or better than others: an ordinary person can also become a wendigo - of his own free will.
You need to start with fasting. How long can you go without food: a day, two? A week? When hunger becomes unbearable, it's time to go to the forest.
Vedigo will find you himself, don’t even doubt it. Most likely, he uses the “volunteer” as food for the winter, but maybe - why not? - will make a wendigo out of you. After a meal of human flesh, the “volunteer’s” body will gradually become covered with hair, claws will grow, his eyes will learn to see in the dark, and raw human meat will become the most desired food.
And finally, the last, most likely version is cannibalism.
Winters in the north can be harsh. North American Indian tribes were often cut off from the rest of the world for months at a time. And when the food ran out, and spring was still far away, one simple question arose: how to survive? There were cases when a person ate his family or neighbors, but the retribution was terrible - gradually such a cannibal became a wendigo.

But not only Indians turned into wendigos.
Hunters, gold miners, travelers, settlers, seekers of a better life, vagabonds, everyone who poured into the North American continent at that time - many of them had no idea how fierce, merciless and hungry the local winter could be.
And there were cases when a company of gold miners, fleeing from inevitable death by starvation, killed and ate one of them, justifying themselves by the fact that the fittest survive. And all of them, sooner or later, they were all doomed to turn into monsters and suffer from hunger, which can only be satisfied by human meat.
Be that as it may, the Indians still believe in the Wendigo and consider it one of the most dangerous creatures.

What do wendigos look like?
They are most often described as tall creatures with a lipless mouth, sharp teeth and eyes that glow in the dark. Despite their insatiability, wendigos are extremely thin. Sometimes they are covered with matted white fur, while some claim that wendigos are completely bald.
Important note: Vedigo is said to give off an unpleasant odor, reminiscent of a corpse in the advanced stages of decomposition.
The Wendigo lives in the forest and there are usually no animals there and there is always silence. Wendigos build dens underground, in caves, or climb into abandoned mines: they do not like bright light. Before winter, they always stock up: they hide pieces of meat on tree branches or in specially dug holes. Sometimes there are also prisoners in his lair - a strategic reserve in case of power failure.
When supplies run low, the wendigo goes hunting. Having discovered a traveler, he can stalk the trail for hours. Usually, sooner or later a person begins to suspect something, begins to listen, look around, but spotting a wendigo is not so easy. Then the cannibal begins to scare his victim: from time to time the traveler hears strange sounds, it seems to him that someone’s silhouette is flashing between the trees, he begins to suspect that there is someone else in the forest besides him and this “someone” moves like this so quickly that the human eye cannot notice it. Sometimes the victim hears a whistle, reminiscent of the rustling wind.
From all this, even a person with strong nerves panics and starts running, and then the wendigo gives chase.

Is it possible to kill a wendigo?
Let's think about it. The Wendigo is a living, not an otherworldly creature, which means it can be destroyed? At least theoretically.
But how to do that?
It cannot be taken by conventional weapons, including bullets.
There is an opinion that you can kill a wendigo with a silver weapon, but you probably shouldn’t rely too much on this: after all, a wendigo is not a vampire. It is also advised to pierce the monster’s heart with some sharp object, also preferably silver - a stake, an arrow, a knife, then dismember the body and bury it in consecrated ground. In fact, silver is not dangerous to wendigos and they are afraid of only one thing - fire. This is why experienced travelers, even those who consider the legends about wendigos to be fiction, try to keep the fire burning all night and why wendigo hunters always burn the body of a killed forest cannibal.
By the way, about hunters.
When settlers began to populate the North American continent, many of them took the Indian legend of the Wendigo very seriously. And how could it be otherwise: first, people who went hunting disappeared without a trace, and then the forest cannibal himself was seen several times, appearing near the town of Rosesu in Northern Minnesota. (Wendigos were regularly seen there from the late 1800s until 1920).
Among the local residents there were people who devoted their entire lives to hunting monsters, becoming professional wendigo hunters.
The most famous of them, named Jack Fielder, claimed to have killed at least 14 wendigos in his lifetime. He destroyed the last one when he was already 87 years old; his son helped him in the hunt.
In October 1907, hunter Fiedler and his son Joseph were convicted of murdering an Indian woman.
They both pleaded guilty to this crime, but in their defense they stated that the woman was infected with "Wendigo fever" and was only hours away from completely turning into a monster and had to be destroyed before she began to kill others.
They say that wendigos still live in Minnesota.

What is Wendigo Fever?
It happened that after an attack by a wendigo, people still managed to stay alive. But it’s too early to rejoice - they were struck by the so-called “Wendigo fever.” In modern medical language, these unfortunate people were in a peculiar clinical state, like psychosis. They spent night after night in nightmares, which were accompanied by unbearable pain in their legs and, in the end, the man ran into the forest screaming wildly.
The first sign of transformation into a wendigo, the first symptom of fever, is the appearance of a strange smell that only the future monster can smell. It is this smell that causes nightmares, from which a person wakes up in a cold sweat. Then the person begins to feel a burning pain in the legs and feet, which becomes so unbearable that no one can stand it. And the unfortunate person runs away into the forest, throwing off both his shoes and clothes - this is how the transformation into wendigo occurs not only of shamans or people who have broken tribal taboos, but also of those who have been cursed by the wendigo. Most of the damned never return from the forest, and those who do return will remain insane forever.

Reference
Pay attention to a small nuance. If we talk about mental illness, it would be more correct to use the term “indigo” or “windigo”. If you are talking about a real monster, then they usually call it “Wendigo”.
Indigo is a mental disorder among Canadian Indians: the sudden appearance of an attraction to cannibalism, a need for human meat. Detailed descriptions of the disease were made in the 18th century; modern research was carried out by J. M. Cooper (Cooper) in 1933. The word "windigo" (lit., "cannibal") originally denoted a mythical clan of cannibals mentioned among the Chippewa and Ottawa Indians and living on the Hudson Bay Islands. Over time, in the mythology of the Algonquin Indians, the name "windigo" spread to a tribe of evil spirits, as well as the devil (devils).
Perhaps this myth was used by the Indians as a remedy against cannibalism during the winter months of hunger.

And here is what the Indians themselves say about encounters with wendigos.
S.E. Schlosser
The story of an Ojibwe Indian about an encounter with a Wendigo.

The storm lasted so long that we thought we would die of hunger. Finally, when the gusts of wind died down, I remembered my father, who was a brave warrior and went out in any weather. Before the storm returns, they must find food, or the family will not survive.
Taking a spear and a knife, he went to the area, usually most of all, dotted with animal tracks. I’m standing, studying the signs in the snow. But the shimmering layer of ice and snow gave no sign of the presence of prey. In such bad weather, every intelligent creature was within its hole and slept. Not me. Knowing the desperate hunger the family was experiencing, I continued the hunt.
As I moved through the eerie silence, broken only by weak gusts of wind, I clearly heard a strange noise, a hiss. It came from everywhere and nowhere at the same time. He stopped, his heart pounding wildly. When I saw the blood-soaked tracks in front of me, I pulled out a knife, instantly realizing that a Wendigo was watching me somewhere nearby.
I knew about the Wendigo when I sat on my father's lap. From his stories it followed that it was a large creature, tall as a tree, with a lipless mouth and a palisade of sharp teeth. Its breathing was accompanied by strange sounds like hissing, its tracks were full of blood, and this beast ate any man, woman or child who dared to enter its territory. And one could consider themselves lucky. Sometimes the Wendigo wanted to possess a person and, instead of killing him, he made the unfortunate person also become a Wendigo and hunt down those he once loved and devour their flesh.
The warrior knows that he has only one chance to defeat the Wendigo. If it doesn't work out, then death. Or... the thought was too terrible to complete.
Slowly I stepped back from the bloody trail, listening to the hissing sound. Was it stronger in one direction? Then he gripped the spear tightly with one hand and the knife with the other. Suddenly, the snowdrift on the left exploded with snow and a huge creature jumped out of it. I dodged to the side and drove through the snow so that my clothes were tightly covered with it. This could help me remain invisible in the white snow. Then, in the gray twilight, I noticed the approach of fury.
It was the Wendigo who rushed forward with his massive body, and only my spear stopped him. It hit the creature's chest, but the Wendigo simply shook it off like a toy. I quickly pulled back and hid behind a small tree, watching as the creature examined my broken trail in the snow. Perhaps I have another chance, but now I only have one knife in my hands...

The Wendigo was already peering with a sharp gaze in my direction, noticing a shadow next to the tree. The beast leaned forward, stretching forward its long arms with root-like fingers. And then I jumped out of cover as if I was going to grab the creature, and suddenly stuck the knife into its bottomless black eye. The Wendigo howled in pain as the knife blade penetrated its eye socket. The creature tried to throw me off its chest, but I grabbed onto the beast tightly and continued to strike blow after blow, again and again - to the eyes and head.
The Wendigo collapsed to the ground, bleeding, almost crushing me with its weight... As soon as I came to my senses, I began to examine the creature, which against the background of the snow would have been completely invisible if not for the blood pouring from its eyes, ears and wounds on the head. Then the contours of the creature began to blur, became foggy, and it completely disappeared, leaving only crimson footprints in the snow.
Shocked, with my heart beating in fear, tired from the stress of the struggle, I turned home. Weakened, I knew that the storm would soon end its break, and I would be in trouble if I did not find shelter or did not manage to return home.
At the edge of the forest I met a red fox. It was a well-fed and probably old animal, as evidenced by the gray stripes on its face. It was as if the fox had been brought to me as a reward for killing the Wendigo. With a prayer of thanksgiving I killed the fox. There was enough meat for several days until the storm blew itself away and I was able to safely go hunting again.

Wendigo in cinema and literature
It seems that Algernon Blackwood was the first to raise the topic of wendigo in the last century with his legendary “Wendigo” (1910). Lovecraft also added interest to this character, introducing Wendigo as one of the Ancients, whose real name is Ithaqua - the Running Wind, the God of cold white silence. S. King also partially used the wendigo theme.
In modern popular culture, the Wendigo is also not ignored. The second episode of the first season of the TV series "Supernatural" is dedicated to the Wendigo. The Wendigo was also mentioned in one of the episodes of the television series “Charmed,” but this creature was more like a werewolf with horned-hoofed elements. There are Wendigos in Marvel comics as well.

The story "Wendigo" by Algernon Henry Blackwood.
Download.

According to ancient legends, in the forests of the northern United States and central Canada there lives a terrible monster that feeds on human flesh. Even today, Indian tribes associate the disappearance of their hunters and ordinary tourists with the insatiable nature of a monster called the Wendigo. This creature can take the form of a person or an animal, change its voice in order to lure a traveler into the forest thicket. The first mentions of the cannibal are found in manuscripts of the 17th century, compiled by missionaries from the words of Indian leaders.

What does a wendigo look like?

Among the indigenous peoples of the North American continent, the image of a forest demon is associated with cold, hunger, and darkness. Descriptions of the monster's appearance may vary slightly, but they all agree on one thing: the Wendigo is a supernatural, evil creature that mercilessly deals with everyone who crosses its path.

In the minds of the Algonquin Indians living in the Great Lakes region, the monster's body is almost transparent, its skeleton and heart are made of ice. The Wendigo's hands have no fingers, and huge yellow fangs protrude from its lipless, bloody mouth. The monster moves very quickly and silently, it is difficult to notice it until you come close to it.

Hunters of the Ojibwa tribe describe the appearance of the Wendigo this way: “This is a gigantic creature as tall as a tree. He has sharp teeth and long claws, glowing eyes and a huge tongue, and his whole body is covered with matted fur. Where the Wendigo passes, deep tracks filled with blood remain. His hissing breath can be heard for miles, and the stench emanating from his body is reminiscent of the smell of a decomposed corpse.”

Monster Habitats

Wendigo lives in deep forest thickets, where birds do not sing and animals do not live. The monster avoids bright light, so during the day it hides in underground caves. Since the wendigo is a demon of cold and darkness, the monster prefers to hunt its victims at dusk.

The cannibal has excellent orientation in the dark, knows every inch of his territory and can change the weather with the help of black magic. He is extremely gluttonous and insatiable, but sometimes he stores up supplies by hanging pieces of human meat on tree branches, or burying them in holes dug with sharp claws. The evil monster also takes living people prisoner, locking the unfortunate ones in his lair in case of power outages.

Where do wendigos come from?

One might not believe the legends. Indeed, from the point of view of a civilized person, who is a Wendigo? Just a fictional character existing in the imagination of poorly educated Indians. But the fact is that there are a lot of these creatures; they say that they still appear today in the forest and mountain areas of North America, capturing more and more new territories.

Wendigos are not born, they are made. The Wendigo spirit can inhabit any person if he, willingly or unwillingly, breaks the taboo of cannibalism. This happened more than once in the old days, when famine occurred in the villages of North American Indians caused by crop failure or harsh weather conditions. If one of his fellow tribesmen, trying to save his life, ate another person, a terrible reckoning occurred - the cannibal’s body became overgrown with hair, his teeth turned into fangs. Having brought upon himself the curse, the Wendigo was forced to go into the forest to continue doing his dark deeds.

The population of monsters also increased due to settlers, travelers, and gold miners who, in extreme situations, were forced to eat the bodies of their comrades in order to avoid starvation. Who knows, perhaps similar cases occur today, since the disappearances of tourists without a trace are recorded from time to time in local forests.

A deal with the devil as an act of self-sacrifice

There is another, more noble version of the appearance of the Wendigo. This happened during periods of protracted inter-tribal wars. To protect his family from mortal danger, one of the most courageous warriors entered into an agreement with forest demons and took on the image of a super-strong, invulnerable giant.

After defeating his enemies, the hero was unable to regain his human form and he joined the ranks of evil cannibals. His former fellow tribesmen began hunting for the Wendigo, because, having taken the form of a beast, he became very dangerous, sparing neither children, nor the elderly, nor women, in the name of whose salvation he committed a heroic act.

Voluntary transformation into a monster

The Indians believe that anyone who expresses such a desire can become a monster. To do this, you supposedly need to completely give up food for several days or weeks, and when hunger becomes unbearable, go to the darkest thicket of the forest. The Wendigo will definitely find a daredevil and, depending on his mood, will either feast on the exhausted body or turn the volunteer into one like himself.

There is also an opinion that some shamans, with an excessive passion for black magic, unwittingly or intentionally become wendigos. An evil spirit that has possessed the sorcerer drives the unfortunate man into the forest away from human eyes.

Is it possible to escape from a bloodthirsty monster?

It is almost impossible to escape from the monster. The giant moves faster than the wind and can catch up with its prey in the blink of an eye. There is an opinion that the Wendigo is like a zombie or a vampire, so it can easily be killed with a silver bullet or stabbed. Unfortunately, these methods do not work on the cannibal.

The only way to prevent a wendigo attack is to start a fire. Therefore, when locals go to the forest, they always take a large supply of matches with them. The monster never approaches a burning fire. Surely there are other secret methods of destroying monsters, since both Indians and white settlers periodically went out to fight them.

Hunters of the evil forest spirit

The Wendigo (demon of the forest) is known by several names - Windigo, Vitigo, Uichiko and Wee-Tee-Go, but each of them translates roughly the same: "an evil spirit that devours human flesh."

At the dawn of the exploration of the North American continent, many settlers took the Indians' stories about the Wendigo quite seriously. Moreover, there was every reason for this. People who went hunting periodically disappeared, and a wandering monster was seen more than once in the forests of Northern Minnesota. They say that isolated specimens of bloody monsters still live here, and in the period from 1800 to 1920 there were especially many of them.

Some brave souls declared a real war on the giants, calling themselves professional wendigo hunters. The most famous fighter against cannibals, Jack Fidler, according to his own statement, managed to destroy fourteen wendigos. He neutralized the last of them when he was already an 87-year-old man.

In 1907, Fiedler, along with his son, stood trial for murder. Without denying their guilt, the hunters said that they could not do otherwise, since the unfortunate woman was seized with “Wendigo fever.” In a short time, the woman would turn into a monster, endangering the lives of many people.

Symptoms of Wendigo fever infection

No matter how terrible and bloodthirsty the Wendigo was, in some cases people managed to survive after meeting it. But just as turning into a vampire occurs, a person bitten by a forest monster gradually began to take on the appearance of a monster. First of all, the psyche suffered. The unfortunate man was tormented by hallucinations and nightmares.

Wendigo psychosis could occur without contact with the monster, for example, against the background of prolonged fasting. The man was overcome by the fear of becoming a cannibal; it began to seem that no food could satisfy his hunger except human meat. And although these symptoms, as a rule, were false, in the Indian tribes such a possessed person was executed.

How does a person feel when turning into a wendigo?

Before becoming a monster, someone infected with “Wendigo fever” begins to smell a strange smell, his body shakes from severe chills, and every night he is afraid to fall asleep, fearing a repetition of nightmares. Then the unfortunate person develops unbearable pain in his legs, his feet burn as if scorched by fire. In the end, having gotten rid of clothes and shoes, the future monster runs away into the forest, where his final transformation takes place.

How it was possible to record the sensations of werewolves remains a mystery. It is obvious that, having turned into a monster, a person would not describe the intricacies of the process to his former fellow tribesmen or comrades. Probably, films about wendigos, of which many were made both in the past and in the present century, played an important role in the appearance of this information. Among the most popular films on this topic are Larry Fessenden's Wendigo (2001) and the horror film The Blair Witch Project: Coursework from the Other World, released by an independent American film studio in 1999.

Wendigo syndrome as a mental illness

An ancient Indian legend is reflected in the definition of the modern medical term “Wendigo psychosis.” Some experts find the existence of such a disease very controversial, while others believe that with certain changes in the psyche the patient has an intense desire to taste human flesh and a fear of becoming a cannibal.

Susceptibility to this psychosis is observed only among the Indian populations living in the Great Lakes region of Canada and the United States. The disease usually develops in winter in people isolated by heavy snow for a long time.

Initial symptoms include loss of appetite, nausea and vomiting. Subsequently, the person develops the illusion of becoming a monster. Surprisingly, the frequency of cases of Wendigo psychosis sharply decreased in the 20th century, when they began to actively join Western culture.

Modern ideas about the Wendigo

And these days, many seriously believe in the existence of an evil forest monster. It is reported that already in the new millennium, a wendigo was allegedly spotted in northwestern Ontario, near the city of Kenora. According to the testimony of hunters, traveling traders and travelers, the monster often appears on the shores of Lake Forest. According to legends, it is in these places that the lair of the evil cannibal is located. The town of Kenora has been given the unofficial title of Wendigo Capital of the World.

They say that a bloodthirsty monster, almost five meters tall, still roams the forests and prairies of the North American continent, terrifying not only local residents, but also visiting tourists. Despite all the efforts of those fighting the monster, we have to admit: the Wendigo cannot be killed, it is immortal.

If you look at it, the United States of America, despite all its gloss and imaginary civilization, still has many places over which the power and will of man has no power. Its dominance has not been proven in these strange, sometimes frightening places, filled with a variety of flora and fauna.

Yes, in truth, south Georgia is different from everything we have already seen. The most wonderful, creepy and beautiful place here, undoubtedly, is the swamp with the mysterious name Okefenokee Swamp.

The area occupied, almost all of two hundred hectares of watery and precarious land, formerly belonged to the Simenoles, an American Indian tribe that has survived to this day only due to its original huge numbers. This, and, perhaps, the proud, uncompromising spirit of the Indians allowed them to survive in the unequal struggle with the pale-faced ones. But that’s not what we’re talking about at all.

The swamp is called Okefenoke with the light hand of the Simenoles. In their language this word means “Shaking Earth.” Today, the entire swamp belongs to the “Swamp Park” - a National Nature Reserve, and there are even organized excursions here.

However, the Okefenokee is not easy to understand or even accept. The Indians have always respected this fragile land. After all, a swamp brings surprises, and where there was a dry area a day ago, a quagmire can easily arise and drag down, for example, a building or a bridge, or a bivouac, along with sleeping people.

The indigenous people believed that an evil spirit walked through these swamps, the embodiment of everything negative and bad, evil in its purest form, called Wendigo, dragging away the souls of random travelers, and even looking into the surroundings of the swamp. However, the Indians also believed in the highest justice, the one who is pure in heart, brave, honest and kind, could compete with the Wendigo in strength, and even come out of the trouble alive, having acquired new patrons, and at the same time, unlimited abilities.

What we see in reality, without going into esotericism and mysticism, also amazes the imagination. Huge centuries-old trees, sometimes growing straight from the water, bushes covered either with fragrant flowers, which, for some reason, are not pollinated by bees, or with bright fruits that animals do not eat. The vegetation here is lush, and animals and birds are not afraid of anything.

Those who were born and raised here, and such people call themselves “swamp people,” regardless of skin color or nationality, tell amazing stories about real thunderclaps coming from the swamp, about strange moans and screams. Modern scientists consider this to be the release of combustion products to the surface, but you and I know where the Wendigo walks...

In some parts of the swamp there are sufficiently dry spaces where you can set up a camp, but keep in mind that you are unlikely to be allowed to light an open fire due to safety reasons. Burning peat, and there is simply a colossal amount of it here, is a terrible disaster. Smoke from burning peat bogs, which spontaneously ignite from time to time, sometimes spreads over many thousands of kilometers.

In addition, it is full of alligators, ready to feast on unlucky travelers and blame it on the innocent Indian spirit. The red shadows of pumas move silently between the thickets, creeping up on the victim, terribly poisonous snakes sit on almost every hummock, and above all this, constantly buzzing, humming, and also biting, a great variety of insects, occasionally eaten birds.

Have you lost the desire to visit this amazing place? Well, great, then pack your backpacks and go, just prepare thoroughly for the trip.

You will have to fork out some money to visit and take a boat or canoe excursion, and to stay overnight, to the delight of mosquitoes and alligators, you have to pay even more, but it is 100% worth it!

In a cape of white matted wool, not much more than just a tall man, incredibly skinny and bony, sometimes without the tips of the ears, several fingers, nose or lips, completely bald or very, very shaggy - this is the Wendigo, the ice monster of the Algolquin tribes; a monster that was once a man, and is now a creature that feeds its insatiable hunger with human flesh. This is no ordinary monster. Wendigo is the physical embodiment of the metaphysical spirit of winter Cold and Hunger.

Wendigo
Windigo- variant spelling of the name Wendigo in Latin
Windigo
Windigo- variant of the Russian spelling of the name Wendigo

If one winter you find yourself lost in the forests of North America, don’t worry! There are a dense crowd of people there, you can meet anyone and you won’t die from cold and hunger. Just don't be crazy. Especially if you start hearing strange sounds in the forest - don’t freak out! If you start freaking out and looking around nervously, you're in trouble. It will immediately seem that you see some kind of flickering, it will seem to you that behind the trees someone or something is moving so quickly that the eye cannot follow it... After some time, the flickering will subside. And then, when the wendigo barks right in your ear, you will understand that he was just getting closer to you. And you will rush... You will jump into your last race. 7th letter from mr. McGrogan

From a practical point of view, the Wendigo is primarily an exceptional cannibal hunter. It is difficult to determine who he is first of all: a terrible cannibal or a hunter. Not a trapper, but a kicking hound. So, on the one hand, the wendigo feeds exclusively on human flesh. In preparation for the long winter (when fresh tourists become scarce), the Wendigo even stores supplies on tree branches in a large cauldron, filling it to the brim with human meat. In rare cases, the wendigo stores supplies in its den and in fresh form. Among his preferences: the sweet fat of children, the soft skin of women, the fleshy parts of men, the fragile bones of the elderly.

On the other hand, it is well known that the Wendigo, like no other, is able to enjoy the hunt, receiving incredible pleasure from the gradual transition of the self-confident Yankee from the state of a frivolous tourist-hunter to a distraught fugitive-prey. It must be said that the Wendigo conducts this score masterfully, fortunately, he has something to create his theme with: amazingly handsome fangs and plector claws (the former easily pierce human skulls, and the message can tear and cut anything, even mithril), an absolute ear for music (recognizes the tone of the chosen victim's heartbeat from many miles away), all-weather and night vision (seemingly in infrared mode), amazing abilities for onomatopoeia and sound generation (can reproduce any voice, his whistle has the hypnotic power of luring a person to the place where he is hiding wendigo). And, of course, his chorus: wolves and bears, ravens and eagles summoned from the darkest thickets, for whose songs the wendigo pays with part of the prey. The appropriate ambience is created by controlled atmospheric phenomena: from a whispering breeze to a storm. Agree, impressive accompaniment. It should also be added that experienced wendigos can use lighting effects to enhance the emotional response from their concert. In particular, they are capable of causing darkness to fall at least an hour earlier than expected.

All these wendigos are the curse of the North American continent.

No one knows for sure how and where it comes from. However, there are several versions:

1. Heroic - in order to ward off the threat from the native tribe in difficult times of trials, the strongest warrior of the tribe sacrifices his soul to the spirits of the forest. So he turns into a terrible monster, capable of frightening any enemy. When the threat to the tribe is eliminated, the monster warrior goes into the deepest thicket, where his heart turns into an ice stone - a man becomes a wendigo.

2. Magical - they say that a shaman or sorcerer who is overly keen on black, harmful magic turns into a wendigo. Some, however, stipulate that for actual transformation into a Wendigo there is a small but very important condition - the sorcerer will not become a monster until he tastes human flesh. It seems that for those who purposefully seek such a metamorphosis, this is not the greatest test.

The first symptom of transformation into a wendigo is the appearance of a strange smell that only the future monster can smell. After the appearance of this soul-disturbing smell, the victim wakes up at night from the horror of nightmares and his own crying. Next, the person begins to feel a burning pain in the legs and feet, which becomes so unbearable that the person runs into the forest, throwing off both his shoes and clothes. This is how the transformation into wendigo occurs not only of sorcerers and shamans who have broken tribal taboos, but also of those who have been cursed by the wendigo. Most of the cursed victims never return from the forest, and those who do return will remain insane forever.

3. Accidentally infectious - it is believed that any random hunter who is simply unlucky enough to meet a real wendigo in the night forest, whose old body has worn out, can become a wendigo. In this case, the monster will not just kill the unlucky traveler, but will itself inhabit his body. Another wendigo - a spirit after all - can move into a person if he falls asleep in the forest. However, spending the night under your own roof is also not a panacea for wendigos.

The moment the spirit penetrates a person is marked by severe nausea and pain. Vomiting is uncontrollable, for several hours without a break, until there is gastric juice and blood. Eventually, the person loses a huge amount of blood and inevitably dies. Meanwhile, the body undergoes a terrible transformation. The body grows in volume, a thick layer of white fur appears. Physical strength and weight increase significantly, and supernatural forces are included in the process. The Wendigo spirit introduces purely animal components into the human body - powerful fangs and sharp teeth. The nails metamorphose into sharp claws. The evil spirit then animates the body, not as a human, but as a bloodthirsty beast known as a wendigo.

4. Vile-gastronomic - among North American Indians there are also such stories related to the birth of the Wendigo... “These stories usually talk about a harsh winter, and about someone cut off from the outside world, left without food. Trying to survive, he eats his family or friends. But he still fails to survive, since his crime destroys everything human in him...”

5. Voluntary - there will always be people who themselves want to become monsters. Those who want to become a Wendigo start by fasting. It lasts several days, after which the person goes into the forest. There he offers his body to the Wendigo. He can accept his body both as shelter and food. However, sometimes it happens that the wendigo seems to adopt such volunteers. Over time, their bodies become abundantly covered with hair, claws grow, their eyes become yellow and huge, a craving for raw human flesh develops, and various supernatural abilities begin to appear. Although such Wendig “stepchildren” are much weaker than their stepfathers.

But these are all abstract questions. The fact remains that the Wendigo exists and must be fought. Fighting a wendigo is difficult, but possible.

Firstly, due to its icy nature, the Wendigo cannot help but be afraid of fire. Therefore, when spending the night in the forest, always keep the fire blazing, not smoldering. The time spent on collecting firewood will pay for itself. Secondly, arrange for protective amulets and talismans from local shamans ahead of time. If you neglected it, plug your ears with at least some headphones. Earplugs, at worst. Yes, just cotton wool from a Narvi padded jacket... However, the surest thing is silver. But not just a cross on a chain (the wendigo is not a vampire, for him it’s just a bauble), but a silver-plated blade or an argentum bullet in the barrel: any wounds on the wendigo heal very (very!) quickly. The only exceptions are those inflicted with silver weapons. These two things - fire and silver - are very painful and even fatal for the Wendigo.

If you are planning to kill a wendigo, then you need to act seriously and for sure. Remember - there is no turning back. A Wendigo that is not completely killed will pursue its would-be killer even across oceans. There have been such cases. So, stock up on silver bullets and silver your knife. A knife is better; you're probably not very good with a sword. You can also plate the ax with silver. In any case, cutting up a wendigo’s body with an ax will be more convenient than with a knife. But it needs to be divided. Although some say that "the only sure way to truly deal with a wendigo is to burn it to the ground and make sure that its icy heart melts," shamans advise being more pedantic:

After localizing the monster (which in itself is not an easy task), its heart must be pierced with some sharp silver object (stake, arrow, knife, axe, bullet - your choice). Then the body should be dismembered (here you will need an ax with a silver-plated blade) in order to collect the fragments of the ice heart and securely fix them in any silver container. After which these containers with parts of the wendigo heart should be buried in consecrated places such as a cemetery or some kind of tomb (possibly in a church or some other religious building of any religious nature). The body of the Wendigo itself, dismembered with a silver ax, should be sprinkled with salt (each part of the body is salted separately) and burned to the ground, scattering the ashes in the wind, or hidden in extremely far apart from each other and inaccessible places (the seabed, the bottom of a canyon, or something will do). something similar).

That's what they are, Wendigos.

edited news VENDETTA - 22-02-2012, 10:57

Goblins, orcs and moroks - no matter what terrible monsters the devil’s imagination gave birth to, but these were not all that inhabited the planets from the cloud of chaos and darkness. Now I want to introduce you to such a horror of death as the Wendigo, a creature known as Windigo and Windego.

This deadly creature is described in Native American legends, especially among the Algonquian people.

These peoples are among the most widespread and numerous Native American groups in North America, and in the past lived throughout the Atlantic coast and Great Lakes region.

However, in the memories of other Indian tribes, mystical creatures like the Wendigo also haunt the legends of the Iroquois and their Algonquian neighbors. Among these cultures, the nightmare known as Stonecoat (Stone Skin) bears some resemblance to the Wendigo cannibal incarnation. Just don’t look for the reasons for bloodthirstiness in moral or ethical deformity, the matter here is similar to something else, in a terrible mutation of the body.

Who is the Wendigo, the mysticism and horror of the jungle.

An insatiable hunger, a thirst for human flesh and blood, this is what the name Wendigo means. To avoid scary words, it is “an evil spirit that devours the human body and soul.” Another comparative concept to this jungle minotaur, said to have been applied by a German explorer around 1860, was combining the word "Wendigo" with the name "Cannibal".

Speaking of the bloodthirsty cannibal killer, their sense of insatiable hunger for human flesh is noted, and some rumors say they are still hungry. The feeling of animal hunger is reflected in the appearance of the monster; he is extremely, rather painfully thin. However, despite the skinny physique, the man-eater is presented in myths as a huge humanoid beast with a height of about 4.5 meters.

Yes, there is a slight difference in the physical description of this creature in different cultures. But in general, as a rule, the legends agree, with large and sharp yellow fangs, and a long tongue, licking the remains of the feast from the face. The bones of this passion are covered with yellowish skin, although other stories claim that the monster is covered with matted hair on rotten skin.

In fact, inaccurate descriptions are quite understandable, since obviously those who met the devilish creature, due to objective reasons, could no longer give testimony.

The appearance of Wendigo in the world.

In accordance with the most popular version of the origin of the Wendigo, it is recognized that the creature appeared precisely at a time when people were slipping into cannibalism. Even when a person justified it by survival, an evil spirit appeared in the frame of life. It turns out that when a person eats the meat of his own kind, he is subjected to an invasion of his body by an evil spirit, and he himself becomes a Wendigo, suffering.

Another version of the origin of this death specialist mentions the Pact with the Devil, saying: the first Wendigo was a warrior who made a pact with the devil. Worried about saving his tribe, the warrior sold his soul to the devil, voluntarily turning himself into a Wendigo and condemning himself to mutation. When peace came, and the tribe no longer needed a terrifying clot of evil in the flesh, the leaders acted cruelly - the warrior was expelled from the tribe, doomed to live separately from the world.

It’s a terrible thing, but some believe that a human heart still lives in this terrible creature, forced to live in a body beyond its control. This man is trapped, and by killing the devil's degenerate, it also kills the man. At the same time, some legends cite cunning mystical manipulations with the help of which a person can be successfully saved. - Although most likely this is nonsense, since no one has yet.

However, in most cases, death is the only way to free a person from the evil spirit that has captured his body. Wendigoag are believed to still be roaming the American forests, and many people are rumored to have disappeared over the years after being eaten by these creatures. From that area there are many reports of Wendigo sightings, not only by Native Americans, but also by white settlers.

In the late nineteenth century and early modern, an angry and bloodthirsty creature appeared near the village of Roseau, in northern Minnesota, and according to local stories, every time this huge creature was spotted there, someone suddenly disappeared.

Perhaps this whole story is an invention of mysticism lovers, however, as soon as the evil creature left the town, all the mysterious disappearances of people stopped, and everything returned to normal life without worries.

It must be said that this legend about the warrior lives firmly in folklore. Among the Cree people there is a traditional dance called "Wihtikokansimoowin" - "Wendigo dance". In it, the terrifying forest dweller is represented by dancers in a satirical tone, ridiculing this phenomenon from mythology. Some Native Americans even became "Wendigo hunters." — By the way, we have already written about

So, about mysticism and reality - at the beginning of the twentieth century, an 87-year-old man, Jack Fiddler, was brought to justice for the murder of a woman from the Cree tribe. Pleading guilty to the murder of a fellow tribesman, he said the following in his defense: the woman was going to become a Wendigo because she was possessed by an evil spirit. For this reason, I was forced to kill her before she killed the other members of the tribe.

In addition, the proceedings ended with the unexpected confession of Jack Fiddler, who publicly stated: I have killed at least 13 other Wendigoag throughout my life.