Wrought from insatiable hunger, the wendigo makes its way into the hearts of humans possessing them to commit the act of cannibalism. The wendigo… Is it fact or fiction? Can there really be a creature that can possess a person and cause them to do the unthinkable? Is it possible for someone to turn into 1 of these creatures? Or is this just a metaphorical translation of greed? This creature hails from Algonquian folklore and the tales of the horrors committed have been passed on for generations. Read more and decide for yourself if this creature is real or not. This article is on special request from my friend Nicole.
First the Stats…
Scientific name: Cryophagus maleficus
Weight: Up to 1,200 lbs.
Length: Up to 10 feet
Lifespan: Unknown
Now on to the Facts!
1.) This entity has been said to cause not only insatiable hunger, but the desire to commit murder.
2.) The creature is also said to take the lives of humans.
3.) It’s described as being a giant humanoid with a heart of ice, and whose approach is signaled by a horrid stench and a sudden unseasonable chill.
4.) Wendigo psychosis is a condition characterized by symptoms like an intense craving for human flesh and fear of becoming a cannibal.
5.) This psychosis also causes symptoms like insatiable greed and the wanton destruction of the environment.
But wait, there’s more on the wendigo!
6.) This being also appears in many Native American cultures, and has many different translations. The source of the English word is the Ojibwe word wiindigoo. In the Cree language it is wīhtikow, which is also transliterated wetiko.
7.) Other transliterations include: Wiindigoo, Weendigo, Windego, Wiindgoo, Windgo, Windago, Windiga, Wendego, Windagoo, Widjigo, Wiijigoo, Wijigo, Weejigo, Wìdjigò, Wintigo, Wentigo, Wehndigo, Wentiko, Windgoe, Wītikō, as well as Wintsigo.
Did you know…?
Although depictions can vary slightly, common to all cultures is the view that the wendigo is a malevolent, cannibalistic, supernatural being, strongly associated with cold, the north, winter, famine, and starvation.
8.) This horrifying creature was skinny to the point of emaciation, its desiccated skin pulled tightly over its bones. With its bones pushing out against its skin, its complexion the ashy-gray color of death, and its eyes pushed back deep into their sockets. It looked like a gaunt skeleton recently disinterred from the grave. What lips it had were tattered and bloody. It was unclean and suffering from suppuration of the flesh. It also gave off a strange and eerie odor of decay and decomposition, of death and corruption.
9.) The afore mentioned description was given by Basil H. Johnston, an Ojibwe teacher and scholar from Ontario
10.) Whenever a wendigo ate another person, it would grow in proportion to the meal it had just consumed, so it could never be full. Therefore, wendigos are portrayed as simultaneously gluttonous yet extremely thin due to starvation.
But wait, there’s still more on the wendigo!
11.) Wendigos are seen as the embodiment of excess, gluttony, and greed, and are never satisfied after killing and consuming 1 person, they are constantly searching for new victims.
12.) A story often told led the listeners through a gory tail where a boy was taken by a wendigo to be eaten, but the boy wasn’t fat enough. The creature took the boy to a village where the boy told the villagers of how the creature cut his hand to see if he was fat enough. The villagers set out and cut off the legs of the creature. When they returned the next day the wendigo was eating the marrow from his own bones.
Did you know…?
Although in many recorded cases of wendigo psychosis the individual has been killed to prevent cannibalism from resulting. There are some Cree folklores that recommend treatment by ingestion of fatty animal meats or drinking animal grease; those treated may sometimes vomit ice as part of the curing process.
13.) The villagers decided to cut the creature into pieces, leaving it for dead. Thus was the end of that wendigo.
14.) A ceremony, known as wiindigookaanzhimowin, was performed during times of famine, and included wearing masks and dancing backward around a drum. The last known ceremony conducted in the United States was at Lake Windigo of Star Island of Cass Lake, within the Leech Lake Indian Reservation in northern Minnesota.
15.) The psychosis makes people so ravenous for human flesh that they pounce upon women, children, and even men, like virtual werewolves, and devour them voraciously, without being able to appease or satisfy their appetite; ever seeking fresh prey, and the more greedily the more they eat.
But wait, there’s still a little more on the wendigo!
16.) Another well-known case involving this psychosis was of Jack Fiddler, an Oji-Cree chief and medicine man known for his powers at defeating wendigos. In some cases, this involved killing people with wendigo psychosis. As a result, in 1907, Fiddler and his brother Joseph were arrested by the Canadian authorities for homicide. Jack committed suicide, but Joseph was tried and sentenced to life in prison. He ultimately was granted a pardon but died three days later in jail before receiving the news of this pardon.
17.) The occurrence of wendigo psychosis cases reduced sharply in the 20th century as Boreal Algonquian people came into more and more contact with European ideologies and more sedentary, less rural, lifestyles.
18.) The concept of wendigos can be applied to any person, idea, or movement infected by a corrosive drive toward self-aggrandizing greed and excessive consumption, traits that sow disharmony and destruction if left unchecked.
19.) With the evidence presented before you, what are your thoughts? Is this creature real, a figment of macabre imagination, or simply a metaphor for greed and destruction? You decide and comment below with your thoughts.
Now a Short Wendigo Video!
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Some source material acquired from: Wikipedia
Photo credit: Historic Mysteries
