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The 'Beast of Gévaudan' (French: ''La bête du Gévaudan'') was a mysterious wolf-like creature that terrorised the former province of Gévaudan (modern day Lozère ''département''), in the Margeride Mountains in south-central France from about 1764 to 1767. Many attacks took place - between 60 and 100 people were killed - and debate continues as to the Beast's true identity. Unexplained! 347 Strange Sightings, Incredible Occurrences, and Puzzling Physical Phenomena, , Jerome, Clark, Visible Ink Press, , ISBN 0810394367 The story is a popular subject for cryptozoologists and conspiracy theorists.

Contents

Appearance

Attacks

The hunt for the beast

Jean Chastel

Explanations

In the arts and popular culture

References

See also

External links

Appearance

The Beast was described as being a wolflike creature the size of a cow, with a wide chest, a long sinuous tail with a lion-like tuft of fur on the end, and a greyhound-like head with small straight ears and large protruding fangs. The creature was said to have red fur, and a peculiar black stripe that ran down the length of its back.
Although it was said to be able to leap up to thirty feet, this most probably results from an error in reading its tracks.

Attacks

The first attack that provided a description of the creature took place in June of 1764. A girl from Langogne saw a large, lupine animal emerge from the trees and charge directly toward her, but it was driven away by the farm's bulls.
The creature's reported method of killing was unusual for a predator, often targeting the head, and ignoring the usual areas targeted by predators, including the legs and throat. Often the head was crushed or removed. It also seemed to target people over farm animals, reportedly having an aversion to cattle; many times it would attack someone while cattle were in the same field.
There were some reports that the beast was seen with another such animal, or with young. No recorded testimony implies the presence of a man nearby.
Though it is difficult to establish an exact number of victims, an estimate based on official documents gives over 198 attacks, including 36 wounded and 88 dead. Other sources could expand these results to over 308 attacks, including 51 wounded and 124 dead. The Beast's preference towards women and children is perhaps due to their working the country-side farms in pairs or even alone, making themselves easier targets. Men, however, tended to have objects that could be used as weapons, such as sickles, and often worked the fields in large groups.

The hunt for the beast

On January 12 1765, Jacques Portefaix and six friends were attacked by the Beast; they drove it away by staying grouped together. Their fight caught the attention of King Louis XV, who awarded 300 livres to the boys. The King then directed professional wolf-hunters, Jean-Charles-Marc-Antoine Vaumesle d'Enneval and his son Jean-François, to kill the beast.
They arrived in Clermont-Ferrand on February 17 1765, bringing with them eight bloodhounds which had been trained in wolf-hunting. They spent several months hunting wolves, believing them to be the beast. However the attacks continued, and by June 1765 they were replaced by François Antoine (also wrongly titled Antoine de Beauterne), the king's harquebus bearer and chief huntsman, and who held the title of Great Louvetier (wolf hunter) of the realm. He arrived in le Malzieu on June 22.
On September 20 1765, Antoine killed a large gray wolf measuring 80 cm high, 1.7 m long, and weighing 60 kg. The wolf was called 'Le Loup de Chazes,' after the nearby Abbaye des Chazes. It was agreed locally that this was quite large for a wolf. Antoine officially stated: ''"We declare by the present report signed from our hand, we never saw a big wolf that could be compared to this one. Which is why we estimate this could be the fearsome beast that caused so much damage."''
The wolf was stuffed and sent to Versailles where Antoine was received as a hero, receiving a large sum of money as well as titles and awards.
However, on December 2 1765, the Beast attacked again in la Besseyre Saint Mary, severely injuring two children. Dozens more deaths are reported to have followed.

Jean Chastel

The killing of the creature that eventually marked the end of the attacks is credited to a local hunter, Jean Chastel, at the Sogne d'Auvers on June 19, 1767.
Controversy surrounds Chastel's account of his success. Family tradition claimed that, when part of a large hunting party, he sat down to read the Bible and pray. During one of the prayers the creature came into sight, staring at Chastel, who finished his prayer before shooting the beast. This would have been aberrant behavior for the beast, as it would usually attack on sight. Some believe this is proof Chastel participated with the beast, or that even he had trained it. However, the story of the prayer may simply have been invented out of religious or romantic motives.

Explanations

Various explanations were offered at the time of the attacks. They
ranged from exaggerated accounts of wolf attacks, to a ''loup-garou''
(werewolf) all the way to the beast being
a punishment from God, or perhaps an unholy creature summoned by a
sorcerer.
Though wolves in the wild usually avoid contact with humans, they will
attack livestock when their natural prey runs out. Conversely the Beast
itself was said to have taken exclusively human victims, ignoring the
livestock present in the area. Some experts however, hold the belief
that wolves at the time may have been more aggressive than their modern
day counterparts, stating that today's generation of shy wolves are the
result of natural selection favouring animals which were less prone to
attacking humans with
firearms.^[1]
The areas in the world today where wolf attacks are still a common
occurrence are usually poverty stricken with a general lack of predator
control technology.^[2]
Other theories say the beast may have been an escaped captive exotic
animal such as a
hyena.^[3] Two species have been known to attack humans; the
striped hyena of Africa, the Middle East, Pakistan and
western India and the larger spotted hyena of Africa.
Hyenas are known to inflict injuries similar to the Beast of Gevaudan,
primarily biting the facial regions when attacking
humans^[4][5];
however hyenas do not have the smooth running gait ascribed to the
Beast, and are not good at jumping.
The slightly more logical explanation is that the beast was some form
of domestic dog or hybrid. This theory has found support from, among
many others, naturalist Michel Louis, author of
the book ''La bête du Gévaudan: L'innocence des loups'' (The Beast of
Gévaudan: Wolves Are Exonerated).
The beast may have been a wolfdog, according to the TV show
Animal X . Wolf-dog hybrids ware usually
noted as not sharing their wolf parent's fear of man and it would have
also been quite trainable, perhaps lending further credence to the
reports that the Beast was seen in the company of a human.
According to Loren Coleman's Cryptozoology A to Z, page 35, that a
taxidermist at the National Museum of Natual History in Paris, Franz
Jullien by name, discovered that an animal similar to the description
and
listed as shot by Jean Chastel, had been stuffed and was on display
from 1766 to 1819. It had been definitely identified as an African
striped hyena.

In the arts and popular culture

★ Robert Louis Stevenson travelled through the region in 1878 and described the legend in his book ''Travels with a Donkey in the Cévennes'':

For this was the land of the ever-memorable BEAST, the Napoleon Bonaparte of wolves. What a career was his! He lived ten months at free quarters in Gévaudan and Vivarais; he ate women and children and ‘shepherdesses celebrated for their beauty’; he pursued armed horsemen; he has been seen at broad noonday chasing a post-chaise and outrider along the king’s high-road, and chaise and outrider fleeing before him at the gallop. He was placarded like a political offender, and ten thousand francs were offered for his head. And yet, when he was shot and sent to Versailles, behold! a common wolf, and even small for that.

★ The horror fiction writer Clark Ashton Smith was inspired to write "The Beast of Averoigne" and other short stories set in an ancient Auvergne.

★ The legend surrounding the attacks spawned a movie, ''Brotherhood of the Wolf'' (2001), which, while based on the records of the creature, also took several creative liberties in order to make the story more entertaining. The movie portrays the creature as an Atlas Lion equipped with a type of armor to make it seem more threatening. Generating positive reviews and record business, it is primarily fictional.

★ A barely more accurate version of the historic events was shown in the TV-film ''La bête du Gévaudan'', France 2003, first aired by the station ARTE in 2005, directed by Patrick Volson.

★ The creature was subject of an episode of the television series ''Animal-X''.

★ The creature is incorporated into the plot of the novel ''Rogue Angel: Destiny''.

★ The beast appears indirectly in Caitlin R. Kiernan's dark fantasy story "The Road of Pins" (in ''To Charles Fort, With Love'') and is also mentioned in her 2003 novel, ''Low Red Moon''.

★ The board game ''Nightmare'' features a playable character named "Gévaudan the Werewolf".

References

1. http://www.wolftrust.org.uk/a-wkp7-explaining-attacks.html
2. WOLF
ATTACKS ON HUMANS
3. [1]

4. http://www.interplastgrandrounds.org/virtual_tour_hyena_attack.html
5. http://www.jewishsf.com/content/2-0-/module/displaystory/story_id/1870/edition_id/28/format/html/displaystory.html

See also

List of fatal wolf attacks

External links

★ Occultopedia: Beast of Gévaudan

★ Shadow of the Beast

★ The Cryptid Zoo: Beast of Gévaudan

★ Beast of Gévauland, a show by Théâtre S'Amourailles

★ Cassiopaea.org: Window Fallers

★ La Bête Website