Wolf of Ansbach

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The Wolf von Ansbach (also Werewolf von Ansbach ) was an allegedly man-eating wolf that is said to have attacked an unknown number of people in Ansbach - Neuses around 1685 .

history

Peasants Hunt and Kill the Wolf (Contemporary Flyer)

Probably due to a lack of game, the wolf began attacking humans. Two or three children were killed within three months. Some of the citizens of Ansbach believed that the late fraudulent caretaker Michael Leicht had been turned into a wolf as a punishment. It was said that he watched his own funeral and would appear at night as a werewolf wrapped in a white cloth. In any case, the citizens were convinced that this animal was possessed by the devil.

Michael Leicht is said to have visited his old apartment as a werewolf (contemporary flyer)
Hanged wolf from Ansbach

While chasing a chicken, the wolf fell into a wolf pit , a well covered with brushwood, and was killed there by the citizens. After the carcass was displayed, the wolf's hide was stripped off. The body was provided with a face made of cardboard, disguised with a wig and a cape and hung on a specially built gallows on the Nuremberg mountain near Ansbach.

At that time, poems were also written about the wolf, which provide information about the wolf and the acts accused of it:

I wolf, a fierce animal and eater of many children, / whom I respect far more than fat sheep and cattle, / a rooster that killed me, a fountain was my death; / Now I hang on the gallows, to mockery of all people. / As a spirit and a wolf at the same time I plague people, / How right it happens to me that people now say: / Ha! you cursed ghost went into the wolf, / are now hanging on the gallows here adorned with human hair. / This is the right reward and well-deserved gift, / If you have earned, the gallows is your grave. / Got this drink money for you because you ate human children / Like an angry animal and a real thief & c.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ How the Werewolf Came among Witches. About the genesis of this process variant . www.elmar-lorey.de. Retrieved May 25, 2009.
  2. ↑ Wolfgang Schild: The history of jurisdiction. Nikol, Hamburg 1997, ISBN 3-930656-74-4 , p. 67, licensed edition: Georg D. W. Callwey, Munich 1980, ISBN 3-7667-0782-5 .
  3. ^ Franz von Kobell: Wildanger in the Gutenberg-DE project

See also

literature