Shamanic therianthropy

From Greek mythology to Celtic story telling, from western Cameroon to medieval Europe the imagery may change but the subliminal language speaks of the same primeval concepts, that of transformation, be it into mouse, cat, deer, wolf or any other animal. But could these age old transformation stories hold a deeper spiritual meaning?
For instance there are many traces left of an earlier, more benevolent meaning, hidden within the artistic symbolism of today’s modern highly stereotyped wolfman figure. Could this be due to some unconscious expression of the original nature, separate from the medical cases of lycanthropic insanity? Carl Jung’s explanation for the spirituality of alchemy expresses many similarities to the animal transformation in its own transformation metaphor that of base metal into gold.
Carlo Ginzburg has pieced together concepts of a post-shamanic origin for these tails of animal transformation during the years of witch crazed Europe.
Within the realms of documented werewolf cases are several interesting cases of lycanthropy. These cases point significantly to shamanic beliefs and practices. Such as in a case reported in Livonia in 1692. An eighty year old man called Theiss claimed to be one of a group of Livonian werewolves who not only did not eat humans, but could not. He said that on three nights of the year they would change shape into that of a wolf travelling to hell to fight for the fertility of their communities’ fields. His human body would remain behind while his transformed spirit would travel to this other reality, he claimed that this was the were-wolfs job. This was also said to be true for both the Russian and German werewolves of this time although each group would travel down to their own particular hell’ to fight for their fertility rites.
It has been recognised that the visual structure of the shamans inner spirit world’ is highly effected by social expectations, although still holding the same universal messages and interpretations, much like the function of Carl Jung’s archetypes. Many shamanic orientated cultures hold similar beliefs to this fertility ritual described by Theiss, and this would help explain why the Russian and German werewolves went down to there own particular hell.
There were also some fifty cases based on specially marked out people who were called benandanti’. These people were usually chosen at birth by a special mark, often being a Caul’ a amniotic membrane still attached to the heads of newly borns, or by some other physical defect. This is also how the shamans and medicine men of pre-religious cultures were usually chosen if not inherited.
These benandanti’s like the shaman’s of earlier cultures would battle against the darker side of the spirit world in fertility rituals for example much like Theiss and the Livonian werewolves. There spirits would leave their bodies changing into other were-animals such as butter flies and mice, sometimes riding on the back of hares, cats and many other animals’. Many of the benandanti were reported to fall into cataleptic like states, and were unable to be woken even by the flame of candles’ while battling for the fertility of the harvest.
There are many similar reports of people falling into similar states, while there souls’ travel far distances in many different forms. For instance a Danish king called Harold is reported to have sent a warlock in the form of a whale to Iceland, while his body lay stiff and stark at home.’
But what of the Greek transformation tales like Zeus who could change into many animal forms including serpents, bulls, a swan, even an ant. Or Apollo as a dolphin or wolf as well as many more. Should these also be classed as the same? There are hundreds of similar documented reports scattered throughout ancient world literature and mythology. For myths such as these there could have been two uses. One, that of a were-animal -the possible explanation we shall come to- and the other a teaching tale, from the wise story tellers, usually shamans in pre-religious cultures. These where often in animal form relating to familiar animals of the region of the tale.
So what are the were-animals? Or what did they represent? To give us a possible idea of the meanings there are a people still living in forested parts of Western Cameroon called the Banyang who perceive the were-animal as a kind of “spirit double” an expression of the persons character traits or character potentials, represented in animal form. The same is said of the neo-shamanic totem animal which itself is said to be connected to your spirit, usually staying throughout life even if we are not always aware of it. The totem animal is also known as a principal power animal.
The power animal, which although are like the totem beast usually don’t stay with a person throughout their lives. These can be related to are none stagnant characteristics, while the principal power animal is a stagnant, dominant characteristic.
The subconscious part of are psyche -which is known by many different names including the hidden self, the child within and the animal self- communicates to the conscious mind through a visual language. This is where Kenneth Meadows says the power and totem animals are formed by spiritual energy’.
Totem and power animals seem to be some kind of spiritual expression from non-conscious levels of the human spirit, which teach, guide and help us. So could the legends of the werewolf etc. have originally been based on the human spirits need to guide it’s physical body in the right direction’?