Beast of Gevaudan - Werewolf or a Huge Wolf Like Beast?
During the summer of 1765, the beast attacked many children. As time passed, entire villages were abandoned. People reported they saw the beast look at them through the windows of their homes. Many of the peasants were afraid to venture out. Some of the peasants were too scared to shoot at it even when they had a clear shot.
In June of 1767, the Marquis d'Apcher, who lived in the western part of Gevaudan, gathered a group of several hundred trackers and hunters. The beast's massacres had to be stopped. They fanned out in small bands over the area.
On the evening of June 19th, the beast charged at the men in one of the bands.
One of hunters, Jean Chastel, believed the beast was a loup-garou and had loaded his rifle with silver bullets. He shot at it twice and the second shot pierced the beast's heart, killing it. The animal was gutted and they found a collar bone of a young girl in its stomach.
The beast killed about 60 people. The state soent over 29,000 livres, a fortune at the time, to track it down and kill it.
The body was carried throughout Gevaudan for two weeks before it was going to be sent to Versailles. The carcass started to putrefy and it was buried somewhere in the countryside.
There are two other versions as to what happened to the body. One has it being burned after the beast was killed. The article, itself, gives so much other detail that it reads more like fiction. The other has the body being transported to Versailles and stuffed and mounted, but, mysteriously disappearing, another thing fiction is made of.
Many experts on wolves, if this is what the beast was, believe that wolf attacks are extremely rare. This has been evidenced by documentation. Whatever the Beast of Gevaudan was belongs to the realm of cryptozoology, because of its size and the fact that it killed so many people so violently and savagely. It is odd that the dogs fled in terror when they saw the beast. Dogs have been used in hunting wolves and they have been known to mate with them. The beast was shot many times before it was killed by a silver bullet.
Mutant wolf? Werewolf? There are documented court cases of people who confessed that they were werewolves. When caught, they were in human form. The beast remained a beast and was killed in
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