Fear of the Scary Big Bad Wolf Story ?
In a poorly tamed natural space, wild lands and the animals they shelter inspire fear and mistrust in men of the Middle Ages. More than any other animal, the big bad wolf story crystallizes this fear from the depths of the ages.
The forest, a space on the fringes of the law
Relationships between humans and wolves are probably thousands of years old. But it is probably at the beginning of the Middle Ages, between the 7th and the 12th century, that these relationships, by multiplying, take on the most considerable symbolic weight. Winter, cold, snow, the forest, but also wars, famine and misery, in a society that lives more in the countryside than in the city, are then associated with the presence of wolves, considered as a revealer of the temporary difficulties and weakness of men.
In the Christian era, forests were places on the fringes of human law. Impenetrable, obscure, a refuge from harmful forces, they represent a constant threat. The very word foresta originally designated a more or less wooded area, excluded from common uses, at the sole disposal of the king or prince. This "forest" most often constitutes a reserve of wild animals intended to ensure the maintenance of a fundamental aristocratic ritual, hunting. There are also real game parks, protected by ditches and enclosures. Wild boars, deer, fallow deer, foxes and rabbits are the hosts of choice, while wolves, considered as pests, are eliminated. On the continent, wolves, who have left their normal habitat on the Eurasian steppes and great plains, find refuge in the forests, away from men.
The "Western Tiger"
In the 9th century, the hordes of wolves were thus in full resurgence. The damage which these animals cause, by attacking cattle or men, obliges the central government to intervene. So Charlemagne enacts measures to try to fight against the proliferation of these animals.
But the organization of systematic beatings at the time of reproduction only produced insufficient results: in 846, during a cold winter, the arrival of hundreds of wolves in Western Europe, and particularly in Aquitaine, provoked a veritable panic.
The "Western Tiger", which hardly spares the southernmost parts of Europe, thus feeds the tales and gradually furnishes childish terrors. Progressing in successive waves from the east, the hordes of wolves take over from the hordes of Barbarians. Reputedly eaters of humans, and even of corpses, which are said to be dug up, wolves in reality rarely attack humans. But, if the winter is really cold, if the hunger tortures the animals too strongly, then these animals do not hesitate to attack the isolated, the weak - whether it be small cattle or old people and children.
Wolves have invaded Paris…
Thus, horrified witnesses describe them advancing in columns, even on the roads built by men. So the inhabitants, as they would do in front of human invaders, have no other solution than to hide in their homes. But, in some extreme circumstances, places populated by humans are no longer enough to deter wolves.
In 1438-1439, one of the most terrible winters that Europe has known, groups of wolves enter even the cities: it is the case in Paris, where they sow terror. From their fear of these beasts, men have tried to rid themselves by ridiculing the wolf in the literary tradition. Despite this, the myth of the anthropophagous and demonic big bad wolf remains the strongest: the killings of the "Beast of Gévaudan" will have nothing to envy to the wolf attacks that fueled medieval imagination.
A devilish beast
Sent by God to punish men for their sins, slaughtering lost sheep deprived of their good shepherd, the big bad wolf is clothed in a demonic character which is reinforced by current myths and pagan cults.
The Wolf of Gubbio
The most famous example of a miraculous intervention remains that of Saint Francis of Assisi, at the beginning of the 13th century, who crosses a wolf threatening the Italian city of Gubbio and convinces it to leave the inhabitants in peace, provided that they supply it with regular food.
The intercession of the saints
The rare protectors of the big bad wolf are the holy characters of Christianity, the only ones capable of transforming evil into good, of driving out the demon of the animal to make it the instrument of God. This is why many localities have put themselves under the protection of a famous saint in the matter. Thus saint Loup (Loup de Bayeux), bishop of Bayeux (in the 5th century); Saint Nicholas in Poland and Saint George in Russia are "shepherds of wolves"; the Abbess of Pavilly, Saint Austrebertha (died in 704), submits to her power a green wolf, celebrated in the Norman Jumièges Abbey.
