La Bête Du Gévaudan

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In 1764 something began hunting and killing humans in the Gevaudan, now the department of Lozere.  There were an estimated 210 attacks, with 113 dead and about 49 injured.  One will note the ratio of dead to wounded.  About 98 of those killed were eaten.  This statue of Marie-Jeanne Valet by Philip Kaeppelin sums up the whole thing quite nicely.

https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/marie-jeanne-valet-vs-the-beast-of-gevaudan



It did not look like this.


Or this.


And it sure did not look like this terrifying image from the movie Brotherhood of the Wolf, which was most enjoyable, entertaining, and historically accurate with the general look of the whole thing.

Some of the pictures drawn at the time do resemble this thing.

See what I mean?


This is what the beast looked like.  No, perhaps not.  It is now thought that the beast was a lion, which would explain a lot.  It could have escaped from a circus or private zoo.


 Tres formidable.  Here is a light hearted article about this amusing episode-



Several hunters killed  big wolves with the body of the one sent to Versailles declared a fake, a Jenny Haniver as it were.  Jean Chastel, a local, killed a huge wolf during a hunt in 1767, and the attacks stopped.  His reward is to be accused of raising and training the animal.


 Some believe that a human in a fursuit committed these hideous acts.  


Hmmm...not proven.


This is from the autopsy of the 'beast' conducted by the incredible polymath Georges-Louis Leclerc, Comte de Buffon.  His conclusion was that the beast was a very large wolf.  This does not mean that the primary culprit was a wolf as the beast did not behave like any wolf before or since.  I must emphasize that France had a bureaucracy second to none and there is no doubt that these attacks took place, they were extremely well documented.


It is easier to believe that someone is lying than to believe in a miracle.



Comments

  1. chaosfive55November 9, 2020 at 6:04 PM

    Hyenadon. They still prowl the French countryside, I have no doubt!

    ReplyDelete

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