Question by Ry: did cherokee indians (shamans to be exact) have anything to do with the wolf?
well, more specifically, i am looking for reliable information about:
1. native americans’ relationship with werewolves
2. werewolves
3. any sites with good information.
also, what would happen if a vampire and a werewolf (or someone who had just been infected with lycanthropy) had a child with a vampire?
i’m writing a book… please answer seriously i hate bs answers.
Best answer:
Answer by Quan D
I’m so sorry. Can’t help u.
ps:it sounds a lot like twilight.
Know better? Leave your own answer in the comments!
There’s a culture I think has been co-opted enough.
twilight strikes again. i haven’t seen this much interest since dances with wolves came out.
its a movie. cherokee or any other north american tribe/nation do not have shamans. natives do not turn into werewolves nor do we have a relationship with werewolves. there are no such things as werewolves.
i doubt you will believe me. after all there was a movie and i’m just some native so what do i know.
“Werewolves” and “shamans” are not Native American terms.
If you want information on Native American “shamans” look up medicine men and women. As for “werewolves” what you want is skinwalkers (Navajo or Dine). And if you are looking for a connection between werewolves and vampires check out the beliefs of Slavic countries.
Some terms that might help:
yenaldlooshi, vrykolakas, strigoi, brujeria, wendigo
Read “The Social Biology of Werewolves” by W.M.S. Russell and Claire Russell. You can order it form JSTOR or read it in the book “Animals in Folklore”.
There are several people from history who wrote about Native American beliefs; some accounts are very biased against the Native beliefs and some are more fair: Henry Schoolcraft, Frances Densmore, Peter Esprit Radisson, The Jesuit Relations (73 volumes).
Here is a fictional story about “Indian werewolves” but it is written from a very anti-Native American view, is based on European beliefs, and doesn’t accurately reflect the traditions of the Iroquois. I include it because it is an interesting piece of history and a look at how some people viewed the Native peoples and werewolves:
http://gaslight.mtroyal.ca/werwolvs.htm
You might enjoy “The Beast of Bray Road” and “Hunting the American Werewolf” both by Linda Godfrey.
EDIT: One of the most original things you could do is stay true to the real beliefs. Very few fiction writers do this. It won’t be easy. You will have a lot of research ahead of you, but it would be a great thing to try.
Kinda hard to answer your question because there is no such thing as a Native American “Shaman”. And stay away anyone claiming to be American Indian shamans , talking about tarot cards and Wiccan/pagan things, or talking about crystals and New Age things. I’ve got nothing against shamanism, paganism, or the New Age, but a cow is not a horse: none of these things are traditionally Native American. Shamanism is a Russian mystic tradition, Wicca is a religion based in pre-Christian European traditions, Tarot readings are an Indo-European divination method, and the New Age is a syncretic belief system invented, as its name suggests, in the modern era. None of them have anything to do with authentic Indian traditions, and anyone who thinks they do is likely to be wrong about anything else he claims about Native American religions as well. Wiccans and New Agers don’t have any more knowledge about actual American Indian beliefs than you do.
Second we DO NOT believe in werewolves or vampires…
The native americans have different beliefs from those who came from Europe and modern pagan ideas (I am a pagan myself). This is an article about that –
http://www.native-languages.org/religion.htm
If it is fiction you can write anything of course but since you want reliable information look up some books on werewolves and read about the European ideas. I hope you get published. 🙂