Post by D.umB.linD.eaf on Oct 19, 2009 15:54:01 GMT -8
WEREWOLVES
Werewolves are only second to vampires in terms of popularity. Perhaps, like vampires, belief in humans that turn into wild predatory (and sometimes, nocturnal) animals exists in all major world cultures. Many psychologists attribute this to the natural animal instinct that resides in the psyche of all men, an instinct that existed since the dawn of mankind.WERECATS
In folklore and fantasy fiction, werecats are shapeshifters who are similar to werewolves, except that they turn into some species of feline instead of a wolf. The species involved can be a domestic cat, a tiger, a lion, a leopard, a lynx, or any other type, including some that are purely fantastical felines.
WEREDOGS
Anthropologist David Gordon White called Central Asia the "vortex of cynanthropy" because races of dog-men were habitually placed there by ancient writers. Hindu mythology puts races of "Dog Cookers" to the far north of India, the Chinese placed the "Dog Jung" and other human/canine barbarians to the extreme west, and European legends frequently put the dog men called Cynocephali in unmapped regions to the east. Some of these races were described as humans with dog heads, others as canine shapeshifters (White, 114-15).
Other mixes of sapian-carnivores are allowed.