Woodwoses support coats of arms in the side panels of a portrait by Albrecht Dürer, 1499 (Alte Pinakothek, Munich)

Grand arms of Prussia, 1873

The Woodwose or hairy wildman of the woods was the Sasquatch figure of pre-Christian Gaul, in Anglo-Saxon a wuduwasa. Woodwoses appear in the carved and painted bosses where intersecting ogee vaults meet in the cathedral of Canterbury, in positions where one is also likely to encounter the vegetal Green Man. The Woodwose was a link between civilized humans and the dangerous elf-like spirits of natural woodland, such as Puck. The wildman, pilosus or hairy all over, often armed with a rough club, survived to appear as supporter for heraldic coats-of-arms, especially in Germany (Wilder Mann), well into the 16th century (illustration, right). Download high resolution version (750x1201, 184 KB)Albecht Durer: woodwoses with coats-of-arms: side panels of a portrait, 1499 (Alte Pinakothek, Munich) The two-dimensional work of art depicted in this image is in the public domain in the United States and in those countries with a copyright term... Download high resolution version (750x1201, 184 KB)Albecht Durer: woodwoses with coats-of-arms: side panels of a portrait, 1499 (Alte Pinakothek, Munich) The two-dimensional work of art depicted in this image is in the public domain in the United States and in those countries with a copyright term... Self-Portrait, 1493, Oil on Canvas Albrecht Dürer (May 21, 1471 - April 6, 1528) was a German painter, wood carver, engraver, and mathematician. ... Jump to: navigation, search Image File history File links Download high resolution version (560x745, 79 KB) großes Wappen des Königs von Preußen (Deutscher Kaiser) nach 1873. ... Jump to: navigation, search Image File history File links Download high resolution version (560x745, 79 KB) großes Wappen des Königs von Preußen (Deutscher Kaiser) nach 1873. ... The coat of arms of the Kingdom of Prussia, 1701-1918 The word Prussia (German: Preußen, Polish: Prusy, Lithuanian: Prūsai, Latin: Borussia) has had various (often contradictory) meanings: The land of the Baltic Prussians (in what is now parts of southern Lithuania, the Kaliningrad exclave of Russia and... Sasquatch can refer to: A legendary creature also known as Bigfoot. ... Ogee Arch Ogee is a shape consisting of a concave arc flowing into a convex arc, so forming an S-shaped curve with vertical ends. ... St Peters St, Canterbury, from the West Gate, 1993 Canterbury (Latin: Duroverum) is a cathedral city in the county of Kent in southeast England. ... Green Man depiction from British Cathedral The Green Man is a symbol of uncertain origin common in the British Isles. ... A small forest elf (älva) rescuing an egg, from Solägget (1932), by Elsa Beskow An elf is a mythical creature of Germanic mythology which survived in northern European folklore. ... Puck is a mischievous pre-Christian nature spirit. ...

A British example can be found on the coat-of-arms used as the pub sign for the Woodhouse Arms in Corby Glen, Lincolnshire. As this illustrates, various spellings of the word have been used over the centuries, for example woodhouse and wodehouse (pronounced 'wood-house', with the accent on the first syllable, as in the surname of the author P.G. Wodehouse); wodwo, the Middle English version, appears (as 'wodwos', the plural) in the 14th-century poem Sir Gawayne and the Grene Knyght; it was used by poet Ted Hughes as the title of a poem and, in 1967, a volume of his collected works. An amusingly named pub (the Old New Inn) at Bourton-on-the-Water, in the Cotswold Hills of South West England A pub in the Haymarket area of Edinburgh, Scotland A public house, usually known as a pub, is a drinking establishment found mainly in the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada... Corby Glen lies at grid reference TF0025 in South Kesteven, in Lincolnshire. ... Lincolnshire (abbreviated Lincs) is a county in the East Midlands of England. ... Called English literatures performing flea, P. G. Wodehouse, pictured in 1904, became famous for his complex plots, ingenious wordplay, and prolific output. ... Middle English is the name given by historical linguistics to the diverse forms of the English language spoken between the Norman invasion in 1066 and the mid-to-late 15th century, when the Chancery Standard, a form of London-based English, began to become widespread, a process aided by the... Jump to: navigation, search Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a late 14th century metrical romance recorded in a manuscript containing three other pieces of an altogether more Christian orientation, which are linked by a commonality of dialect usage. ... Jump to: navigation, search Edward James Hughes, OM referred to normally as Ted Hughes (August 17, 1930 – October 28, 1998) was an English poet and childrens writer. ...

King Charles VI of France and five of his courtiers were dressed as woodwoses and chained together for a mascarade at the tragic Bal des Sauvages at the Queen Mother's Paris hotel, January 28, 1393. In the midst of the festivities, a stray spark from a torch set their hairy costumes ablaze, burning several courtiers alive; the king's own life was saved through quick action by his aunt, the duchesse de Berry, who smothered the flames in her cloak. Charles VI the Well-Beloved, later known as the Mad (French: Charles VI le Bien-Aimé, later known as le Fol) (December 3, 1368 – October 21, 1422) was a King of France (1380 – 1422) and a member of the Valois Dynasty. ... A masquerade ball (or masque) is an event which the participants attend in costume, usually including a mask. ...

The woodwose was unsettling to Christian writers, needless to say. Augustine reports the Gaulish name of "Dusii" in City of God XV, ch. 23: "Et quosdam daemones, quos Dusios Galli nuncupant, adsidue hanc immunditiam et efficere, plures talesque adseuerant, ut hoc negare impudentiae uideatur." ...and perhaps the early 7th century encyclopedist Isidore of Seville has picked up Augustine's reference, for his Etymologies book viii: It has been suggested that Isidro be merged into this article or section. ...

Pilosi, qui Graece 'panitae', Latine 'incubi' appellantur - hos daemones Galli 'Dusios' nuncupant. Quem autem vulgo 'Incu-bonem' vocant, hunc Romani 'Faunum' dicunt "Satyrs are they who are called Pans in Greek, Incubi in Latin, these daemons the Galls call Dusi. What vulgarly are called "Incu-bonem", these the Romans name "Fauns"

Another variant of the Gaulish Dusi may lurk in the misunderstanding of fauni ficarii "fig Fauns" in Jerome's Vulgate translation of Jeremiah 50:39, describing the coming desolation of Babylon: "Therefore shall dragons dwell there with the fig fauns." Fig fauns exist nowhere except in dictionaries mentioning this passage. Is this a slip of the copyists for Jerome's fauni Sicarii ("fauns of the Sicarii", the ancient tribe of Gauls in Sicily?) Apparently, the King James' Version committee thought so, rendering the passage "Therefore the wild beasts of the desert with the wild beasts of the islands shall dwell there, and the owls shall dwell therein: and it shall be no more inhabited for ever; neither shall it be dwelt in from generation to generation." (See http://bibletools.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Def.show/RTD/ISBE/Topic/Wild%20Beast ) , by Albrecht Dürer Jerome (ca. ... The Vulgate Bible is an early 5th century translation of the Bible into Latin made by St. ...

Geoffrey of Monmouth, in his Life of Merlin (ca 1150), describes the agonized mourning of Merlin after a bloody battle, when Geoffrey of Monmouth was a clergyman and one of the major figures in the development of British history. ... Merlin Ambrosius (Welsh: Myrddin Emrys; also known as Myrddin Wyllt (Merlin the wild), Merlin Caledonensis (Scottish Merlin), Merlinus, and Merlyn) is the personage best known as the mighty wizard featured in accounts of Arthur of Britain starting with Geoffrey of Monmouths Historia Regum Britanniae. ...

"a strange madness came upon him. He crept away and fled to the woods, unwilling that any should see his going. Into the forest he went, glad to lie hidden beneath the ash trees. He watched the wild creatures grazing on the pasture of the glades. Sometimes he would follow them, sometimes pass them in his course. He made use of the roots of plants and of grasses, of fruit from trees and of the blackberries in the thicket. He became a Man of the Woods, as if dedicated to the woods. So for a whole summer he stayed hidden in the woods, discovered by none, forgetful of himself and of his own, lurking like a wild thing."

Other uses

The term wood-woses or simply Woses is used by J.R.R. Tolkien to describe a fictional race of wild men in his stories, called also Druedain. According to his legendarium, other men, including the Rohirrim, mistook the Druedain for goblins or other wood-creatures and referred to them as Pukel-men (Goblin-men). In J. R. R. Tolkiens world of Middle-earth, the Drúedain, also known as Drûg, Woses, Wild Men of the Woods and Púkel-men, were a strange race of Men which was counted amongst the Edain. ... J. R. R. Tolkien in 1916, wearing his British Army uniform in a photograph from the middle years of WW1. ... In J. R. R. Tolkiens fictional universe of Middle-earth, the Rohirrim were the people of Rohan. ...

His fiction might imply that (in his fictional timeline) the 'actual' Druedain of ancient Middle-earth, were the origin of the legendary Woodwoses of more recent folklore. A map of the Northwestern part of Middle-earth at the end of the Third Age, courtesy of the Encyclopedia of Arda. ...

Tolkien was, of course, an expert in Old and Middle English literature, who translated Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (see above). Jump to: navigation, search Sir Gawain and the Green Knight is a late 14th century metrical romance recorded in a manuscript containing three other pieces of an altogether more Christian orientation, which are linked by a commonality of dialect usage. ...

External links

• Geoffrey of Monmouth, Vita Merlini
• Woodwose: from the Speculum Regale ("the King's Mirror"), written in Norway around 1250: "It once happened in that country (and this seems indeed strange) that a living creature was caught in the forest as to which no one could say definitely whether it was a man or some other animal; for no one could get a word from it or be sure that it understood human speech. It had the human shape, however, in every detail, both as to hands and face and feet; but the entire body was covered with hair as the beasts are, and down the back it had a long coarse mane like that of a horse, which fell to both sides and trailed along the ground when the creature stooped in walking."

• Drusi and woodwoses in Latin literature from the 5th century onwards (in German)

• Blending medieval bestiaries and modern "wildman" myth