

According to Animal Planet, Swift Runner claimed to be possessed by a “windigo spirit” at the time of the murders. One of the most infamous cases is the story of Swift Runner, a Native American man who murdered and ate his whole family during the winter of 1879. Once he has infiltrated their minds, he can turn them into wendigos as well, instilling upon them a similar lust for human flesh.

The tribes attributed many of the mysterious disappearances to the wendigo, thus calling him the “spirit of lonely places.”Īnother rough translation of wendigo is “the evil spirit that devours mankind.” This translation is related to yet another version of the wendigo that has the power to curse humans by possessing them. The Algonquian people say that during the turn of the 20th century, a large number of their people went missing. Once they’re isolated in the desolate depths of the wilderness, he attacks them and then feasts on them.

He uses this skill to lure people in and draw them away from civilization. Rather, one of his creepiest traits is his ability to mimic human voices. Unlike other terrifying carnivores, the wendigo doesn’t rely on pursuing his prey in order to capture and eat it. But speed wouldn’t be a necessary skill for a monster of this nature. Others say he walks in a more haggard manner, as if he is falling apart. Some claim he is unusually fast and can endure walking for long periods of time, even in harsh winter conditions. Scary Stories About The Flesh-Eating Monsterįlickr An animatronic depiction of a wendigo in a cage on display in “Wendigo Woods” in Busch Gardens Williamsburg.ĭifferent versions of the wendigo legend say different things about his speed and agility. However, some other people simply describe the wendigo as a skeleton-like figure with ash-toned skin.īut no matter which version sounds the most plausible, this is obviously not a creature you’d want to run into on a hike. What lips it had were tattered and bloody… Unclean and suffering from suppurations of the flesh, the Wendigo gave off a strange and eerie odor of decay and decomposition, of death and corruption.”Īccording to ethnohistorian Nathan Carlson, it’s also been said that the wendigo has large, sharp claws and massive eyes like an owl. With its bones pushing out over its skin, its complexion the ash gray of death, and its eyes pushed back deep into the sockets, the Wendigo looked like a gaunt skeleton recently disinterred from the grave. “The Wendigo was gaunt to the point of emaciation, its desiccated skin pulled tightly over its bones. Johnston once described the wendigo in his masterwork The Manitous as such: According to Legends of the Nahanni Valley, a Native author and ethnographer named Basil H.
