Howl Do You Do?
Vampires vs Werewolves vs Speculative Non-Fiction
How many franchises have capitalized on the vampires vs werewolves dynamic? The exact number isn’t critical here, so let’s say three hundred. Seven fifty? Sure, let’s go with a two thousand.
The important thing is that it’s such an oft-repeated theme that you already know it. An ancient rivalry that goes back further than bleh, vampires and the werewolves have been engaged in bleh for supremacy of all that is bleh you know the broad strokes.
Is there any basis for this rivalry in folklore?
Ehhhhhh it’s not a lock. But there is something super intriguing in the scientific and folkloric record that would allow us to make that argument. But be patient on that because first we have to address the obvious.
The VvW franchises seem to go back to Universal Pictures. After the smash success of Tod Browning’s Dracula in 1931, they followed up not by making a sequel, but by introducing a series of films that were in a similar vein. Not vein as in more vampires, you goofs, but vein as in more gothic horror: Frankenstein, The Invisible Man, and of course the Wolf Man.
When the steam started to run out on the Universal Monster machine, they went for sequels like Bride of Frankenstein and Son of Dracula and eventually went full Monster Mash with films like 1944’s House of Frankenstein. And the party never stopped.
It’s simple synergy, people! Get your best IPs in one place and watch the dollars roll in! It’s the same alpha move that gave us Batman v Superman.
Is there more to the Fur On Fang Bitedown?
There’s two things to address here.
First, in certain regions of the southern Balkans, vampires and werewolves were linked in the folklore not as enemies, but as evolving forms. Specifically, werewolves who died could rise again as vampires. But then, so could wizards and those who commit suicide so we aren’t looking at a unique link here.
There is also a connection to a common mistranslation of the word “vrykolakas”; that word is often thought of as a type of vampire, and indeed it has come to mean that. However, smart people have found that it originated as a word for werewolf.
But I want to try something else out on you
In his wonderful book Vampires, Burial, and Death, Paul Barber explains the observation of hands sticking out of graves as the result of scavengers — wolves and dogs — that would dig up and tear at any appendage they could when they detected an accessible, rotting corpse under the ground.
At the same time, there’s a parallel observation from the folklore: dogs and wolves could detect the presence of a vampire in a graveyard — and they would stop and dig at the infected grave.
Canines, of course, have a better sense of smell and hearing than we do. So detecting the smell, even under ground, or hearing the disgusting sound a corpse makes as it decomposes, wouldn’t be hard for them.
Paul Barber doesn’t take the logical, totally irresponsible next step in this line of thinking, so let’s do it for him:
The ability of canines to detect rotting corpses where we can’t, and their willingness to dig up corpses to scavenge carrion, gave rise to the idea that werewolves and vampires were natural enemies.
Yeah? It would make sense, right? You’re with me on this, aren’t you?
Any villager who saw a wolf digging/feasting in a graveyard — a graveyard where vampires were suspected to live — could reasonably suppose that the wolf was attacking the vampire; because wolfs hate vampires.
We all good here?
It’s a much juicier origin story than synergy. Anything is a juicier origin story than synergy. But tragically, there’s just not much in the folklore record to support my spec mythology. Vampires and werewolves, along with ghosts and witches, seem to all inhabit approximately the same space but rarely have a meaningful crossover issue. That’s not bad — history is not bad — but sometimes it’s a damn shame.
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Image Credits: Marvel Comics, Universal Pictures, Michael E. Powers, Unison Films, Shutterstock
