The simplest marking of the northern Milky Way figure and the
celestial north pole.
The Northern Milky Way
contours is often observed, pictured and carved on the rocks as a man; a man with concentric
symbols; a man
with erection; a man with horns; and even as a winged man. Beast or human?
Angel or Devil? God or Human? The answer is Yes!
The Milky Way contours refer
also to the Myth of the Serpent as known from many cultures around the World.
The Horned Serpent shows even the connection with the Horned Man and with Horned
Beasts in general. Also the Horned and Winged Serpent is well known in many
cultures.
Originally
the Beast and the Human was one and the same and the lived together both on
the Earth and in the Sky. Later the ecclesiastical and secular "power-people"
succeeded to change the originally universal meaning towards a "power tool"
in order to manipulate their populations for the sake of small egoistic
interests,
Link to Crypto
Zoology:
http://www.google.dk/search?hl=da&q=cryptozoology&btnG=S%C3%B8g&meta=
Mythological Shapeshifting
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
(Redirected from
List of shapeshifters in myth and fiction)
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Tsarevna Frog
by
Viktor Vasnetsov:
a frog metamorphoses into a princess.
Shapeshifting
is a common theme in
mythology
and
folklore
as well as in
science fiction
and
fantasy.
In its broadest sense, it is when a being has the ability to alter its
physical appearance. The transformation may be purposeful or not
depending on whether it has been the subject of a
curse
or
spell.
In some folklore, once the shapeshifter has become transformed, it
becomes progressively more difficult for it to return to its original
form.[citation
needed]
[edit]
Themes in
shapeshifting
An
important aspect of shape-shifting, thematically, is whether the
transformation is voluntary.
Circe
transforms intruders to her island into swine, whereas
Ged,
in
A Wizard of Earthsea,
becomes a hawk to escape an evil wizard's stronghold. When a form is
taken on involuntarily, the thematic effect is one of confinement and
restraint; the person is bound to the new form. In extreme cases,
such as
petrifaction,
the character is entirely disabled. Voluntary forms, on the other hand,
are means of escape and liberation; even when the form is not undertaken
to effect a literal escape, the abilities specific to the form, or the
disguise afforded by it, allow the character to act in a manner
previously impossible.
Hence, in
fairy tales,
a prince who is forced into a bear's shape (as in
East of the Sun and West of the Moon)
is a prisoner, but a princess who takes on a bear's shape to flee (as in
The She-Bear)
escapes with her new shape.[1]
Shapeshifting may be used as a
plot device,
as when
Puss In Boots
tricks the
ogre
into changing into a mouse so he may eat him; it may also include a
symbolic significance, as when the Beast's transformation at the end of
Beauty and the Beast
indicates Belle's ability to accept him despite his appearance. In the
Spiderwick
Chronicles, the evil ogre Mulgarath is tricked by Jared into turning
into a swallow so that the
hobgoblin
Hogsqueal can eat him.[2]
In
modern fantasy, more than in folklore, the extent to which the change
affects the mind can be important.
Poul Anderson,
in
Operation Chaos,
has the
werewolf
observe that taking on wolf-form can simplify his thoughts. A similar
effect is noted in Stephanie Meyer's
Twilight (series).
This can be more dangerous in other writers' works;
J.K. Rowling
observed that a wizard who became a rat had a rat's brain (although the
Animagus talent bypasses this problem), and in her
Earthsea
books,
Ursula K. Le Guin
depicts an animal form as slowly transforming the wizard's mind, so that
the dolphin, or bear, or other creature forgets it was human and can not
change back, a voluntary shapeshifting becoming an imprisoning
metamorphosis.[3]
Beyond this, the uses of shape-shifting, transformation, and
metamorphosis
in fiction are as
protean
as the forms the characters take on. Some are rare —
Italo Calvino's
"The
Canary Prince"
is a
Rapunzel
variant in which shape-shifting is used to gain access to the tower —
but others are common motifs.
[edit]
Between the sexes
Fiction that makes use of
gender
shape-shifting tends to invoke themes not normally found in other
shapeshifting fiction.
Vertumnus, in the form of an old woman, wooing Pomona, by
Gerbrand van den Eeckhout
It
may be merely used as means of disguise: appearing as a woman allows a
man to enter situations from which men are forbidden, and vice versa.
Zeus
disguised himself as
Artemis
in order to get close enough to
Callisto
that she could not escape when he turned himself into male form again,
and raped her. More innocently,
Vertumnus
could not woo
Pomona
on his own; in the form of an old woman, he gained access to her
orchard, where he persuaded her to marry him.
In
Norse mythology,
however, both
Odin
and
Loki
taunt each other with having taken the form of females in the
Lokasenna.
The ultimate proof of this was that they had given birth and had nursed
their offspring. It is unknown what myths, if any, lie behind the
charges against Odin, but Loki had taken the form of a
mare
and was the mother of
Sleipnir.
L. Frank Baum
concluded
The Marvelous Land of Oz
with the revelation that
Ozma,
the princess that the main characters had been looking for, had been
turned into a boy as a baby and raised as the boy named Tip. Tip, one of
the characters looking for Ozma, agreed to let himself be changed back
into a girl but wished that he could be changed back into a boy if he
did not like being a girl.
Glinda
decreed that he could be changed only into his proper form. Since she is
a sorceress, Glinda disapproves of shapeshifting magic. Therefore it had
to be done by the evil witch
Mombi,
who was skilled in its use.[4]
In
Greek mythology,
Tiresias,
the blind prophet who helped Jason and the Argonauts, was walking
through a forest when he found two snakes in the act of love. He prodded
them with a stick and was instantly changed into a woman. He lived in
this female form for many years, and even married and had children.
Years later, Tiresias was walking through the same forest and came
across the same snakes doing the same thing. Again she poked them with a
stick, and Tiresias turned back into a man. Later in his life, he was
asked by Zeus which of the two sexes enjoys sex more. Tiresias, speaking
from experience, replied that it is woman, and Hera blinded him for
telling her husband of the greatest secret of women. Zeus, unable to
undo what his wife had done, gave the now blind Tiresias the gift of
foresight. Other versions say that it was Zeus who was angered by
Tiresias for saying that men did not get the most out of sex and that it
was Hera who gave Tiresias the gift of foresight to comfort him.
Rumiko Takahashi's
manga
Ranma ˝,
along with several characters that transform into animals, also features
two that transform from male to female. One is the title character,
Ranma Saotome,
and another is a powerful antagonist, Herb, from late in the series.
While some have drawn the conclusion that this constitutes a parody of
Japanese gender roles,[5][page needed]
Takahashi herself has replied that it was a "simple, fun idea," that she
"doesn't think in terms of societal agendas," and "thought humans
turning into animals might also be fun and märchenhaft."[6]
Arjuna,
of the Indian epic
Mahabharata,
spent a year disguised as a woman after refusing to sleep with the
reincarnation
of one of his ancestors.
[edit]
Punitive changes
In
many cases, imposed forms are punitive in nature. This may be a just
punishment, the nature of the transformation matching the crime for
which it occurs; in other cases, the form is unjustly imposed by an
angry and powerful person.
"Svipdag transformed" by
John Bauer
This motif is used in tales from myths to modern fantasy:
-
Ali ibn Abi Taleb
transformed an offender into a crow in
Masjid
al-Kufa.
-
Athena
transformed
Arachne
into a spider for challenging her as a weaver.
-
Artemis
transformed
Actaeon
into a stag for spying on her in her bath.
-
Odin
transformed
Svipdag
into a dragon because he had angered him.
-
In
Child ballad
35,
Allison Gross,
the title witch turned a man into a dragon for refusing to be her
lover. This is a motif found in many legends and folktales.[7]
-
In some variants of the fairy tales, both
The Frog Prince
and Beast, of
Beauty and the Beast,
were transformed as a form of punishment for some transgression.
-
In
Eglė the Queen of Serpents,
Eglė transforms her children and herself into trees as a punishment
for betrayal.
-
In
East of the Sun and West of the Moon,
the hero was transformed into a bear by his
wicked stepmother,
who wished to force him to marry her daughter.[8]
-
Circe
transformed all intruders into her home. Generally, this is for
merely intruding, but in
Nathaniel Hawthorne's
Tanglewood Tales,
"she changes every human being into the brute, beast, or fowl whom
he happens most to resemble."
-
In
George MacDonald's
The Princess and Curdie,
Curdie is informed that many human beings, by their acts, are slowly
turning into beasts; he is given the power to detect the
transformation before it is visible, and is assisted by beasts that
had been transformed and are working their way back to humanity.[9]
-
In
The Chronicles of Narnia,
Eustace
transforms into a dragon,[10]
and the war-monger
Rabadash
into a donkey,.[11]
Eustace's transformation is not strictly a
punishment - his transformation simply revealing the truth of his
human nature. It is reversed after he repents and his moral nature
changes. Rabadash is given an opportunity to return to human form
providing he does so in a public place, so that his former followers
will know that he had spent some time as a donkey. He is also warned
that, if he ever leaves his capital city again, he will once more
become a donkey and this time the transformation will be permanent.
After following the instructions to regain his human form, Rabadash
never again leads a military campaign ... as to do so would require
him to leave his capital city. Also in
The Chronicles of Narnia
the
Dufflepuds
are dwarfs who have been transformed into
monopods
as a punishment. However, it ultimately transpires that they are
happier with their new form in the end.
-
In the novel
I, Coriander
by
Sally Gardner,
Prince Tycho is transformed into a fox after refusing to marry
Undwin, Queen Rosmore's daughter.
In
mythology, the punishment is often a metamorphosis, and may be origin
myths.
In
most works of fiction, the changes are usually a temporary
transformation. If the punishment was just, the character can often
re-gain his form on learning the lesson it instructed him in; if unjust,
the restoration is merely dependent on discovering the trick of it.
[edit]
Transformation
chase
In
many
fairy tales
and
ballads,
as in
Child Ballad
#44,
The Two Magicians
or
Farmer Weathersky,
a magical chase occurs where the pursued endlessly takes on forms in an
effort to shake off the pursuer, and the pursuer answers with other
shape-shifting, as, a dove is answered with a hawk, and a hare with a
greyhound. The pursued may finally succeed in escape or the pursuer in
capturing. This appears in legends around the world. One is "The Story
of Calicoin", the story of a powerful witch called Cerridwen who wished
to make her son Afaggdu a powerful potion that would make him a wizard.
She ordered her servant, a boy named Gwion, to make a potion that took a
year and one day. He stirred it until the very last day, when Gwion
accidentally spilled three drops on his finger. His finger was burning,
so he put it in his mouth and swallowed the drops. Gwion became a wizard
instantly. Cerridwen found out, and began to chase Gwion. Gwion first
changed into a hare, and Cerridwen changed into a hound. The boy became
a fish, and the woman an otter. He turned into a dove, she turned into a
hawk. Finally Gwion transformed into a tiny grain of wheat, hiding with
many other grains on a barn floor. Cerridwen transformed into a black
hen and pecked up all the grains, including Gwion. Nine days later
Cerridwen gave birth to Gwion as a baby. She could not kill her own
child, so she tied him up in a leather bag and threw him into the river.
He was discovered by a kind man named Elphin, who had no children of his
own. Elphin named the boy Taliesin and raised him. As Taliesin grew, he
remembered all that had happened before he was with Elphin, and retained
his wizardly knowledge. It was said he became a very great wizard, maybe
the greatest in the Islands of Britain before Merlin.
In
Dapplegrim,
this was set as a challenge; if the youth found the transformed princess
twice, and hid from her twice, they would marry. The Grimm Brothers
fairy tales
Foundling-Bird
contains this as the bulk of the plot.[12]
In Greek mythology,
Zeus
frequently transformed himself and his love to escape Hera's wrath, or
that of the women's fathers, but generally in a simplified form, with
only one transformation.[13]
In
other variants, the pursued may transform various objects into
obstacles, as in the fairy tale "The
Master Maid",
where the Master Maid transforms a wooden comb into a forest, a lump of
salt into a mountain, and a flask of water into a sea. In these tales,
the pursued normally escapes after the
three
obstacles.[12]
This obstacle chase is literally found worldwide, in many variants in
every region.[14]
In
fairy tales of the
Aarne-Thompson
type 313A, the girl helps the hero flee, one such chase is an integral
part of the tale. It can be either a transformation chase (as in
The Grateful Prince,
King Kojata,
Foundling-Bird,
Jean, the Soldier, and Eulalie, the Devil's Daughter,
or
The Two Kings' Children)
or an obstacle chase (as in
The Battle of the Birds,
The White Dove,
or
The Master Maid).[15]
In
a similar effect, a captive may shape-shift in order to break a hold on
him.
Proteus's
shape-shifting was to prevent heroes from forcing information from him.[16]
Tam Lin,
once seized by Janet, was transformed in her arms by the
faeries
to keep Janet from taking him, but as he had advised her, she did not
let go, and so freed him.[17]
The motif of capturing a person by holding him through all forms of
transformation is found throughout Europe in folktales.[18]
Patricia A. McKillip
made use of this motif at one point in the
The Riddle-Master of Hed
trilogy: a shapeshifting Earthmaster finally wins its freedom by
startling the man holding it.
Another variant was used by
T. H. White
in
The Sword in the Stone,
where
Merlin
and
Madam Mim
fought a wizards' duel, in which the duelists would endlessly transform
until one was in a form that could destroy the other.[19]
[edit]
Powers
One motif is a shape change in order to obtain abilities in the new
form.
Berserkers
were held to change into wolves and bears in order to fight more
effectively. In many cultures, evil magicians could transform into
animal shapes and thus skulk about.
In
many fairy tales, the hero's
talking animal
helper
proves to be a shapeshifted human being, able to help him in its animal
form. In one variation, featured in
The Three Enchanted Princes
and
The Death of Koschei the Deathless,
the hero's three sisters have been married to animals. These prove to be
shape-shifted
men, who aid their brother-in-law in a variant of tale types.[20]
In
an early Mayan text, the Shapeshifter, or Mestaclocan, was said to not
only have the ability to change his appearance but could also manipulate
the minds of animals. In one tale, the Mestaclocan finds a dying eagle.
Changing into the form of an eagle, he convinces the dying bird that it
is, in fact, not dying. As the story goes they both soar into the
heavens, and lived together for eternity.
This use, though rare in older fiction, is perhaps the most common in
modern fiction. Several superheroes —
Beast Boy,
Chameleon Boy/Chameleon,
Morph,
Ben 10,
Mystique,
Clayface
— have it as their sole power. The
Harry Potter
series contains both
Animagi
who can change to a single form and
Metamorphmagi
who can alter their appearance. In addition Rowling also involves
werewolves who change involuntarily with the rising of the full moon.
Even one episode of the television show
Supernatural
featured a shape-shifter, and a reference that the main characters had
hunted shape-shifters before, or at least knew how to. Both the
Earthmasters and their opponents in
The Riddle-Master of Hed
trilogy make extensive use of their shape-shifting abilities for the
powers of their new forms.[21]
[edit]
Bildungsroman
A
young character may learn of his shape-shifting abilities, and exploring
them becomes part of a
Bildungsroman.
Mavin Manyshaped
and her son Peter in
Sheri S. Tepper's
True Game
novels are both shifters, being a subspecies of humans having this
power, and in both, the learning of their abilities is a large portion
of their growing up.
For a very different effect,
T. H. White
had
Merlin
transform
Arthur
into various animals in
The Sword in the Stone,
as an educational experience.[22]
Although the lessons are very different, the
Bildungsroman element is in common.
[edit]
Needed items
Valkyries as swan maidens: having shed their swan skins
Some shape-shifters are able to change form only if they have some item,
usually an article of clothing. Most of these are innocuous creatures —
even if they are werewolves. In
Bisclavret
by
Marie de France,
a werewolf cannot regain human form without his clothing, but in wolf
form does no harm to anyone.
Another such creature is the
selkie,
which needs its sealskin to regain its form. In
The Great Silkie of Sule Skerry
the (male) selkie seduces a human woman but does no further harm.
The most common use of this motif, however, is in tales where a man
steals the article and forces the shape-shifter, trapped in human form,
to become his bride. This lasts until she discovers where he has hidden
the article, and she can flee. Selkies feature in these tales. Others
include
swan maidens
and the Japanese
Tennin.
Various forms of
fairytale fantasy
have taken up these creatures and incorporated them into modern day
works.
Jane Yolen
took up the notion of selkie in Greyling and
transformed it into a
foundling
tale.
[edit]
Usurpation
Some transformations are performed to remove the victim from his place,
so that the transformer can usurp it.
Bisclaveret's
wife steals his clothing and traps him in wolf form because she has a
lover. A witch, in
The Wonderful Birch,
changed a mother into a sheep to take her place, and had the mother
slaughtered; when her stepdaughter, with her dead mother's aid, married
the king, the witch transformed her into a reindeer so as to put her
daughter in the queen's place. In the Korean Transformation of the
Kumiho, a
kumiho,
a fox with magical powers, transformed itself into an image of the
bride, only being detected when her clothing is removed. In
Terminator 2: Judgment Day,
the
T-1000
took the form of
John Connor's
foster mom to gather information regarding his whereabouts, and later as
his biological mother to gain his trust.
Changelings
take the place of the infant the
elves
have stolen, and usually resemble it, at least initially; sometimes,
this is temporary, so that the child will appear to die, and sometimes
the changeling grows up in the child's family.
Sister Alenushka Weeping about Brother Ivanushka
by
Viktor Vasnetsov,
Russian variant of Brother and Sister: Alenushka laments her
brother's transformation into a goat
This may not be so much desire to usurp a specific place as to remove
possible rivals, but the intended effect of the removal is much the
same. In
Brother and Sister,
when two children flee their cruel stepmother, she enchants the streams
along the way to transform them. While the brother refrains from the
first two, which threaten to turn them into tigers and wolves, he is too
thirsty at the third, which turns him into a deer.
The Six Swans
are transformed into swans by their
stepmother,[23]
as are the Children of Lir in Irish mythology. In
The Laidly Worm of Spindleston Heugh,
Princess Margaret is transformed into a dragon by her stepmother; her
motive sprung, like
Snow White's
stepmother's, from the comparison of their beauty.[24]
Modern fiction also includes this motif:
Mary Stewart's
A Walk in Wolf Wood revolves about revealing that one man is an
imposter, taking the form of a man who is living as a wolf in the woods,
and
Patricia A. McKillip
has her shapeshifters, in the
Riddle-master trilogy,
use their forms to take the place of others. The
Harry Potter
series included both a usurpation by a shape-shifter, and considerable
precautions being taken by wizards and witches to attempt to identify
such shape-shifters as they arose. In science fiction,
Who Goes There?
by
John W. Campbell
included a shape-shifting alien that could devour and replace
terrestrial life.
While
Doppelgängers
in folklore were a kind of portent that resembled a person, with no
shapeshifting required, in modern fiction and roleplaying games,
they
are usually depicted as shape-shifters out to usurp
someone's place.
This motif can also be used in a similar manner to the Monstrous
Bride/Bridegroom theme. A character who falls in love with a usurper
(given a justifiable motive for the replacement) can discover the
unimportance of appearances beside character. In the
Legion of Super-Heroes
comics,
Colossal Boy
fell in love with a shapeshifter who had been duped into taking the form
of a woman he had been attracted to. The revelation of this made him
realize that he had fallen in love with the shapeshifter herself and not
with the woman he had thought her to be. Similarly, the
Human Torch
fell in love with a
Skrull imposter;
although in the
Marvel Universe
they eventually broke up, in the
MC2
alternate universe, they remarried, are now members of the
Fantastic Five,
and have a son.
[edit]
Ill-advised
wishes
Many fairy-tale characters have expressed inadvised
wishes
to have any child at all, even one that has another form, and had such
children born to them.[25]
At the end of the fairy tale, normally after marriage, such children
metamorphize into human form.
Hans My Hedgehog
was born when his father wished for a child, even a hedgehog. Even
stranger forms are possible:
Giambattista Basile
included in his Pentamerone the
tale
of a girl born as a sprig of myrtle, and
Italo Calvino,
in his Italian Folktales, a girl born as an apple.
Sometimes, the parent who wishes for a child is told how to gain one,
but does not obey the directions perfectly, resulting in the transformed
birth. In
Prince Lindworm,
the woman eats two onions, but does not peel one, resulting in her first
child being a
lindworm.
In
Tatterhood,
a woman magically produces two flowers, but disobeys the directions to
eat only the beautiful one, resulting her having a beautiful and sweet
daughter, but only after a disgusting and hideous one.
Less commonly, ill-advised wishes can transform a person after birth.
The Seven Ravens
are transformed when their father thinks his sons are playing instead of
fetching water to christen their newborn and sickly sister, and curses
them.[26]
In
Puddocky,
when three princes start to quarrel over the beautiful heroine, a witch
curses her because of the noise.
[edit]
Monstrous bride/bridegroom
Such wished-for children may become monstrous
brides
or
bridegrooms.
Other such characters have no explanation for their forms, because their
tales focus on the person who must marry them.
These tales often lean heavily on the promise of the father that his
child should marry, or on the financial advantages to her family that
she should do so—factors clearly present in arranged marriages. These
tales have often been intrepreted as symbolically representing arranged
marriages; the bride's (in particular) revulsion to marrying a stranger
being symbolized by his bestial form.[27]
These tales form,
broadly, three subclasses.
"Beauty and the Beast" by
Warwick Goble
The heroine must fall in love with the transformed groom.
Beauty and the Beast
falls under this. This has been interpreted as a young woman's
coming-of-age, in which she changes from being repulsed by sexual
activity and regarding a husband therefore bestial, to a mature woman
who can marry.[28]
The hero or heroine must marry, as promised, and the monstrous form is
removed by the wedding.
Sir Gawain
thus transformed the
Loathly lady;
although he was told that this was half-way, she could at his choice be
beautiful by day and hideous by night, or vice versa, he told her that
he would choose what she preferred, which broke the spell entirely.[29]
In
Tatterhood,
Tatterhood is transformed by her asking her bridegroom why he didn't ask
her why she rode a goat, why she carried a spoon, and why she was so
ugly, and when he asked her, denying it and therefore transforming her
goat into a horse, her spoon into a fan, and herself into a beauty.
Puddocky
is transformed when her prince, after she had helped him with two other
tasks, tells him that his father has sent him for a bride. A similar
effect is found in
Child ballad
34,
Kemp Owyne,
where the hero can transform a dragon back into a maiden by kissing her
three times.[30]
Sometimes the bridegroom removes his animal skin for the wedding night,
whereupon it can be burned. Hans My Hedgehog,
The Donkey
and
The Pig King
fall under this grouping. At an extreme, in
Prince Lindworm,
the bride who avoids being eaten by the lindworm bridegroom arrives at
her wedding wearing every gown she owns, and she tells the bridegroom
she will remove one of hers if he removes one of his; only when her last
gown comes off has he removed his last skin, and become a white shape
that she can form into a man.[31]
The lindworm's bride was the last of a number of brides. Some other
tales using this theme also have one or two who fail the task of the
marriage.
In
other tales, such as
The Brown Bear of Norway,
The Golden Crab,
The Enchanted Snake
and some variants of
The Frog Princess,
burning the skin is a catastrophe, putting the transformed bride or
bridegroom in danger; this is an example of the third grouping.
In
the third grouping, the hero or heroine must obey a prohibition; the
bride must spend a period of time not seeing the transformed groom in
human shape (as in
East of the Sun and West of the Moon),
or the bridegroom must not burn the animals skins. In these tales, the
prohibition is broken, invariably. The hero or heroine must therefore
find his bride, or her bridegroom again.[31]
This motif is found in modern fiction mostly in the form of
fairytale fantasy.
Robin McKinley
retold Beauty and the Beast twice, in
Beauty
and
Rose Daughter.
Ghosts sometimes appear in animal form. In
The Famous Flower of Serving-Men,
the heroine's murdered husband appears to the king as a white dove,
lamenting her fate over his own grave. In
The White and the Black Bride
and
The Three Little Men in the Wood,
the murdered — drowned — true bride reappears as a white duck. In
The Rose Tree
and
The Juniper Tree,
the murdered children become birds who avenge their own deaths.
In
some fairy tales, the character can reveal himself in every new form,
and so a usurper repeatedly kills the victim in every new form, as in
Beauty and Pock Face,
A String of Pearls Twined with Golden Flowers,
and
The Boys with the Golden Stars.
This eventually leads to a form into which the character (or characters)
can reveal the truth to someone able to stop the villain.
Similarly, the transformation back may be acts that would be fatal. In
The Wounded Lion,
the prescription for turning the lion back into a prince was to kill
him, chop him to pieces, burn the pieces, and throw the ash into water.
Less drastic but no less apparently fatal, the fox in
The Golden Bird,
the foals in
The Seven Foals,
and the cats in
Lord Peter
and
The White Cat
tell the heroes of those stories to cut off their heads; this restores
them to human shape.[32]
[edit]
Shapeshifting in religious texts
Rigveda
describes shapeshifting
rakshasas
assuming
animal
forms.[33]
[edit]
Shapeshifting in
historical accounts
Procopius Caesarensis
in his
Secret History
(ch. 12) gives an account about the shapeshifting of
Emperor
Justinian I:
And
some of those who have been with Justinian at the palace late at night,
men who were pure of spirit, have thought they saw a strange demoniac
form taking his place. One man said that the Emperor suddenly rose from
his throne and walked about, and indeed he was never wont to remain
sitting for long, and immediately Justinian's head vanished, while the
rest of his body seemed to ebb and flow; whereat the beholder stood
aghast and fearful, wondering if his eyes were deceiving him. But
presently he perceived the vanished head filling out and joining the
body again as strangely as it had left it.
Another said he stood beside the Emperor as he sat, and of a sudden the
face changed into a shapeless mass of flesh, with neither eyebrows nor
eyes in their proper places, nor any other distinguishing feature; and
after a time the natural appearance of his countenance returned. I write
these instances not as one who saw them myself, but heard them from men
who were positive they had seen these strange occurrences at the time.
They
also say that a certain monk, very dear to God, at the instance of those
who dwelt with him in the desert went to Constantinople to beg for mercy
to his neighbors who had been outraged beyond endurance. And when he
arrived there, he forthwith secured an audience with the Emperor; but
just as he was about to enter his apartment, he stopped short as his
feet were on the threshold, and suddenly stepped backward. Whereupon the
eunuch escorting him, and others who were present, importuned him to go
ahead. But he answered not a word; and like a man who has had a stroke
staggered back to his lodging. And when some followed to ask why he
acted thus, they say he distinctly declared he saw the King of the
Devils sitting on the throne in the palace, and he did not care to meet
or ask any favor of him.
[edit]
Shapeshifting in folklore
1722
German woodcut of a
werewolf
transforming
Popular shapeshifting creatures in folklore are
werewolves
and
vampires
(mostly of
European,
Canadian,
and
Native American/early
American origin), the
Huli jing
of
East Asia
(including the
Japanese
kitsune),
and the gods,
goddesses,
and
demons
of numerous mythologies, such as the
Norse
Loki
or the
Greek
Proteus.
It was also common for
deities
to transform mortals into animals and
plants.
Although shapeshifting to the form of a
wolf
is specifically known as
lycanthropy,
and such creatures who undergo such change are called lycanthropes,
those terms have also been used to describe any human-animal
transformations and the creatures who undergo them.
Therianthropy
is the more general term for human-animal shifts, but it is rarely used
in that capacity.
Other terms for shapeshifters include metamorph,
skin-walker,
mimic, and
therianthrope.
The prefix "were-," coming from the Old English word for "man"
(masculine rather than generic), is also used to designate
shapeshifters; despite its root, it is used to indicate female
shapeshifters as well.
Almost every
culture
around the world has some type of transformation myth, and almost every
commonly found animal (and some not-so-common ones) probably has a
shapeshifting myth attached to them. Usually, the animal involved in the
transformation is indigenous to or prevalent in the area from which the
story derives. While the popular idea of a shapeshifter is of a human
being who turns into something else, there are numerous stories about
animals that can transform themselves as well.[31]
[edit]
Greco-Roman
Shapeshifting, transformations and metamorphoses serve a wide variety of
purposes in classical mythology.
Examples of shapeshifting in
classical literature
include many examples in
Ovid's
Metamorphoses,
Circe's
transforming of
Odysseus'
men to pigs in
Homer's
The Odyssey,
and
Apuleius's
Lucius becoming a donkey in
The Golden Ass.
In
Homer's, The Odyssey, the goddess Athena transforms her appearance on
multiple occasions throughout: She appears to Odysseus' son Telemachus
as Mentor (Mentes);She transforms herself into a girl named Dymas; a
young girl; the herald of King Alcinous; a young herdsman; materializes
from a young man into a tall woman, etc. She even transforms Odysseus
into a beggar so that no one in his household , including the suitors,
would recognize him.
Proteus
among the gods was particularly noted for his shape-shifting; both
Menelaus
and
Aristaeus
seized him to win information from him, and succeeded only because they
held on during his manifold shape changes.
Gianlorenzo Bernini,
Apollo
pursuing an unwilling
Daphne
who transforms into a laurel tree.
While the Greek gods could use transformation punitively — as for
Arachne,
turned to a spider for her pride in her weaving, and
Medusa,
turned to a monster for having sexual intercourse with
Poseidon
in
Athena's
temple — even more frequently, the tales using it are of amorous
adventure.
Zeus
repeatedly transformed himself to approach mortal women, both as a means
of gaining access:
or
to attempt to conceal his affair from
Hera
-
Io,
as a cloud, and Io herself as a white heifer.
More innocently,
Vertumnus
transformed himself into an old woman in order to gain entry to
Pomona's
orchard; there, he persuaded her to marry him.
In
other tales, the woman appealed to other gods to protect her from
rape,
and was transformed (Daphne
into laurel,
Cornix
into a crow). Unlike Zeus and other god's shape-shifting, these women
were permanently metamorphosed.
In
one tale,
Demeter
transformed herself into a mare to escape
Poseidon,
but Poseidon counter-transformed himself into a stallion to pursue her,
and succeeded in the rape.
"Cadmus Sowing the Dragon's Teeth" by
Maxfield Parrish
Humans were also transformed, for many reasons.
Tiresias
once saw two snakes mating and struck the female with his staff; this
transformed him into a woman, and he lived as such for many years. At
the end, he saw the snakes again, and this time was careful to hit the
male, which restored him to male form.
Caenis,
having been raped by
Poseidon,
demanded of him that she be changed to a man. He agreed, and she became
Caeneus,
a form he never lost, except, in some versions, upon death.
As
a final reward from the gods for their hospitality,
Baucis and Philemon
were transformed, at their deaths, into a pair of trees.
Pygmalion
having fallen in love with a statue he had made,
Venus
had pity on him and transformed the stone to a living woman.
In
some variants of the tale of
Narcissus,
he is turned into a flower.
After
Tereus
raped
Philomela
and cut out her tongue to silence her, she wove her story into a
tapestry for her sister, Tereus's wife
Procne,
and the sisters murdered his son and fed him to his father. When he
discovered this, he tried to kill them, but the gods changed them all
into birds.
Sometimes metamorphoses transformed objects into humans. In the myths of
both
Jason
and
Cadmus,
one task set to the hero was to sow
dragon's teeth;
on being sown, they would metamorphose into belligerent warriors, and
both heroes had to trick them into fighting each other to survive.
Deucalion
and
Pyrrha
repopulated the world after a flood by throwing
stones behind them; they were transformed into people.
Cadmus
is also known to have transformed into a dragon or serpent towards the
end of his life.
[edit]
British and Irish
[edit]
Celtic mythology
Though much of
Welsh mythology
has been lost, shapeshifting magic features several times in what
remains.
Pwyll
was transformed by
Arawn
into Arawn's own shape, and Arawn transformed himself into Pwyll's, so
that they could trade places for a year and a day.
The
Children of Lir, transformed into swans in Irish tales
Llwyd ap Cil Coed
transformed his wife and attendants into mice to attack a crop in
revenge; when his wife is captured, he turned himself into three
clergymen in succession to try to pay a ransom.
Math
and
Gwydion
transform flowers into a woman named
Blodeuwedd,
and when she betrays her husband
Lleu,
who is transformed into an eagle, they transform her again, into an owl
- Blodeuwedd.
Gilfaethwy
committed rape with help from his brother
Gwydion.
Both were transformed into animals, for one year each. Gwydion was
transformed into a stag, sow and wolf, and Gilfaethwy into a hind, boar
and she-wolf. Each year, they had a child. Math turned the three young
animals into boys.
Gwion,
having accidentally taken some of wisdom potion that
Ceridwen
was brewing for her son, fled her through a succession of changes that
she answered with changes of her own, ending with his being eaten, a
grain of corn, by her as a hen. She became pregnant, and he was reborn
in a new form, as Taliesin.
Irish mythology
also features shapeshifting. Perhaps the best known myth is that of
Aoife
who turned her stepchildren, the
Children of Lir,
into swans to be rid of them. Likewise in the
Wooing of Etain
Fuamnach
jealously turns
Étaín
into a butterfly.
The Púca is a Celtic faery, and also a deft shape-shifter. He can
transform into many different, terrifing forms.
Sadbh,
the wife of the famous hero
Fionn mac Cumhaill
was changed into a deer by the druid Fer Doirich.
The most dramatic example of shapeshifting in Irish myth is that of
Tuan mac Cairill,
the only survivor of
Partholón's
settlement of Ireland. In his centuries long life he became successively
a stag, a wild boar, a hawk and finally a salmon prior to being eaten
and (as in the Wooing of Étaín) reborn as a human.
[edit]
British folklore
"The
giant
Galligantua
and the wicked old magician transform the duke's daughter into a white
hind."
by
Arthur Rackham
Fairies,
witches,
and
wizards
were all noted for their shapeshifting ability. Not all fairies could
shapeshift, and some were limited to changing their size, as with the
spriggans,
and others to a few forms, such as the
each uisge,
which appears only as a horse and a young man.[34]
Other fairies might have only the appearance of shape-shifting, through
their power, called "glamour," to create illusions.[35]
But others, such as the Hedley Kow, could change to many forms, and both
human and supernatural wizards were capable of both such changes, and
inflicting them on others.[34]
Witches could turn into hares and in that form steal milk and butter.[36]
Many British fairy tales, such as
Jack the Giant Killer
and
The Black Bull of Norroway,
feature shapeshifting.
Loge
feigns fear as Alberich turns into a giant snake. Wotan stands in the
background; illustration by
Arthur Rackham
to
Richard Wagner's
Das Rheingold
Both
Odin
and
Loki
are shapeshifters in Norse myth. Unusually, both take on female forms,
and Loki in the form of a mare bore
Sleipnir.
The
Lokasenna
depicts the two of them taunting each other with it, as having been
women through and through, having borne children. (Any myths that depict
Odin in female form have been lost, but the Lokasenna does
contain references to many myths that are known to be believed.
In
the
Hyndluljóđ,
the goddess
Freya
transformed her protégé
Óttar
into a boar to conceal him. She also possessed a cloak of falcon
feathers that allowed her to transform into a falcon. Which Loki
borrowed upon occasion.
The
Volsunga saga
contains many shapeshifting characters.
Siggeir's
mother changed to a wolf to help torture his defeated brothers-in-law
with slow and igmonious deaths. When one,
Sigmund,
survived, he and his nephew and son
Sinfjötli
killed men wearing wolfskins; when they donned the skins themselves,
they were cursed to become
werewolves.
Fafnir
was originally a dwarf, a giant or even a human, depending on the exact
myth, but in all variants he transformed into a dragon—a symbol of
greed—while
guarding his ill-gotten hoard.
In
more recent folklore, the
Nisse
is sometimes said to be a shapeshifter. This trait also is attributed to
Huldra.
[edit]
Slavic
In
Slavic mythology,
werewolves and other human-to-animal shapeshifters are fairly rare,
usually created as a course of
Leszi.
[edit]
Armenian
In
Armenian mythology,
shapshifters include the Nhang, a serpent-like river monster than
can transform itself into a woman or seal, and will drown humans and
then drink their blood, or the beneficial Shahapet, a guardian
spirit that can appear either a man or a snake.[37]
[edit]
Hinduism
Hindu folklore tells of
nāga,
snakes that can sometimes assume human form. One nāga took on a man's
shape in order to be ordained a monk; the Buddha refused it, but gave it
directions on how to ensure it could be reborn as a man after death, in
which form it could be ordained.
[edit] Far
East
"Madame White Snake" Picture on long veranda in the
Summer Palace,Beijing,China.
Chinese, Japanese, and Korean folklore all tell of animals able to
assume human shape. Though they have other traits in common—such animals
are often old, they grow additional tails along with their abilities,
and they frequently still have some animal traits to betray them—there
are distinctions between the folklore in the various countries.
[edit]
Chinese
Chinese folklore contains many tales of animal shapeshifters, capable of
taking on human form. The most common such shapeshifter is the
huli jing,
a fox spirit which usually appears as a beautiful young woman; most are
dangerous, but some feature as the heroines of love stories.
Madame White Snake
is one such legend; a snake falls in love with a man, and the story
recounts the trials that she and her husband faced.
[edit]
Japanese
Kuzunoha
the fox woman, casting a fox shadow
Many Japanese
yōkai
are animals with the ability to shapeshift. The fox, or
kitsune
is among the most common, but other such creatures include:
[edit] Korean
Korean folklore also contains a fox with the ability to shape-shift.
Unlike its Chinese and Japanese counterparts, the
kumiho
is always malevolent. Usually its form is of a beautiful young woman;
one tale recounts a man, a would-be seducer, revealed as a kumiho.[38]
She has nine tails and as she desires to be a full human, she uses her
beauty to seduce men and eat their hearts (or in some cases livers where
the belief is that 100 livers would turn her into a real human).
Tatar folklore includes
Yuxa,
a hundred-year-old snake that can transform itself into a beautiful
young woman, and seeks to marry men in order to have children.
[edit]
Philippines
Philippine folklore includes
aswang,
a cannibal capable of transforming itself to either a huge black dog or
a black boar to stalk human beings at night. The folklore also mentions
other beings, i.e., Kapre, Tikbalang, and Engkanto, that change their
appearnace to woo beautiful maidens. Also, talismans, called
"anting-anting" or "birtud" in the local dialect, can have the power to
give its owner the ability to shapeshift.
[edit]
Shapeshifting in popular culture
Shapeshifting can be a rich symbolic and narrative tool. Today, the
theme appears in many
fantasy,
science fiction
and
horror
stories; some would even recognize a distinct subgenre of
shapeshifting or transformation fiction, with its own genre
conventions. Fantasy and science fiction occasionally feature
races or species
of shapeshifters, and both magic and technology can be used to impose a
change in form. Some of the more popular themes include
werewolves,
vampires,
and
age regression.
In a broader sense, the term includes stories about characters who
shrink or grow in size without changing their form. Transformation in
this regard is physical, as opposed to the character development
common to many stories, even with no fantastic element, which typically
involves
characters changing
mentally, psychologically or spiritually.
[edit]
Shapeshifting
in TV
Shapeshifting is a recurrent theme in the TV show
Fringe,
in which shapeshifters are from another universe and are human/machine
hybrids with blood made of
mercury,
which was taken from the TV show X-files.
In
the
cult television series
Charmed,
several characters and
mythological beings
had the ability to shapeshift. Of them, some
whitelighters
(guardian
angel-type
beings) were able to glamour, a term used to denote a
change in physical form into the appearance of another humanoid being.
Notable whitelighters with this ability include protagonists
Paige Matthews
and
Leo Wyatt.
Additionally, during the second season a Glamour to Change Ones
Appearance spell was seen in the magical
Book of Shadows,
to be used by
witches.
It was not until the seventh season finale and the eighth season that
the spell was actually used by the main characters. Furthermore,
shapeshifters is the name given to evil beings with the power to
transform their physical appearance into anything else animate or
inanimate. Other evil beings in the series, mainly
demons,
have also had the ability to shapeshift into any desired form, and some
(including
The Source of All Evil
and
Cole Turner
during the fifth season) have also been able to change the appearance of
others. This ability, when used by demons other than the shapeshifters,
is occasionally referred to as morphing.
Three episodes of the television show
Supernatural
(Season 1 Episode 6 "Skin," Season 2 Episode 12 "Nightshifter," & Season
4 Episode 5 "Monster Movie") deal with the shapeshifter lore.
Dozens of episodes of the hit science-fiction TV series
Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
featured shapeshifters known as
The Founders,
also referred to informally as
changelings,
who were liquid life forms composed of a
gelatinous
substance and were the leaders of
The Dominion.
The most frequently seen of these was
Odo.
Star Trek VI
featured a
chameloid,
another species of shapeshifter, by the name of Martia. Earlier in
The Original Series,
a shapeshifter, Captain Garth of Izar, 77 appeared in
"Whom Gods Destroy".
Beginning in Season 2, "Space:
1999"
featured a shapeshifter called
Maya.
In
Family Guy Viewer Mail#1,
Peter Griffin
has this power to turn into anything (and back to original form); from
Britney Spears
to a
Dinosaur.
In
the
HBO
series
True Blood,
the character Sam divulges that he is a shapeshifter, most of time into
a dog and that there are several other shapeshifters in the world and
they can all turn into different things. He also makes mention that
turning into a human is too complicated.
In
the long running
BBC
science fiction series
Doctor Who,
the main character changes or
"regenerates"
into another person. This usually takes place when the current actor
ends his contract or dies or leaves the series for any reason. There was
also an episode in season 2 called
Tooth and Claw
in which the Doctor and his companion face a werewolf.
In
kids' TV comedy
My Parents are Aliens,
the foster parents, Aliens from Planet Valux, can shapeshift into any
person (or on a few occasions, animals) and back, except for two issues
where Sophie Johnson couldn't morph back to her original form from 1) An
alterntive Woman and 2) A Mermaid.
In
Cartoon Network's "The Venture Brothers," the leader of the Guild of
Calamitous Intent, David Bowie, is a shape-shifter.
In
the
ABC
series
Lost
a character known only as
The Man in Black
is capable of shape-shifting into that of various dead characters and a
cloud of black smoke.
In
the
NBC
series
Heroes,
the character
Sylar
acquires the ability to shape-shift into various individuals.
[edit]
Shapeshifting in movies
In
the film
The Spiderwick Chronicles,
Mulgarath; the antagonist is shown shapeshifting into a
basilisk,
raven,
and a
human.
Another antagonist who shape shifts is
Maleficent,
who becomes both a
Will o' the Wisp
and a
Dragon
In
Terminator 2,
the T-1000 is a shape-shifting, liquid-metal robot that frequently
shape-shifts parts of itself into weapons, such as knives and hooks,
shape-shifts to look like people and take on their identities, and even
shape-shifting into a flat, black-and-white checkered surface to match
and hide on the tile floor of a mental hospital.
In
The Thing
the alien life form can assimilate and replicate people's cells so the
alien is an exact copy of the person. When threatened though the alien
would rapidly mutate and kill anyone that it could catch.
[edit]
Shapeshifting in novels
The plots of several novels in the
mythic fiction
field revolve around shape-shifting and
therianthropy,
for example: The Antelope Wife by
Louise Erdrich,
Coyote Blue
by
Christopher Moore,
and
The Wood Wife
by Terri Windling are all contemporary explorations of Native American
shape-shifter myths. The Fox Woman by
Kij Johnson,
When Fox is a Thousand by Larissa Lai, and A Rumor of Gems
by
Ellen Steiber
are novels based on Japanese
kitsune
myths. Greenmantle by
Charles de Lint
and Stepping from the Shadows by
Patricia McKillip
draw on the Celtic myth of the stag-man
Cernunnos.
The Limits of Enchantment by
Graham Joyce
and Hannah's Garden by
Midori Snyder
are contemporary novels, set in England and North America respectively,
concerning the shape-shifting powers of
hares
in the folklore of the British Isles.
In
the series
Animorphs
by
K. A. Applegate
the protagonists receive the power to 'morph' into any animal they touch
from a dying alien prince. The power to morph in these stories is not
due magic, but to technology and has certain limitations.
In
the book series
Mindwarp,
the Omega, which the six protagonists think are aliens at first are
shape-shifter. At normal state, they have gray skin, bubbled head and
totally dark eyes. One of the principal characters, Todd Aldridge, has a
power who looks like it : he can record what he as already seen or heard
- like another human - and turn into it, like a video recorder.
Jack Finney's
novel
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
and the various movies it inspired use the shapeshifting motif as a
means of exploring contemporary anxiety and paranoia, particularly fear
of totalitarian manipulation of free will and the elimination of human
emotion.
In
the book
The Hobbit, or There and Back Again
by
J. R. R. Tolkien,
there is the character
Beorn
who can change from man to bear at will.
In
the
Harry Potter
series of novels, there are certain witches and wizards in the wizarding
world that have the ability to transform into a single animal form. Such
an individual is trained to do so and is referred to as an Animagus.
Minerva McGonagall, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, James Potter, Peter
Pettigrew and Rita Skeeter are among the only Animagi named in the
series.
In
the
Twilight
series by
Stephenie Meyer,
members of the Quileute tribe who can turn into wolves are said to be
shapeshifters.
In
Cornelia Funke's
novel
Inkdeath,
the characters Resa and
Mortola
use magical seeds to transform into birds.
In
the
Witchlock
series by
Cyrese Covelli,
main character Gemma Rafferty finds she can shapeshift into a werewolf.
In the third book, Wolfsmage, Merle Pinewood shapeshifts into a
crow, and the Sarke twins Savannah and Ian shapeshift into snakes.
Camouflage
is a novel by
Joe Haldeman,
with two immortal shapeshifting aliens as the main characters.
Polymorph
is a cyberpunk novel by
Scott Westerfeld
about a shapeshifter who meets another shapeshifter but with evil
intentions.
In
the Bartimaeus Trilogy by
Jonathan Stroud,
there are many implications that the Night Police are able to change
into wolves at will, and every demon from foliot upwards is able to
change its shape to some degree.
Mistwood
is a young adult fantasy novel by
Leah Cypess.
The main character is a female shapeshifter who has lost both her memory
and the ability to change her shape.
The
Spiderwick
series features fantasical beasts that shape shift, from brownies who
become boggarts when angered, and the main antagonist; Mulgarath who
transforms in to human, or a bird.
In
The Power of Five
series by
Anthony Horowitz,
there are creatures named Shape-Changers who can shift from human
to monster for disguise.
In
the novel
IT
by
Stephen King,
the titular monster can assume the shape of whatever it feels its
victims will fear most.
Also, on the book "The Shapeshifter" by Ali Sparkes, a 12 year old boy
can shapeshift in a fox, falcon and in the last book, an otter.
[edit]
Shapeshifting in video games
In
Prototype,
the amnesiac protagonist, Alex Mercer, is capable of transforming his
body into weapons or armor, which is a key component of the video game.
He also has the ability to shapeshift into the form of the last enemy
consumed as a disguise.
In
Bayonetta,
the title character,
Bayonetta
is a shapeshifter who uses her hair to help her transform.
In
Altered Beast,
the character shapeshifts as he collects 'power ups' throughout the
levels, he can change into a
werewolf,
a
bear,
a
tiger
and a
dragon
in different levels with each having their own special ability.
In
the popular online RPG
World of Warcraft,
characters of the Druid
class
may shapeshift into several different kinds of animals, both real and
fantastical, as well as into a tree/ent,
presumably due to their closeness to nature. The Warlock and Shaman
classes can also shapeshift into a large demon and a ghostly wolf
respectively for limeted periods of time. The Mage class can cast a
spell called Polymorph, which can transform an opponent into a variety
of animals (most notably a sheep), temporarily disabling the opponent in
combat.
In
the Legend of Zelda,
the protagonist, Link, can shapeshift in several games - into a Deku,
Zora, or Goron in
Majora's Mask,
in size in
Minish Cap,
and into a wolf in
Twilight Princess.
[edit]
Shapeshifting in role
playing games
In
Werewolf: The Apocalypse
the characters, known as Garou, are werewolves that can shapeshift at
will. They guardians of Nature, called Gaia in the game.
[edit]
Shapeshifting in comics
Main
article:
List of comic book superpowers
In
the comic strip
Calvin and Hobbes,
Calvin created a
transmogrification machine
that allowed him to transform into anything he wished.
In
the Japanese manga
Ranma ˝,
by
Rumiko Takahashi,
many of the main characters are under a curse and shapeshift when are
touched by cold water and recover their original form with a little
splash of hot water. For example, the hero, Ranma, changes into a
beautiful maiden, and his father Genma into a Giant Panda.
In
the Japanese manga and anime series
Fullmetal Alchemist
by
Hiromu Arakawa,
the Homunculus Envy is able to turn into any person or animal, and
occasionally turns his limbs into blades.
The
Zoanoids
from the
Guyver
manga and anime series are also notoriously known for their abilities to
change from humans into
monsters.
In
the Japanese manga and anime series
Bleach,
Yoruichi Shihōin
can turn into a cat.
In
the Japanese manga and anime series
Fruits Basket,
people who are members of The Zodiac transform into their respective
zodiac animals when hugged by members of the opposite sex. Over time,
they change back into their human forms, generally whether they want to
or not.
In
the Japanese anime series
Yu-Gi-Oh! GX,
transformation appears linked to love and/or romance. Antagonist Taniya
is originally a tiger who becomes a human amazoness in order to search
for a lover, though it could much more be considered a love slave that
she was searching for. Later on, it is revealed that antagonist Yubel,
who takes a hermaphroditic dragon form which has a nearly-sick romantic
obsession with the main character, was originally a human in a past life
and became its current form in an attempt to protect Judai (Jaden in the
dub) from any harm that may come to him as he matures.
In
One Piece,
the Baroque Agent Bon Clay (Mr. 2) is able to transform in any person he
has ever touched in the face with his right hand. He just has to touch
himself in the face with his right hand. To turn back, he must touch his
face with his left hand.
DC
Comics'
Beast Boy
(later the
Teen Titan
Changeling) can transform into any animal (albeit, due to his green
skin, his animal forms are always green).
DC
Comics'
Mister Mxyzptlk
is also a changeling.
Martians (Most notably
Martian Manhunter
and
Miss Martian)
from various
DC Comics
are shape shifters, able to take on unlimited forms.
The American
underground comic
superhero
Trashman
can change his molecular structure at will to any shape, even
non-organic.
In
the
X-men,
there is the shape-shifting villain
Mystique
and there is the shapeshifting
X-men
member then villain named
Morph.
Due to
Rogue's
ability to temporarily absorb the powers of other mutants, she can
occasionally display shapeshifting abilities by absorbing the powers of
a shapeshifting mutant (such as
Mystique)
or may experience some limited involuntary shapeshifting when she
absorbs the powers of certain mutants (for example, her fingernails will
grow into claws after absorbing
Sabertooth's
powers).
In
New Mutants,
there is the shape-shifting technological life form,
Warlock.
In
the
Marvel Universe
(introduced in
Fantastic Four #11),
Impossible Man
also has shape-shifting abilities. He also gains some of the object's
properties, but not an ability to change color. (This has been
contradicted by some Fantastic Four cover art.)
Also in the
Marvel Universe
are the
Skrulls,
a race of aliens with green skin, pointed ears, multiple chins, expanded
lifespans, and the ability to shapeshift. Several notable Skrulls are
the
Super-Skrull,
Lyja the Laserfist,
and
Paibok.
Despite originally being enemies of the Fantastic Four, the Skrulls have
impacted other heroes, and have been directly involved in the
Kree-Skrull War
and the
Secret Invasion.
Also in the
Marvel Universe
(introduced in
Tales of Suspense
#82),
the
android
Super-Adaptoid
has limited shape-shifting abilities, adopting the appearance of the
person whose powers he has absorbed. He does not gain an ability to
change color, always remaining green. (This has also been contradicted
by some cover art.)
In
the television series' "Ben 10" and "Ben 10 Alien Force" the titular
character uses an alien device to transform into different alien heroes.
In
the
Mario
series Doopliss and Mimi can transform into any known creature.
In
Metroid,
Gandrayda is a hunter with the ability to shape-shift.
In
Castlevania: Symphony of the Night,
Alucard, the son of Count Dracula Tepes Vlad, learned the dark arts of
his father as a youth and can shape-shift into a
bat,
wolf,
or
fog.
In
the
Pokémon
series
Mew
and
Ditto
can shape-shift but their copies are not perfect.
In
Bionicle,
there are many beings that shapeshift.
-
The
Makuta,
who can only use this power when inhabiting their original armor.
-
Rahkshi of Shapeshifting. The limits of their power depend on how
old they are.
-
Krahka's species. Krahka could turn into anything she saw, and
combinations of things she's seen.
-
Toa who wear the Mask of Illusion.
(Great Kanohi Mahiki)
-
Dark Hunter Triglax.
[edit]
Transformation enthusiasts
Many children have animal transformation fantasies and shapeshifting is
a well-known feature of
fairy tales,
such as the story of
the Frog Prince
and
The Spiderwick Chronicles
. Interest in transformation isn't limited just to them, though; the
concept captures some imaginations of all ages. The subject is rather
obscure and there's no established term for those who like
transformations; the general expression is just "TF fans". Note that
having an interest in shapeshifting is distinct from belonging to
therians,
otherkin
or any other group that actually identifies with or wishes to become
something else.
Websites and online communities about transformation exist, both clean
and otherwise, although for someone who e.g. just likes coming across
shapechanges on TV, a site dedicated for appreciating them might be
entirely too much. The
Transformation Story Archive
is a prominent example of its kind.
Two currently prominent
webcomics
feature transformations for their own sake:
El Goonish Shive
is technology- and magic-based and more character-driven, while
The Wotch
is somewhat younger, magic-based and considerably more madcap.
[edit] See
also
-
^
Marina Warner,
From the Beast to the Blonde: On Fairy Tales And Their Tellers,
p 353
ISBN 0-374-15901-7
-
^
Anne Wilson, Traditional Romance and Tale, p 84, D.S. Brewer, Rowman
& Littlefield, Ipswitch, 1976,
ISBN 0-87471-905-4
-
^
David Colbert, The Magical Worlds of Harry Potter, p 28-9,
ISBN 0-9708442-0-4
-
^
Jack Zipes,
When Dreams Came True: Classical Fairy Tales and Their Tradition,
p 176-7
ISBN 0-415-92151-1
-
^
Anime from Akira to Princess Mononoke:
Experiencing Contemporary Japanese Animation;
Napier, Susan Jolliffe;
ISBN 978-0-312-23863-6
-
^
Animerica Vol.1,
#2;
http://www.furinkan.com/takahashi/takahashi7.html
-
^
Francis James Child, The English and Scottish Popular Ballads,
v 1, p 313-4, Dover Publications, New York 1965
-
^
Maria Tatar, p 193, The Annotated Classic Fairy Tales,
ISBN 0-393-05163-3
-
^
Stephen Prickett, Victorian Fantasy p 86
ISBN 0-253-17461-9
-
^
Erik J. Wielenberg, "Aslan the Terrible" p 226-7 Gregory Bassham ed.
and Jerry L. Walls, ed.
The Chronicles of Narnia and Philosophy
ISBN 0-8126-9588-7
-
^
James F. Sennett, "Worthy of a Better God" p 243 Gregory Bassham ed.
and Jerry L. Walls, ed.
The Chronicles of Narnia and Philosophy
ISBN 0-8126-9588-7
-
^
a
b
Vladimir Propp,
Morphology of the Folk Tale, p 57,
ISBN 0-292-78376-0
-
^
Richard M. Dorson, "Foreword", p xxiv, Georgias
A. Megas, Folktales of Greece, University of Chicago Press,
Chicago and London, 1970
-
^
Stith Thompson, The Folktale, p 56, University of California Press,
Berkeley Los Angeles London, 1977
-
^
Stith Thompson, The Folktale, p 89, University of California
Press, Berkeley Los Angeles London, 1977
-
^
David Colbert, The Magical Worlds of Harry Potter, p 23,
ISBN 0-9708442-0-4
-
^
John Grant and John Clute, The Encyclopedia of Fantasy,
"Transformation", p 960
ISBN 0-312-19869-8
-
^
Francis James Child, The English and Scottish Popular Ballads,
v 1, p 336-7, Dover Publications, New York 1965
-
^
L. Sprague de Camp,
Literary Swordsmen and Sorcerers:
The Makers of Heroic Fantasy,
p 266
ISBN 0-87054-076-9
-
^
Stith Thompson, The Folktale, p 55-6, University of
California Press, Berkeley Los Angeles London, 1977
-
^
John Grant and John Clute,
The Encyclopedia of Fantasy,
"Shapeshifting", p 858
ISBN 0-312-19869-8
-
^
John Grant and John Clute, The Encyclopedia of Fantasy,
"Transformation", p 960
ISBN 0-312-19869-8
-
^
Maria Tatar, The Annotated Brothers Grimm, p 226 W. W. Norton
& company, London, New York, 2004
ISBN 0-393-05848-4
-
^
Joseph Jacobs,
English Fairy Tales,
"The Laidly Worm of Spindleston Heugh"
-
^
Maria Tatar, Off with Their Heads! p. 60
ISBN 0-691-06943-3
-
^
Maria Tatar, The Annotated Brothers Grimm, p 136
ISBN 0-393-05848-4
-
^
Maria Tatar, Off with Their Heads! p. 140-1
ISBN 0-691-06943-3
-
^
Steven Swann Jones, The Fairy Tale: The Magic Mirror of
Imagination, Twayne Publishers, New York, 1995,
ISBN 0-8057-0950-9,
p84
-
^
Anne Wilson, Traditional Romance and Tale, p 89, D.S. Brewer,
Rowman & Littlefield, Ipswitch, 1976,
ISBN 0-87471-905-4
-
^
Francis James Child,
The English and Scottish Popular Ballads, v 1, p 306, Dover
Publications, New York 1965
-
^
a
b
c
Terri Windling,
"Married
to Magic: Animal Brides and Bridegrooms in Folklore and Fantasy"
-
^
Maria Tatar, The Hard Facts of the Grimms' Fairy Tales,
p174-5,
ISBN 0-691-06722-8
-
^
Rigveda 7.104.18-22
-
^
a
b
Katharine Briggs,
An Encyclopedia of Fairies, Hobgoblins, Brownies, Boogies, and
Other Supernatural Creatures, "Shape-shifting", p360.
ISBN 0-394-73467-X
-
^
Katharine Briggs,
An Encyclopedia of Fairies, Hobgoblins, Brownies, Boogies, and
Other Supernatural Creatures, "Glamour", p191.
ISBN 0-394-73467-X
-
^
Eddie Lenihan and Carolyn Eve Green, Meeting The Other Crowd: The
Fairy Stories of Hidden Ireland, p 80
ISBN 1-58542-206-1
-
^
"Armenian Mythology"
by Mardiros H. Ananikiam, in Bullfinch's Mythology
-
^
Heinz Insu Fenkl, "A
Fox Woman Tale of Korea"
[edit]
References
-
Hall, Jamie, Half Human, Half Animal: Tales of Werewolves and
Related Creatures (AuthorHouse, 2003
ISBN 1-4107-5809-5)
[edit]
External links
Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shapeshifting"
Categories:
Shapeshifting
|
Science fiction themes
|
Fantasy tropes
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