Thursday, October 18, 2012

Adventures in Logophilia Day 37: Lycanthropia (jillian)

Today's word is...

lycanthropia

Lycanthropia (an archaic noun) refers to "a variety of melancholy in which the person believes himself to be changed into a wolf." (From Jeffrey Kacirk's Forgotten English) Therefore a lycanthrope is a werewolf - not someone who likes lichens.  That would be "lichenthrope."  According to Oxford Dictionaries lycanthrope is a 17th century term.  So... not medieval but a decidedly early modern paranoia.  It makes me wonder how the werewolf myth began in the first place.

As it is so close to Halloween, I should have put this word into spooky calligraphy, but alas, I ran out of time this morning. 

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