In 1589 a trial was conducted
against Jacques Roulet, a vagabond from Claude in the vicinity of Angers. His
behaviour in custody showed that he was mentally ill and was epileptic. The
tribunal took lycanthropy for the real reason for these aberrations of mind,
thanks to which the accused avoided the death penalty.
Roulet’s confessions during the
trial were contradictory and improbable. He claimed that his brother John and
cousin Julien were involved in committing the crimes, however, it was then
concluded that both of them were many miles away from him at the time. Roulet
was accused of having been found in the form of a werewolf (by a soldier and
three villagers) among bushes, half-naked, with untidy hair, hands covered in
blood and fingernails sunken in the remains of human flesh. The mutilated body
of a fifteen-year-old boy by the name of Cornier lay nearby. Roulet admitted to
the murder of the lad and described in detail the victim as well as the
circumstances of the murder.
On August 8th 1598 judge
Pierre Herault was interrogating the prisoner:
Judge: What is your name and your
craft?
Roulet: My name is Jacques Roulet, I
am thirty-five years old, and am a poor beggar.
Judge: What are you accused of?
Roulet: Of theft; of blasphemy. My
parents gave me a certain ointment, I don’t know its contents.
Judge: Did you become a wolf when
you rubbed it in your skin?
Roulet: No, but thanks to it I
killed and devoured son Cornier. I was a wolf.
Judge: Were you dressed as a wolf?
Roulet: I was dressed as I am now.
My hands and face were bloodied, because I ate the boy’s flesh.
Judge: Did your hands and feet
become the paws of a wolf?
Roulet: Yes!
Judge: Did you head become similar
to that of a wolf, and your jaws become larger?
Roulet: I do not know what my head
was like then; I was using my teeth. My head was like it is now. I injured and
devoured many children. I also took part in a Sabbath.
Secular court sentenced Roulet to
death. What is curious, however, is that he appealed to the Parliament in
Paris, which exchanged his death sentence to two years of stay at the St.
Germain des Pres asylum, so that he would be re-educated on the subject of
religion “which he had forgotten about in his huge poverty”. […]
On the basis of: E. Petoia, Wampiry I wilkołaki. Źródła, historia, legendy od antyku do
współczesności, Universitas, Kraków 2003. Own translation into English. Will update with
the page details once I get my hands on the book itself, as I have left it in
another place.
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