From the book
The Anatomy of Melancholy
Robert Burton · Diotimos Editions · 2026
Browse this book’s lexicon →Orientation
At a Glance
- The wordLycanthropia, modernized as lycanthropy, names the condition Burton also calls Wolf-madness: people believe themselves wolves or similar beasts and, in his account, howl and wander at night.
- In the Anatomy of MelancholyThe synopsis places lycanthropy among settled disorders of head or mind.
- In this edition“Lycanthropia” becomes “lycanthropy,” and the English “Wolf-madness” survives as “wolf-madness.”
- A place to readLycanthropy among the conditions subsequently surveyed
Meaning
Lycanthropia, modernized as lycanthropy, names the condition Burton also calls Wolf-madness: people believe themselves wolves or similar beasts and, in his account, howl and wander at night. Lupinam insaniam is the Latin phrase for wolf-madness printed beside the English gloss. Cucubuth and Cucubuthe are the two printed forms of an alternative name attributed to Avicenna; their linguistic and textual history remains unverified in the supplied edition. The description concerns conviction and behaviour, not an assertion that a human body actually changes into a wolf.
Use in the book
A classification disputed within the book
The synopsis places lycanthropy among settled disorders of head or mind. The prose survey names it among conditions affecting imagination or reason, and the following subsection groups it with kinds of fury. Burton then distinguishes his own preference from those of Aetius and Paulus: they call it a kind of melancholy, while he would rather place it under madness, “as most do.” These are the taxonomy and comparative claim of this passage, not a unanimous diagnosis across his authorities.
Later, when reporting alternative divisions of melancholy, Burton says that lycanthropy is commonly included in head melancholy. The sentence does not erase his earlier preference; it reports a common scheme within a survey that repeatedly admits disagreement and mixed cases. Its following “this last” is grammatically awkward: the promised Third Partition discussion concerns love melancholy, as the attached edition note explains, rather than an extended treatment of lycanthropy.
The symptom survey adds lycanthropy to a list of conditions found with melancholy in consultation literature. Its argument is the difficulty of assigning mixed symptoms to distinct kinds. Burton immediately warns that the entire catalogue is not found in one person: some symptoms occur in one, some in another, and at different times. The name’s appearance in that list should preserve this caution.
Belief, behaviour and contested evidence
The central definition combines an unshakable animal-identity belief with howling around fields and graves at night. The next paragraph opens by acknowledging doubt about the disease’s existence, then offers reports attributed to Altomarus, Wierus and Forestus. One person believes himself a wolf, another a bear; the Alkmaar farm worker is described as haunting churchyards. This range explains why Burton says “Wolves, or some such beasts.” It also separates his reported cases from a narrow claim about wolves alone.
Further reported features include hiding during the day, nocturnal wandering, sunken eyes, scabbed limbs, dryness and pallor. The margin adds excessive thirst. Burton assigns seasonal and regional claims to named authorities, including Avicenna’s February claim and reports about Bohemia, Hungary and Livonia. These remain his received accounts; their precision should not be mistaken for independent verification of cases, prevalence or treatment.
Animal-transformation stories
Burton suggests that this condition may explain stories about Proetus’s daughters, Nebuchadnezzar and human beings becoming wolves. His modifiers are essential: the daughters were “belike” in a similar condition; Nebuchadnezzar receives this interpretation from “some interpreters”; the illness “perhaps” occasioned transformation tales. The article therefore reports Burton’s comparison and those interpreters’ view without diagnosing the named figures.
The supplied editorial apparatus also identifies limits in Burton’s classical reporting. It says Pliny rejects literal transformations before recounting the stories, whereas Burton calls transformation his “bold assertion”; it similarly notes Pausanias’s disbelief and a disagreement over the number of years. Those are the edition’s source cautions, not fresh collations undertaken for this entry. Burton’s catalogue of further reading is extensive, but its abbreviated references likewise retain unresolved details.
Related entries
Madness; Melancholy; Dotage; Imagination; Ecstasy
Places to read
- Synopsis of settled disordersLycanthropy among the conditions subsequently surveyed
- Definition and competing classificationsDisorders of imagination or reason, kinds of fury and Burton’s preference for madness
- Reported cases and transformation narrativesDoubt, animal-identity reports, classical and biblical comparisons, references and symptoms
- Commonly assigned to head melancholyFocus on paragraphs 50–52. Rival divisions and the subsequent warning about mixtures
- Intermixed symptomsConsultation examples and the refusal to combine every symptom into one person
- The source’s own retrieval route“Lycanthropia described 9” points back to the opening definition
In this edition
“Lycanthropia” becomes “lycanthropy,” and the English “Wolf-madness” survives as “wolf-madness.” In the definition, however, the modernization gives one English designation where the original gives the Latin “Lupinam insaniam” and Burton’s accompanying English gloss. These are a compressed phrase-level alignment, not two independently displayed modern translations. The alternative names retain their local spellings, “cucubuth” in the definition and “Cucubuthe” in the later classification.
“will not be perswaded but that they are Wolves, or some such beasts” becomes “cannot be persuaded that they are anything but wolves or similar beasts.” This preserves the belief’s reported certainty while keeping it a belief. The modern text explicitly repeats “love melancholy” to clarify the referent of the original’s “this last”; that clarification is not an additional name for lycanthropy. The translations and historical corrections inside labelled marginal and editorial notes are distinct from Burton’s original body text.
Cucubuth / Cucubuthe · Cucubuth
Printed “Cucubuth” (Unresolved source language; historical medical name transmitted in English prose; transmitted medical name).
The condition of believing oneself a wolf or similar beast, with the reported nocturnal behaviour; Cucubuth is the alternative name Burton attributes to Avicenna.
Context: Burton’s attribution; retained as a historical printed name.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording, Original construction: Avicenna calls Cucubuth
Modern rendering, Modern wording, Modern construction: Avicenna calls cucubuth
Qualification: The quoted constructions are aligned at phrase level; individual component meanings are not equated with the entire phrase.
Notes: Authorities and anecdotes are reported as Burton presents them; no fresh historical-witness collation is claimed.
Cucubuth / Cucubuthe · Cucubuthe
Printed “Cucubuthe” (Unresolved source language; historical medical name transmitted in English prose; transmitted medical name).
The animal-identity disorder elsewhere described as belief in being a wolf or similar beast; this printed spelling of the name attributed to Avicenna occurs in a reported classification under head melancholy.
Context: Burton reports a common classification, without withdrawing his earlier personal preference for madness.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording, Original construction: Lycanthropia, which he cals Cucubuthe, are commonly included in head Melancholy
Modern rendering, Modern wording, Modern construction: lycanthropy, which he calls Cucubuthe, are commonly included in head melancholy
Qualification: Cucubuthe is retained unchanged. He refers to Avicenna, named earlier in the full sentence; the plural are has the compound subject love melancholy and Lycanthropia. The later editorially supplied love melancholy resolves this last and is not an alternative name for this condition.
Notes: Authorities and anecdotes are reported as Burton presents them; no fresh historical-witness collation is claimed.
lupina insania
Printed “Lupinam insaniam” (Latin; phrase).
Wolf-like madness or wolf-madness: a Latin alternative designation for the described animal-identity condition. Accusative phrase governed by the understood act of naming.
Context: Burton reports other writers’ designation and supplies the English gloss.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording, Original construction: others Lupinam insaniam, or Wolf-madness
Modern rendering, Modern wording, Modern construction: others “wolf-madness,”
Qualification: The modern wording compresses Latin designation and Burton’s English gloss. The entire equivalence is not evidence that the Latin and English were separately modernized.
Notes: Authorities and anecdotes are reported as Burton presents them; no fresh historical-witness collation is claimed.
lycanthropia · Lycanthropia · local use 1
Printed “Lycanthropia” (Latin medical name in English prose; lemma).
A condition involving the belief that one is a wolf or similar animal, with nocturnal howling and wandering in Burton’s later description; here listed among disorders of imagination or reason.
Context: Burton announces a selective survey of mental disorders before concentrating on melancholy.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording, Original construction: Hydrophobia, Lycanthropia, Chorus sancti viti
Modern rendering, Modern wording, Modern construction: hydrophobia, lycanthropy, St Vitus’s dance
Qualification: The quoted constructions are aligned at phrase level; individual component meanings are not equated with the entire phrase.
Notes: Authorities and anecdotes are reported as Burton presents them; no fresh historical-witness collation is claimed.
lycanthropia · Lycanthropia · local use 2
Printed “Lycanthropia” (Latin medical name in English prose; lemma).
The condition Burton describes through nocturnal howling and the fixed belief that one is a wolf or similar animal.
Context: Burton describes reported behaviour and belief, then prefers classification under madness over the classification under melancholy attributed to Aetius and Paulus.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording, Original construction: Lycanthropia, which Avicenna calls Cucubuth, others Lupinam insaniam, or Wolf-madness
Modern rendering, Modern wording, Modern construction: Lycanthropy, which Avicenna calls cucubuth and others “wolf-madness,”
Qualification: The modern compresses the original Latin alternative Lupinam insaniam and its English gloss Wolf-madness into one “wolf-madness”; it does not print two separate equivalents.
Notes: Authorities and anecdotes are reported as Burton presents them; no fresh historical-witness collation is claimed.
lycanthropia · Lycanthropia · local use 3
Printed “Lycanthropia” (Latin medical name in English prose; lemma).
The condition of imagined wolf-like or other animal identity, listed here among disorders that can accompany melancholy in mixed cases.
Context: Burton draws on consultation literature to stress mixture; the continuation rejects assembling every symptom in one person.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording, Original construction: with falling sickness, headach, Vertigo, Lycanthropia
Modern rendering, Modern wording, Modern construction: with epilepsy, headache, vertigo, lycanthropy
Qualification: The quoted constructions are aligned at phrase level; individual component meanings are not equated with the entire phrase.
Notes: Authorities and anecdotes are reported as Burton presents them; no fresh historical-witness collation is claimed.
wolf-madness
Printed “Wolf-madness” (English; compound).
A supposed disorder in which people believe themselves wolves or similar beasts and howl and wander by night; Burton’s English gloss of Lupinam insaniam.
Context: Authorial English gloss following a reported Latin designation.
Source: original body
Source wording, Original wording, Original construction: others Lupinam insaniam, or Wolf-madness
Modern rendering, Modern wording, Modern construction: others “wolf-madness,”
Qualification: The modern compresses the preceding Latin alternative and this English gloss into one phrase.
Notes: Authorities and anecdotes are reported as Burton presents them; no fresh historical-witness collation is claimed.