i2 4 EXTINCT BRITISH ANIMALS. 



creatures could not find of other beasts sufficient to 

 feed upon."* 



The Saxons also called an outlaw " wolfs-head/'t 

 as being out of the protection of the law, proscribed, 

 and as liable to be killed as that destructive beast. 

 " Et tune gerunt caput lupinum, ita quod sine judiciali 

 inquisilione rite pereant."^ 



In the " Penitentiale" of Archbishop Egber, 1 -, drawn 

 up about A.D. 750, it is laid down (lib. iv.) that, " if 

 a wolf shall attack cattle of any kind, and the animal 

 attacked shall die in. consequence, no Christian may 

 touch it." 



It is to the terror which the Wolf inspired among 

 our forefathers that we are to ascribe the fact of 

 kings and rulers, in a barbarous age, feeling proud of 

 bearing the name of this animal as an attribute of 

 courage and ferocity. Brute power was then con- 

 sidered the highest distinction of man, and the 

 sentiment was not mitigated by those refinements of 

 modern life which conceal but do not destroy it. 

 We thus find, amongst our Anglo-Saxon kings and 

 great men, such names as Ethel wulf, "the Noble 

 Wolf;" Berth wulf, "the Illustrious Wolf ;" Eadwulf, 

 " the Prosperous Wolf;" Ealdwulf, " the Old Wolf." 



In Athelstan's reign, Wolves abounded so in York- 

 shire that a retreat was built by one Acehorn, at 



* " Restitution of Decayed Intelligence," p. 64 (ed. 1673). 



f Ang.-Sax. Wulvcslwofod, that is, having the head of a Wolf. In 

 1041, the fugitive Godwin was proclaimed Wulveshcofod, a price being 

 set upon his head. The term was in use temp. Henry II. 



J Bracton, " De legibus et consuetudinibus Anglia?," lib. iii. tr. ii. 

 c. ii (1569). See also Knighton, " De Eventibus Anglise," in 

 Twysden's " Historic Angiicame Scriptorcs Decem," p. 2356 (1652). 



