202 Gleanings from the 



Sanfcrit form of the word is "vrika," the "tearer," 

 or " render." In Icelandic it is " ulfr," whence 

 our "wolf;" as "old" has become "wold." With 

 the Northmen, the wolf was facred to Odin, who 

 was always accompanied by two of thefe animals, 

 Geri and Freki, which were fed with his own 

 hand. At Jeaft two place-names in Lincolnfhire, 

 Ulceby and Uffelby, retain traces of the wolf's 

 Norfe name j 1 while Wolverton, Woolmer, and the 

 like, mew that the Saxons alfo left their name for 

 the creature in the local nomenclature of the 

 country. 



The wolf was in later hiftorical times the 

 largeft wild beaft known to the Greeks ; although, 

 in the time of Xerxes, lions had fallen upon his 

 baggage animals in Theflaly. It was regarded by 

 them as the type of a bloodthirfty ravening 

 creature, and as fuch frequently appears in Homer. 2 

 Its {kin was occafionally worn as a helmet, like the 

 bearfkins of our troops. The Thracians, who 

 joined the army of Xerxes, each bore two fpears, 

 ufed for wolf-hunting, as arms. As being ftriftly 

 a nocturnal animal, moft often feen in what was 

 called " wolf-twilight," or grey dawn, the wolf 

 was celebrated with the ancients in witchcraft and 

 fuperftition. Homer places it together with the 

 lion in the landfcape round the abode of Circe. 

 Together with the Romans, it was an article of 

 folk-lore among the Greeks that if a wolf faw a 



1 Streatfeild, "Lincolnfhire and the Danes," 1884, p. 72. 



2 Thus the Greeks and Trojans, mutually inflamed with 

 rage, rum upon each other "like wolves " (" II.," iv. 471). 



