Algonquian is a family of languages spoken by North American indigenous tribes. These languages are derived from Proto-Algonquian which was spoken around 3000 years ago. Algonquian speaking tribes stretched from the west to the east of northern modern-day US and Canada. Algonquian culture varied across tribes as they encompassed such a vast territory, yet were primarily organised into smaller villages. Hunter-gatherer lifestyles were common place. However more Southern tribes, specifically those residing below the Great Lakes practiced agriculture; harvesting corn, beans and squash.
Spiritualism was a key aspect of Algonquian life, as religious beliefs are in the lives of many cultures today. Algonquian spiritualism centres around “Manitou”, which is the fundamental life force found in all things. This life force can be found in two states “aashaa monetoo” (good spirit) or “otshee monetoo” (bad spirit). Manitou can be personified as spirit like beings that sometimes interact with humans, as well as each other.

One such otshee monetoo commonly depicted in popular culture is the Wendigo. A malevolent, cannibalistic spirit that is associated with cold, northern winters. The wendigo is said to possess human beings, causing the victims to feel an insatiable hunger for human flesh. As culture varied across Algonquian-speaking tribes, so did their tales of the spirit. Depictions of the Windigo varied from family to family. Some described the Windigo as being human in stature, while others described it as giant, growing with each meal, whilst remaining skeletal, its hunger never satisfied.
It is said, that in the dead cold of winter, as night draws and peoples huddle round each other for warmth, stomachs knotting in hunger. The chill in the air will drop, colder still, and a grave stench will fill the air. At that, the Wendigo has arrived.
Basil H. Johnston a scholar from the Ojibwe clan described the Wendigo as thus –
“The Wendigo was gaunt to the point of emaciation, its desiccated skin pulled tightly over its bones. With its bones pushing out against its skin, its complexion the ash-gray of death, and its eyes pushed back deep into their sockets, the Wendigo looked like a gaunt skeleton recently disinterred from the grave. What lips it had were tattered and bloody … Unclean and suffering from suppuration of the flesh, the Wendigo gave off a strange and eerie odor of decay and decomposition, of death and corruption…”

Perhaps one of the most… disturbing details about the Wendigo is that it isn’t strictly a myth. Sometimes, when winter does call, and food is scarce, the spirit of the Wendigo has been known to surface.
Ka-Ki-Si-Kutchin (Swift Runner) was a native American trapper who lived in Canada in the 1800s. He was married with 6 children and well respected by both the white authorities and his own people. However, his life became unbalanced as he began consuming whiskey and becoming violent. Resulting in the police and his tribe both kicking him out into the wilderness. He left, taking his mother, brother, wife and children with him. The winter was cold that year (1879) and wildlife was scarce. One failed trap after another soon led to starvation setting in amongst the family. And with starvation came something else. Something darker. Swift Runner started to lose control, it is unknown whether it was psychosis that set in, or perhaps, possession. But when Swift Runner returned from the camp, he was alone. Authorities were suspicious and set out to investigate the horror that Swift Runner had left behind. All that was left of his family were bones, bones that had been scraped clean of flesh. Bones that had been eaten. Swift Runner was persecuted and hanged from the neck until dead, for killing and eating, his mother, brother, wife and children. All whilst claiming to have been possessed by a wendingo.