INTRO:
Hello and welcome to Myth Monsters, my name is Erin and I’ll be your host for these little snack bite size podcasts on folklore and mythical monsters from around the world.
These podcasts focus on the actual cryptids, folklore and mythic monsters from global mythology, rather than focusing on full stories of heroes and their big adventures.
I’ll also be dropping in some references that they have to recent culture and where you can see these represented in modern day content so you can learn more, and get as obsessed as I am about these absolute legends of the mythological world.
Oh what a fun two weeks we’re having full of Native American and Inuit myth! These are two mythologies we don’t get to cover often, so it’s very exciting!
DESCRIPTION:
This week we’re covering the vicious Adlet from Inuit mythology to move nicely on from our episode last week on a Native American monster who I am not willing to name again.
The Adlet is described as a top-half human, bottom-half canine monster from Greenland and Canada, specifically Labrador. You can imagine the scenery - it’s very very cold and icy around. They are much taller than man, averaging at about 7ft tall, and can run immensely fast.
Sometimes they are described as red, or different colours based on who is telling the story - but they do always have very large features, like their teeth and claws. They have the usual traits of dogs, with a heightened sense of smell, hearing and sight and they generally have pretty good endurance, speed and strength.
They’re cannibalistic creatures, and will eat each other as well as animals and people - their favourite snack being the blood of a fresh human kill, and hunt in packs like actual wolves. As most werewolf-y style creatures, they can only be killed by silver and fire, although their absolute biggest fear was the latter.
The history of this one is actually really important as to what type of Adlet you get, there are technically two types. However, we’ll get into that in a bit.
ORIGIN:
The etymology of the word Adlet comes from the word ad, which means below - therefore Adlet means those below, which sounds really ominous and spooky. It might also, though, come from the word agdlak, which means striped or streaked, coming to the striped ones, which is in reference to the face painting of Native Americans. Also there is another word for the Adlet which is Erqigdlit, which is used by the Greenland side of the history.
The first time Adlet’s were mentioned in history was back in 1889, from the Journal of American Folklore by Franz Boas, but I’m very sure this myth has been here long before this book did.
However, buckle in because the story around Adlet is really interesting. There are two versions of this story, I’ll tell the more mythical one first.
So back in Greenland, a woman lived with her dad and refused to get married - she rejected all of her suitors, and in protest - married a dog. This dog is like no other dog, it’s bright red and absolutely huge, very much reminiscent of Clifford here, but maybe don’t think of Clifford. They have ten children, don’t ask me about the logistics. All of the children are Adlet, with human bodies, and canine legs.
The dog dad was very much not up for hunting, so this ended up falling to the woman’s father - who took all ten pups to a remote island, and told the dog to visit them every day with meat to feed them. The woman gives the dog a pair of boots to carry the meat across the river, but it turns out that the father had replaced them with stones, leaving the dog to drown. In revenge, the woman summons the puppies to eat off her father’s feet and hands. They get onto a boat to go over to the other island, and the father, in revenge - pushes his daughter overboard, and as she holds onto the side, he cuts off her fingers - but as they fall into the ocean, they form whales and seals.
The woman is then petrified that her father will kill the Adlet, so she puts them on a boat and sends them across the sea to land in Europe - becoming the first European settlers, and ancestors to the Inuit people. The other 5 Adlet stayed with their mother and eventually became the bloodthirsty monsters that they are known for in mythology.
It’s a pretty sad story really, one of betrayal and beastiality - but I’m not sure the other one is any better. The other is that the term Adlet and dog was used for white Europeans, who raped the daughter and impregnated her with mutant children. Which obviously is historically more believable due to the European domination of the earth at one point in our history.
There are a couple of other stories about Adlets, such as the one of the Tornit and the Adlet. Tornit are another race from Inuit folklore, and two of them found themselves stuck with a horrible, savage Adlet. They hide in their hut until the Adlet falls asleep, then they snuck out and cut the reins on the sled of the Adlet and got a head start on their journey. This woke the Adlet, and he hopped on his sled, and the reins fell off - leaving them to get away safely.
Another is a really short one, but one of an Adlet in Alaska who was tied to a stake for being mutated. He chewed through the stick, and then went into a local house where he had sex with a woman (not noted if consenting or not), then she gave birth to a litter of puppies and of men, rather than Adlets.
A interesting real life comparison is that of the European men getting involved, this was called ‘Dog Husbanding’. As when goods were given to the Europeans, just like the dogs in the story were, the Inuit would get goods they needed in return. Therefore, Inuit girls would offer sexual favours to the dog-like white men for things that the Inuits needed from Europe. Most of these men were whalers, and would go over to Greenland to hunt whales and trade objects with the Inuit people. Which is awful if it was for sexual favours, but actually quite sweet if innocent I suppose?
They do have another interesting comparison to that of the European monster, the werewolf - the only difference between them really is location and that werewolves transform into wolves, rather than are just permanently half-dog, half-human. You can also see the comparison in the way that you can kill one, and in what they eat.
CULTURAL SIGNIFICANCE:
Onto cultural significance and honestly, this week was the first proper struggle to find content for this - I know I’ve said that before, but holy moly, for some things, I got absolutely nothing!
Including for art - literally nothing other than independent stuff, go have a look at some cool fanart done by independent artists!
Movies, there are actually none that I could find at all. However, I’ll list out some wolfy ones so that you don’t miss out. You have the best werewolf movies being; American Werewolf in London, Underworld, Van Helsing, The Howling, The Company of Wolves and Dog Soldiers just to name a few.
For TV, again struggling to find anything here but they were in Monsters in Alaska and Alaska monsters - but I can’t find anything else I am sorry, if you know anything, gimme a bell.
Just the one in video games for Adlets and that’s in Pathfinder, which we mention a lot on this podcast. It’s a roleplaying game, and is immensely popular, so if you’re into stuff like that, give it a looksee.
My book recommendations this week are The Hidden: A Compendium of Arctic Giants, Dwarves, Gnomes, Trolls, Faeries and Other Strange Beings from Inuit Oral History by Neil Christopher and Kappianaqtut: Strange Creatures and Fantastic Beings From Inuit Myths and Legends by Louise Flaherty and also Neil Christopher - I’m actually really excited to read these two, we have a few more Inuit monsters to cover!
DO I THINK THEY EXISTED?
Now it’s time for, do I think they existed? Now with this one, just like the werewolf - I can’t see this one actually being real I’m afraid. As much as I would love to say that I’m descended from a bunch of half men, half dogs - I can’t really believe it.
However, I can see where this comes from, the Inuit culture is very much entangled with dogs, and I think honestly that this is almost like a little horror story of maybe how close you let your dog get to you - or maybe like, don’t have relations with animals?
Either way, it’s pretty far-fetched (see what I did there), so I’m out on this one - doesn’t make it any less cool as a monster though, and I absolutely adore the folklore stories around this one from a mythology that is quite often forgotten about.
OUTRO:
I thought this one was really cool and actually, considering it’s an Inuit myth - there was a lot of information about it online and I had fun researching it. I wrote this in a double weekend, so double script for double episode as I’m in Denmark the Thursday you’re listening to this - so I’m not actually about at the moment. It was really easy to write about, so very happy here.
Next week, we’re doing something we’ve never done before - we’re looking at religious mythology. Now, I’ve been quite clear about the fact that I don’t really want to touch this unless there are no current religious figures involved, and with this one, I think it qualifies. We’re covering the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse which is from Christian mythology - saddle up and ride in with the herd next Thursday.
For now thank you so much for listening, it’s been an absolute pleasure. If you enjoyed this podcast, please give it a rating on the service you’re listening on - I’ve got the twitter for any questions, or suggestions on what monsters to cover next and I’d love to hear from you. The social media handles for Tiktok and Instagram are mythmonsterspodcast, and twitter is mythmonsterspod. But all of our content can be found at mythmonsters.co.uk - you can also find us on Goodpods and Patreon if you want to help me fund the podcast, ya know if you feel like it.
Come join the fun and share this with your pals, they might love me as much as you do.
But for now, stay spooky and I’ll see you later babes.