Common Parlance
Anchorhead: A spirit gate between the Near and Deep Umbras
Anthelios: The Portentous red star that has recently appeared in the umbral heavens; largely seen as an omen of doom. Also called “Eye of the Wyrm.”
Apocalypse: The age of destruction, the final cycle, the birth of death, the everlasting corruption, the end of Gaia; a word used in Garou mythology to describe the time of the final battle with the Wyrm. Many consider this time to be the present.
Auspice: The phase of the moon under which a particular Garou was born; commonly thought to determine personality and tendencies. The auspices are: Ragabash (New Moon; Trickster), Theurge (Crescent Moon; Seer), Philodox (Half Moon; Judge), Galliard (Gibbous Moon; Moon Dancer), and Ahroun (Full Moon; Warrior).
Bane: Evil spirits that follow the Wyrm. There are many different kinds of Banes: Scrag, Kalus, Psychomachiae, and more.
Bawn: A boundary area around a caern, patrolled and monitored carefully.
Blight: Any corrupted area in either the spirit world or physical reality.
Breeds: The ancestry of a Garou, be it wolf, human, or other Garou.
Caern: A sacred place; a meeting spot where the Garou can contact the spirit world.
Celestine: The greatest spirits; the closest things the Garou have to gods. Examples are Luna (the Moon) and Helios (the Sun).
Concolation: A great moot, wherein many tribes gather to discuss matters that concerns the Nation of Garou.
Concord, The: The agreement of all the tribes reached nearly 9,000 years ago, after which the Impergium was ended. The traditions thereof are still obeyed today.
Corruption: The act of destroying, devolving, or debasing life; also, the often overwhelming effects of the Wyrm's actions. In the present age, it often specifically refers to the ecological ruin humans wreck upon the environment.
Crinos: The half-wolf, half-human form of the Garou.
Deep Umbra: The aspects of the Umbra that lie outside the Membrane. Reality becomes more and more fragmentary the farther one travels from the Realm.
Delirium: The madness and memory-loss suffered by humans who look upon a Garou in Crinos form.
Domain: A mini-Realm in the Umbra, usually connected to a larger Realm in the Deep Umbra.
Fera: Garou term for shapeshifters other than werewolves; most are presumed extinct.
Feral: Slang for Lupus.
Fomori: (singular Fomor) Humans who have turned to the Wyrm and draw their power from it. Common enemies of the Garou.
Gaffling: A simple spirit servant of a Jaggling, Incarna, or Celestine. Gafflings are rarely sentient.
Gaia: The Earth and related Realms, in both a physical and a spiritual sense; the Mother Goddess.
Garou: The term werewolves use for themselves.
Gauntlet: The barrier between the physical world of Earth and the spirit world of Umbra. It is strongest around technological (Weaver) places, weakest around caerns.
Harano: Inexplicable gloom, inexpressible longing for unnameable things, weeping for that which is not yet lost. Some say it is depression caused by contemplation of Gaia's suffering.
Hispo: The near-wolf form of the Garou.
Homid: A Garou of human ancestry. Occasionally used disdainfully by ferals. Also the human form of the Garou.
Impergium: The 3,000 years immediately following the birth of agriculture, during which strict population quotas were maintained on all human villages.
Incarna: A class of spirits; weaker than the Celestines, but still greater spirits by any measure.
Jaggling: A spirit servant of an Incarna or Celestine.
Kenning: The empathic calling some Garou perform when howling.
Kinfolk: Those humans and wolves who are related to the Garou and are not prone to the delirium, but who are not actual werewolves.
Klaive: A fetish dagger or sword, usually of great spiritual potency and nearly always made of silver.
Litany: The code of laws kept by the Garou.
Luna: The Incarna of the moon; powerful spirit patron of all shapeshnagers.
Lupus: A Garou of wolf origins. Also the wolf form of a Garou.
Membrane, The: The barrier between the Near and Deep Umbras. To breach it, an Anchorhead must be found. Alternatively, the Garou can travel through the Dream Zone.
Metis: The sterile and often deformed offspring of two Garou. Generally reviled by Garou society.
Moon Bridge: A gate between two caerns; it most often appears during moots.
Moot: A sept or trival conclave that takes place at a caern.
Mule: Slang for metis.
Near Umbra: The spirit world surrounding the Gaia Realm.
Pack: A small group of Garou bound to each other by ties of friendship and mission as opposed to culture.
Penumbra: "Earth's Shadow"; the spirit world directly surrounding the physical world; many, but not all, terrain features will be the same.
Protectorate: The territory claimed and patrolled by a sept or pack.
Reaching: Traveling into the spirit world.
Realms: The worlds of "solid" reality within the Tellurian. Earth is referred to as the Realm.
Ronin: A Garou who has chosen or been forced to leave Garou society. It is a harsh fate to become a "lone wolf".
Sept: The group of Garou who live near and tend an individual caern.
Stepping Sideways: Entering the spirit world. Most elders consider this term flippant and disrespectful.
Tellurian: The whole of reality.
Totem: A spirit joined to a pack or tribe and representative of its inner nature. A tribal totem is an Incarna, while a pack totem is an Incarna avatar (a Jaggling equivalent).
Triat, The: The Weaver, the Wyld, and the Wyrm. The trinity of primal cosmic forces.
Tribes: The larger community of Garou. Tribe members are often bound by similar totems and lifestyles.
Umbra: The spirit World.
Veil, The: A poetic term for the false assumptions that the supernatural does not exist, which the Delirium reinforces.
Ways, The: The traditions of the Garou.
Weaver, The: The manifestation and symbol of order and pattern. Computers, science, logic, and mathematics are examples of the Weaver's influence on the material plane.
Wyld, The: Manifestation and symbol of pure change. The chaos of transmutation and elemental force.
Wyrm, The: Manifestation and symbol of evil, entropy, and decay in Garou belief. Vampires are often manifestations of the Wyrm as are toxic waste and pollution.
Wyrmhole: A place that has been spiritually defiled by the Wyrm; invariably a location of great corruption.
Vulgar Argot
Ape: Slang for human or homid. If the speaker wishes to indicate true contempt for her subject, she may use the word "monkey" instead.
Cadaver: A derogatory term for a vampire.
Flock, The: All of humanity, particularly those humans from whom the Garou recruit their members.
Gremlin: A malevolent spirit.
Leech: (see cadaver)
Run: A ritual hunt or revel that takes place at the conclusion of a moot.
Sheep: humans
Throat: To best another in ritual combat. Used as a verb.
Old Form
Adren: A pupil or student who learns from a Mentor.
Airts: The magical paths within the spirit world.
Aisling: A journey into the spirit world.
Animae: "Soul-friend"; most often a bond with a pack totem.
Anruth: A Garou who travels from caern to caern but is bound to none of them.
Athro: Teacher; mentor.
Awen: The sacred Muse, the creative impulse. Some say she is a spirit, but she has never been found. Moon Dancers periodically go on quests for her periodically.
Brugh: Any sort of mystic place, whether a Garou caern or a Wyrmhole. Often a glade or cave located somewhere in the wilderness.
Charach: A Garou who sleeps with another Garou or has done so in the past. Often used as a word of anger.
Chiminage: A form of “favors done for services rendered”. A werewolf may perform a task as Chiminage in order to repay a spirit for teaching him a gift, or to repay a sept for allowing him to use their Caern.
Cliath: A young Garou, not yet of any significant rank
Fostern: Your pack brother and sisters; those who are your family by choice.
Gallain: The Kinfolk of the Garou.
-ikthya: "Of the Wyrm"; a suffix appended to a name.
Inceptor: A Garou who guides another through a rite. An inceptor is also called a ritemaster.
Kinain: The relationship among Garou who are related by blood through an ancestor. This term of endearment and pride is never used when referring to metis.
Moon-Calf: Idiot; simpleton.
Pericarp: The Near Umbra around each Realm.
Phoebe: An Incarna of Luna, representing the Moon.
Praenomen: The guardian spirit of a pack.
-rhya: "Greater in station"; a suffix appended to a name.
Urrah: Garou who live in the city; also, the tainted ones.
-yuf: "Honored equal"; a suffix appended to a name.
