Lupercali

The annual Lupercali festival of the Romans was a perpetuation of the ancient blooding rites of the hunter in which the novice is smeared with the blood of his first kill. The god Lupercus, represented by a wolf, inspires men to act a s wolves, to be thus as werewolves during the festival on February 15. A sacrificial slaying of a goat---representing the flocks that supported early humans in their attempts at establishing permanent or semipermanent dwelling places---is followed by the sacrifice of a dog, the watchful protector of a flock that would be the first to be killed by attacking wolves.

Once the blood of the she-goat and the dog are mixed, a bloodstained knife is dipped into the fluid, then drawn slowly across the foreheads of two noble-born children. Once the children have been "blooded," the blood is wiped off their foreheads with wool that has been dipped in milk. As they are being cleansed, they are expected to laugh, demonstrating their lack of fear of blood and their acknowledgment that they have received the magic of protection against wolves and werewolves.

Certain scholars believe this ritual of protection derived from a much earlier version of the Lupercali in which the smearing of the blood on the forehead indicated that the recipient had been "wolf-blooded" and would now forever be a solitary outlaw, a lycanthrope, a wolfman.

Sources: Eisler, Robert. Man into Wolf. London: Spring Books, n.d.