The article discusses some werewolf motifs in Swedish ballads, which tell of shapeshifters of ambiguous character that change between a human and a non-human body, dwell in spaces on the fringe of the human world, and have potential to intrude into the world of humans. Some of them represent a harsh untamed wilderness, others dangers, threats, or misbehaviour inside the human community. All religious imaginaries have fantastic things to tell: myths from before time, truths about the present, and hopes for the future. But no worldview can move beyond a recognizable everyday world, and the problems presented must be relevant. Did people believe in the content of the supernatural ballads? We should rather ask whether people were able to mirror their lives and nightmares in them.