[3] In pre-war Germany, interest in the Wolfsangel was revived by the popularity of Hermann Löns's 1910 novel Der Wehrwolf, which follows a hero in the Thirty Years war.

[8] The tool was developed by attaching the hook via a chain or rope to a larger bar (often with a double crescent or half-moon shape per photo opposite) lodged between the overhanging branches of a tree.

[9][10] The stylised version of the Z-shaped Wolfsangel developed into a popular medieval symbol in Germany that was associated with magical powers, and was believed to have the ability to ward off wolves.

[12] The stylized Wolfsangel Z-symbol (i.e. excluding the horizontal bar) bears a visual resemblance to the proto-Germanic Eihwaz rune (meaning "yew"), historically part of the ancient runic alphabet.

However, the description is more specifically about the Wolfsanker (or hameçon) component part of the Wolfsangel trap, and defines it as: "the shape of a crescent moon with a ring inside, at mid-height", which describes the bar from which the Z-shaped hook is hung (see the yellow coat of arms of the von Stein family in the table opposite for an example).

The Z-shaped symbol is found comparatively frequently in municipal coats of arms in Germany, and also in eastern France (see Wolfisheim or Wolxheim), where it is often identified as a Wolfsangel.

[13] In pre-war 1930s Germany, interest in the Wolfsangel was revived by the popularity of Hermann Löns's 1910 novel entitled Der Wehrwolf (later published as Harm Wulf, a peasant chronicle, and as The Warwolf in English).

The book is set in a 17th-century German farming community during the Thirty Years' War and the protagonist, a resistance fighter named Harm Wulf, adopts the Wolfsangel symbol as his personal badge.

[21] In Ukraine, far-right movements like the Social-National Party of Ukraine[22][23][24] and the Social-National Assembly,[25] as well as the Azov Regiment of the Ukrainian army,[26][27][28][29] have used a similar symbol of ꑭ (an elongated centre bar and the Z being rotated but untypically not reversed; The group claim that the symbol is a composite of the "N" and the "I", for their political slogan Ідея Нації (Ukrainian for "National Idea", and deny any connection or attempt to draw a parallel with the regiment and Nazism.

[30] Political scientist Andreas Umland told Deutsche Welle, that though it had far-right connotations, the Wolfsangel was not considered a fascist symbol by the general population in Ukraine.