The Windigo (Also known as wendigo, weendigo, windago, waindigo, windiga, witiko, wihtikow, and various other name including manaha) originates from Native-American legend, and is said to be a demonic half-beast as told by the Algonquian peoples along the Atlantic coast of the USA and Canada.
The Windigo is more than often affiliated with cannibalism, the Algonquian people believe that humans who indulged on cannibalism were at possible risk of becoming a windigo; the legend appears to be reinforced by the practice of cannibalism as a taboo.
The legend, itself. lends it's name to the disputed modern medical term wendigo psychosis, which is supposed to be a culture-bound disorder.
Native American mythology
The windigo, as mentioned earlier, originates from the beliefs of the Algonquin peoples, who were common throught the US and Canada near the Atlantic coast. Though there were others who believed in the mythology of the windigo, more notably other Alogonquin-speaking tribes (such as the Ojibwe, Saulteaux, the Cree, the Naskapi, and the Innu people) though some descriptions of it were varied depending on the tribe, though commonly the windigos was seen as malevolent, cannibalistic, supernatural beings of great spiritual power who were strongly associated with the Winter, the North, and coldness, as well as famine and starvation.