Looking for transformed and amnesiac characters in fantasy fiction

Wow, what a remarkably pithy subject title. Let’s see if I can muddy the waters.

I’m looking for examples of characters in fantasy fiction who have been transformed from human to non-human form, who, while in the new form, do not remember being human. The character in question needs to have undergone a permanent metamorphosis, not a periodic one like a werewolf; and the amnesia needs to be genuine rather than the character keeping his true name under wraps.

While my first thought was to use a character from mythology, fairy tales, or folklore, science fiction, fantasy, and comic books also work. But, whatever the character’s medium, it must have originated before 1987, because I’m going to refer to the character in a story set in that year. The reference is something like this:

Thanks in advance.

I can think of a number of characters who were remade, or wiped clean, prior to the story they were part of began.

There’s a Joan D. Vinge story about a character who was some kind of governmental monster - think Hitler or Pol Pot. But prior to the story, he’d been mide wiped to someone else, without any memory of his life before the wipe. And was still on a forced labor camp. I believe it was in her anthology Amber Eyes and Other Stories, and was titled “To Bell the Cat.” I can’t recall the character’s name, however. And if that’s the best I can come up with - I doubt you’ll care for that use for your story.

In some versions of Loki’s transformation into a trout, it’s a complete transformation where he is a fish in mind as well as in body, and takes many years to recover both his mind and body. But that never rang true to me, given that Loki is a shape-shifter extraordinare in most of what I’d consider the canon stories about him.

Sorry I can’t give you better examples, but that date restriction is a bugger and a half.

Yeah, the date restriction’s annoying to me, too. And Loki won’t work because he changes voluntarily, and I’m looking for involuntary metamorphoses. That said, it occurs to be that i could broaden my criteria to include charaters not necessarily amnesiac but neverthleless unableto communicate their true indentities to others.

Did Arachne retain any memory of her previous life? I think you could argue that she was simply a spider after that, if that’s what you wanted.
ETA: If you’re willing to accept an example not from fantasy - the character of Dick (George) Moore from L. M. Montgomery’s Anne’s House of Dreams is a completely transformed man with no memory of his prior life, nor any recognition from others of who he had been. (I’m not spoiling this - it’s an 80 yo book.) But he does get better after what I’d call a “magical” surgery.

while not exactly what you’re looking for…, how about reincarnation? most stories usually start off with them remembering nothing.

As far as the transformation being “permanent, not like a werewolf”, does “permanent until cured” count ? Qebba in Night’s Master by Tanith Lee ( 1978 ) is turned into a monster by Azhrarn the Prince of Demons for a hundred years, and remembers nothing when he is transformed back ( he later regains his memory too though ). Princess in A Voice for Princess by John Morressy ( 1986 ) is turned into a toad for a generation or two, losing much of her memory in the process ( which is why she’s called ‘Princess’; she knows she’s a princess, but not her name or kingdom ) and doesn’t regain her memories for several books.

Ozma, queen of Oz was transformed into a young boy - but those are (arguably) human, so she might not count.

Pretty much every Diana Wynne Jones novel uses this in some form or other. Howl’s Moving Castle is a good example.

Not sure if this counts, but in Raymond Feist’s Riftwar universe, the character Tomas goes through some interesting stuff.

He is one of the first characters that are introduced in Magician, when he is a boy running around doing chores at the Keep. Due to some magician-manipulation further down the story line, he ends up possessing (and being possessed by) a suit of armor that was once worn by a warrior of an ancient race, called the Valheru.

More (spoiler-filled) context here: The Serpentwar Saga - Wikipedia

While I don’t recall if he ever suffered full amnesia in his experience, there was definitely a lot of conflict between the two beings who came to occupy the same body.

Jack L. Chalker’s Well World series delves into this quite a bit - sometimes the transformed remembers their previous selves, sometimes they don’t. The books were written pre-1987.

If I remember correctly, Mavra Chang is transformed into a centaur-like creature and does not remember being human for a period of time in Twilight at the Well of Souls. In the reverse, Nathan Brazil is in human form and doesn’t remember being a Markovian for most of the first book,Midnight at the Well of Souls.

How about a character who appears to be human but really isn’t and can’t remember his true identity?

How about Circe’s swine (and other critters)?

M. A. Foster wrote a series of books called The Morphodite (published 1981), Transformer (published 1983), and Preserver (published 1985). The main character was human, and appears human even after being transformed, but is not human (the books state that it could not interbreed with humans, but could interbreed with others of its kind if they existed). It has no memory of its life as a human.

See if you can dig up copies of Superman #366-368, Volume 1, 1982-3. In the first chapter of this three parter, Superman uses alien tech to (temporarily) transform himself into an reptilian form as well as blanking his own memory in order to go on an undercover mission.

There’s a book by Joe Haldeman where the central character is an alien amnesiac in human form. I forget the title.

Roland, of course. (Actually, I think in the Chanson de Roland, both he and Charlemagne are amnesiac at some point.)

Gene Wolfe has a series (or at least a couple of novels) about a Greek soldier (in a time when the gods dabble in human affairs) who wakes each morning with his memory a blank slate.

One of Andre Norton’s SF novels written before she got all crazy cat lady was called “Judgment on Janus” and is about what happens when a young laborer finds a treasure in the forest left by a vanished alien race. The treasure has the effect of transforming him mentally and physically into a member of said race. Fun read, though a little on the preachy side in certain respects.

Amy in Buffy seemed to just be a normal rat when she was stuck in that form. I don’t remember any sign that her human intellect was still there.

Corwin in Zelazny’s Amber series lost his memory during the Black Death and didn’t get it back until the incidents in Nine Princes in Amber which took place in contemporary times.

His “Four Lords Of The Diamond” series does the same - I think body-shifting is sort of his trademark actually. I do remember that in the last of the Four Lords books, there’s a memory removal (though it’s forced on the person, rather than a natural consequence of shape-changing).