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Is the Necronomicon real or is it something Sam Raimi made up for the Evil Dead films?
The Necronomicon was the creation of the horror writer H. P. Lovecraft, who has been a major influence on writers and filmmakers in the genre since. In Lovecraft's work, the Necronomicon served as a collection of supernatural wonders, a collection of myths of pre-human species on Earth, or a book of spells, depending on where he used it. It is the latter interpretation that has caught the popular imagination the most.
During the 1970s, a major resurgence of interest in Lovecraft occurred, with the result that several different books with the title Necronomicon appeared. None of these, it should be noted, could be confirmed as existing before Lovecraft wrote of the Necronomicon, and most of their authors have admitted that they are fakes. The most popular one, written by "Simon" and published first by Schlangekraft and later in paperback by Avon, links Lovecraft's mythology to Sumerian religion. Though the connections shown within are not borne out through examination of either Lovecraft or Sumerian religion, the book has gained popularity among many would-be spellcasters.
The "Necronomicon Ex Mortis" that appears in Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness bears many differences from the book Lovecraft presented. Diehard fans of the movies will know that the Necronomicon was written three thousand years ago and vanished around 1300 AD. Lovecraft, however, never uses the suffix "Ex Mortis" and has an entirely different timeline for the book. Ash refers to the Necronomicon as a Sumerian book, which shows the influence of the Simon Necronomicon. Why the book in the movies differs so much from the one Lovecraft wrote about is uncertain.
The Necronomicon was the creation of the horror writer H. P. Lovecraft, who has been a major influence on writers and filmmakers in the genre since. In Lovecraft's work, the Necronomicon served as a collection of supernatural wonders, a collection of myths of pre-human species on Earth, or a book of spells, depending on where he used it. It is the latter interpretation that has caught the popular imagination the most.
During the 1970s, a major resurgence of interest in Lovecraft occurred, with the result that several different books with the title Necronomicon appeared. None of these, it should be noted, could be confirmed as existing before Lovecraft wrote of the Necronomicon, and most of their authors have admitted that they are fakes. The most popular one, written by "Simon" and published first by Schlangekraft and later in paperback by Avon, links Lovecraft's mythology to Sumerian religion. Though the connections shown within are not borne out through examination of either Lovecraft or Sumerian religion, the book has gained popularity among many would-be spellcasters.
The "Necronomicon Ex Mortis" that appears in Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness bears many differences from the book Lovecraft presented. Diehard fans of the movies will know that the Necronomicon was written three thousand years ago and vanished around 1300 AD. Lovecraft, however, never uses the suffix "Ex Mortis" and has an entirely different timeline for the book. Ash refers to the Necronomicon as a Sumerian book, which shows the influence of the Simon Necronomicon. Why the book in the movies differs so much from the one Lovecraft wrote about is uncertain.
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History of the Necronomicon
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By H.P. Lovecraft (1927)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(There has been some difficulty over the date of this essay. Most give the date as 1936, following the Laney-Evans (1943) bibliography entry for the pamphlet version produced by the Rebel Press. This date, as can easily be ascertained from the fact that this was a "Limited Memorial Edition", is spurious (Lovecraft died in 1937); in fact, it dates to 1938. The correct date of 1927 comes from the final draft of the essay, which appears on a letter addressed to Clark Ashton Smith ("To the Curator of the Vaults of Yoh-Vombis, with the Concoctor's [?] Comments"). The letter is dated April 27, 1927 and was apparently kept by Lovecraft to circulate as needed.)
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Original title Al Azif -- azif being the word used by Arabs to designate that nocturnal sound (made by insects) suppos'd to be the howling of daemons.
Composed by Abdul Alhazred, a mad poet of Sanaá, in Yemen, who is said to have flourished during the period of the Ommiade caliphs, circa 700 A.D. He visited the ruins of Babylon and the subterranean secrets of Memphis and spent ten years alone in the great southern desert of Arabia -- the Roba el Khaliyeh or "Empty Space" of the ancients -- and "Dahna" or "Crimson" desert of the modern Arabs, which is held to be inhabited by protective evil spirits and monsters of death. Of this desert many strange and unbelievable marvels are told by those who pretend to have penetrated it. In his last years Alhazred dwelt in Damascus, where the Necronomicon (Al Azif) was written, and of his final death or disappearance (738 A.D.) many terrible and conflicting things are told. He is said by Ebn Khallikan (12th cent. biographer) to have been seized by an invisible monster in broad daylight and devoured horribly before a large number of fright-frozen witnesses. Of his madness many things are told. He claimed to have seen fabulous Irem, or City of Pillars, and to have found beneath the ruins of a certain nameless desert town the shocking annals and secrets of a race older than mankind. [The Rebel Press edition adds this editor's note: "A full description of the nameless city, and the annals and secrets of its one time inhabitants will be found in the story THE NAMELESS CITY, published in the first issue of Fanciful Tales, and written by the author of this outline."] He was only an indifferent Moslem, worshipping unknown entities whom he called Yog-Sothoth and Cthulhu.
In A.D. 950 the Azif, which had gained a considerable tho' surreptitious circulation amongst the philosophers of the age, was secretly translated into Greek by Theodorus Philetas of Constantinople under the title Necronomicon. For a century it impelled certain experimenters to terrible attempts, when it was suppressed and burnt by the patriarch Michael. After this it is only heard of furtively, but (1228) Olaus Wormius made a Latin translation later in the Middle Ages, and the Latin text was printed twice -- once in the fifteenth century in black-letter (evidently in Germany) and once in the seventeenth (prob. Spanish) -- both editions being without identifying marks, and located as to time and place by internal typographical evidence only. The work both Latin and Greek was banned by Pope Gregory IX in 1232, shortly after its Latin translation, which called attention to it. The Arabic original was lost as early as Wormius' time, as indicated by his prefatory note; [the Rebel Press edition adds paranthetically: "there is, however, a vague account of a secret copy appearing in San Francisco during the present century, but later perished in fire" -- a transparent reference to Clark Ashton Smith's tale "The Return of the Sorcerer". Indeed, Lovecraft says in a letter to Richard F. Searight (1935) "This 'history' must be modified in one respect -- since Klarkash-Ton's 'Return of the Sorceror' (pub in Strange Tales 3 yrs. ago) tells of the survival of an Arabic text until modern times."] and no sight of the Greek copy -- which was printed in Italy between 1500 and 1550 -- has been reported since the burning of a certain Salem man's library in 1692. An English translation made by Dr. Dee was never printed, and exists only in fragments recovered from the original manuscript. [This sentence does not occur in the first draft of the essay. It was added later, after Frank Belknap Long had quoted from "John Dee's Necronomicon" in his tale "The Space Eaters" (1928).] Of the Latin texts now existing one (15th cent.) is known to be in the British Museum under lock and key, while another (17th cent.) is in the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris. A seventeenth-century edition is in the Widener Library at Harvard, and in the library of Miskatonic University at Arkham. Also in the library of the University of Buenos Ayres. Numerous other copies probably exist in secret, and a fifteenth-century one is persistently rumoured to form part of the collection of a celebrated American millionaire. A still vaguer rumour credits the preservation of a sixteenth-century Greek text in the Salem family of Pickman; but if it was so preserved, it vanished with the artist R.U. Pickman, who disappeared early in 1926. The book is rigidly suppressed by the authorities of most countries, and by all branches of organised ecclesiasticism. Reading leads to terrible consequences. It was from rumours of this book (of which relatively few of the general public know) that R.W. Chambers is said to have derived the idea of his early novel The King in Yellow.
Chronology
Al Azif written circa 730 A.D. at Damascus by Abdul Alhazred
Tr. to Greek 950 A.D. as Necronomicon by Theodorus Philetas
Burnt by Patriarch Michael 1050 (i.e., Greek text). Arabic text now lost.
Olaus translates Gr. to Latin 1228
1232 Latin ed. (and Gr.) suppr. by Pope Gregory IX
14... Black-letter printed edition (Germany)
15... Gr. text printed in Italy
16... Spanish reprint of Latin text
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This should be supplemented with a letter written to Clark Ashton Smith for November 27, 1927:
I have had no chance to produce new material this autumn, but have been classifying notes & synopses in preparation for some monstrous tales later on. In particular I have drawn up some data on the celebrated & unmentionable Necronomicon of the mad Arab Abdul Alhazred! It seems that this shocking blasphemy was produced by a native of Sanaá, in Yemen, who flourished about 700 A.D. & made many mysterious pilgrimages to Babylon's ruins, Memphis's catacombs, & the devil-haunted & untrodden wastes of the great southern deserts of Arabia -- the Roba el Khaliyeh, where he claimed to have found records of things older than mankind, & to have learnt the worship of Yog-Sothoth & Cthulhu. The book was a product of Abdul's old age, which was spent in Damascus, & the original title was Al Azif -- azif (cf. Henley's notes to Vathek) being the name applied to those strange night noises (of insects) which the Arabs attribute to the howling of daemons. Alhazred died -- or disappeared -- under terrible circumstances in the year 738. In 950 Al Azif was translated into Greek by the Byzantine Theodorus Philetas under the title Necronomicon, & a century later it was burnt at the order of Michael, Patriarch of Constantinople. It was translated into Latin by Olaus in 1228, but placed on the Index Expurgatorius by Pope Gregory IX in 1232. [Note that this does not appear in the final version of the essay. The explanation is that the Index did not exist at this time, as further research must have revealed to Lovecraft.] The original Arabic was lost before Olaus' time, & the last known Greek copy perished in Salem in 1692. The work was printed in the 15th, 16th, & 17th centuries, but few copies are extant. Wherever existing, it is carefully guarded for the sake of the world's welfare & sanity. Once a man read through the copy in the library of Miskatonic University at Arkham -- read it through & fled wild-eyed into the hills ...... but that is another story!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In yet another letter (to James Blish and William Miller, 1936), Lovecraft says:
You are fortunate in securing copies of the hellish and abhorred Necronomicon. Are they the Latin texts printed in Germany in the fifteenth century, or the Greek version printed in Italy in 1567, or the Spanish translation of 1623? Or do these copies represent different texts?
Note that this is not entirely consistent with the accounts given earlier.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Annotated Version
From Kendrick Kerwin Chua's Necronomicon FAQ
With further annotation by Dan Clore
(Note: I have substituted the corrected text for the older, corrupt text used in the FAQ. -- D.C.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"History of the Necronomicon", by H.P. Lovecraft, written in 1937 with footnotes and references by Kendrick Kerwin Chua, 1993.
See above for the date of this essay.
Original title Al Azif -- azif being the word used by Arabs to designate that nocturnal sound (made by insects) suppos'd to be the howling of daemons.
Composed by Abdul Alhazred, a mad poet of Sanaá, in Yemen, who is said to have flourished during the period of the Ommiade caliphs, circa 700 A.D. He visited the ruins of Babylon and the subterranean secrets of Memphis and spent ten years alone in the great southern desert of Arabia -- the Roba el Khaliyeh or "Empty Space" of the ancients -- and "Dahna" or "Crimson" desert of the modern Arabs, which is held to be inhabited by protective evil spirits and monsters of death. Of this desert many strange and unbelievable marvels are told by those who pretend to have penetrated it. In his last years Alhazred dwelt in Damascus, where the Necronomicon (Al Azif) was written, and of his final death or disappearance (738 A.D.) many terrible and conflicting things are told. He is said by Ebn Khallikan (12th cent. biographer) to have been seized by an invisible monster in broad daylight and devoured horribly before a large number of fright-frozen witnesses. Of his madness many things are told. He claimed to have seen fabulous Irem, or City of Pillars, and to have found beneath the ruins of a certain nameless desert town the shocking annals and secrets of a race older than mankind. [The Rebel Press edition adds this editor's note: "A full description of the nameless city, and the annals and secrets of its one time inhabitants will be found in the story THE NAMELESS CITY, published in the first issue of Fanciful Tales, and written by the author of this outline."] He was only an indifferent Moslem, worshipping unknown entities whom he called Yog-Sothoth and Cthulhu.
(9) Note already how Lovecraft skirts the fine line between campy parody and seriousness. In Lovecraft at Last, Conover writes that Lovecraft wrote the history in order to allow people with any understanding of Arab studies to see through the mock scholarship. Note also the inconsistencies here with the description of Al-Hazred in the Simon Necronomicon. Al-Hazred there supposedly witnessed the horrible rituals at Masshu, a mythical island at the mouth of the Euphrates upon which Utnapishtim, the Babylonian Noah, supposedly still resides today. Whereas Lovecraft describes the Crimson Desert as the place where Al-Hazred witnessed much of what he wrote down. Note also that in the Simon version, Al-Hazred warns against worshipping "Iak-Sakkak" and "Kutulu", whereas Lovecrafts claims he did just that. Note also the improper use of the A.D. prefix until the next paragraph. KKC
In A.D. 950 the Azif, which had gained a considerable tho' surreptitious circulation amongst the philosophers of the age, was secretly translated into Greek by Theodorus Philetas of Constantinople under the title Necronomicon.
(10) Another inconsistency. Simon claims that Al-Hazred rendered the Necronomicon in Greek first, rather than Arabic. KKC
I haven't been able to find this claim in Simon's text, but he does claim that the manuscript he translated is a Greek version. As noted below, Lovecraft states that the Greek version was lost.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By H.P. Lovecraft (1927)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(There has been some difficulty over the date of this essay. Most give the date as 1936, following the Laney-Evans (1943) bibliography entry for the pamphlet version produced by the Rebel Press. This date, as can easily be ascertained from the fact that this was a "Limited Memorial Edition", is spurious (Lovecraft died in 1937); in fact, it dates to 1938. The correct date of 1927 comes from the final draft of the essay, which appears on a letter addressed to Clark Ashton Smith ("To the Curator of the Vaults of Yoh-Vombis, with the Concoctor's [?] Comments"). The letter is dated April 27, 1927 and was apparently kept by Lovecraft to circulate as needed.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Original title Al Azif -- azif being the word used by Arabs to designate that nocturnal sound (made by insects) suppos'd to be the howling of daemons.
Composed by Abdul Alhazred, a mad poet of Sanaá, in Yemen, who is said to have flourished during the period of the Ommiade caliphs, circa 700 A.D. He visited the ruins of Babylon and the subterranean secrets of Memphis and spent ten years alone in the great southern desert of Arabia -- the Roba el Khaliyeh or "Empty Space" of the ancients -- and "Dahna" or "Crimson" desert of the modern Arabs, which is held to be inhabited by protective evil spirits and monsters of death. Of this desert many strange and unbelievable marvels are told by those who pretend to have penetrated it. In his last years Alhazred dwelt in Damascus, where the Necronomicon (Al Azif) was written, and of his final death or disappearance (738 A.D.) many terrible and conflicting things are told. He is said by Ebn Khallikan (12th cent. biographer) to have been seized by an invisible monster in broad daylight and devoured horribly before a large number of fright-frozen witnesses. Of his madness many things are told. He claimed to have seen fabulous Irem, or City of Pillars, and to have found beneath the ruins of a certain nameless desert town the shocking annals and secrets of a race older than mankind. [The Rebel Press edition adds this editor's note: "A full description of the nameless city, and the annals and secrets of its one time inhabitants will be found in the story THE NAMELESS CITY, published in the first issue of Fanciful Tales, and written by the author of this outline."] He was only an indifferent Moslem, worshipping unknown entities whom he called Yog-Sothoth and Cthulhu.
In A.D. 950 the Azif, which had gained a considerable tho' surreptitious circulation amongst the philosophers of the age, was secretly translated into Greek by Theodorus Philetas of Constantinople under the title Necronomicon. For a century it impelled certain experimenters to terrible attempts, when it was suppressed and burnt by the patriarch Michael. After this it is only heard of furtively, but (1228) Olaus Wormius made a Latin translation later in the Middle Ages, and the Latin text was printed twice -- once in the fifteenth century in black-letter (evidently in Germany) and once in the seventeenth (prob. Spanish) -- both editions being without identifying marks, and located as to time and place by internal typographical evidence only. The work both Latin and Greek was banned by Pope Gregory IX in 1232, shortly after its Latin translation, which called attention to it. The Arabic original was lost as early as Wormius' time, as indicated by his prefatory note; [the Rebel Press edition adds paranthetically: "there is, however, a vague account of a secret copy appearing in San Francisco during the present century, but later perished in fire" -- a transparent reference to Clark Ashton Smith's tale "The Return of the Sorcerer". Indeed, Lovecraft says in a letter to Richard F. Searight (1935) "This 'history' must be modified in one respect -- since Klarkash-Ton's 'Return of the Sorceror' (pub in Strange Tales 3 yrs. ago) tells of the survival of an Arabic text until modern times."] and no sight of the Greek copy -- which was printed in Italy between 1500 and 1550 -- has been reported since the burning of a certain Salem man's library in 1692. An English translation made by Dr. Dee was never printed, and exists only in fragments recovered from the original manuscript. [This sentence does not occur in the first draft of the essay. It was added later, after Frank Belknap Long had quoted from "John Dee's Necronomicon" in his tale "The Space Eaters" (1928).] Of the Latin texts now existing one (15th cent.) is known to be in the British Museum under lock and key, while another (17th cent.) is in the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris. A seventeenth-century edition is in the Widener Library at Harvard, and in the library of Miskatonic University at Arkham. Also in the library of the University of Buenos Ayres. Numerous other copies probably exist in secret, and a fifteenth-century one is persistently rumoured to form part of the collection of a celebrated American millionaire. A still vaguer rumour credits the preservation of a sixteenth-century Greek text in the Salem family of Pickman; but if it was so preserved, it vanished with the artist R.U. Pickman, who disappeared early in 1926. The book is rigidly suppressed by the authorities of most countries, and by all branches of organised ecclesiasticism. Reading leads to terrible consequences. It was from rumours of this book (of which relatively few of the general public know) that R.W. Chambers is said to have derived the idea of his early novel The King in Yellow.
Chronology
Al Azif written circa 730 A.D. at Damascus by Abdul Alhazred
Tr. to Greek 950 A.D. as Necronomicon by Theodorus Philetas
Burnt by Patriarch Michael 1050 (i.e., Greek text). Arabic text now lost.
Olaus translates Gr. to Latin 1228
1232 Latin ed. (and Gr.) suppr. by Pope Gregory IX
14... Black-letter printed edition (Germany)
15... Gr. text printed in Italy
16... Spanish reprint of Latin text
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
This should be supplemented with a letter written to Clark Ashton Smith for November 27, 1927:
I have had no chance to produce new material this autumn, but have been classifying notes & synopses in preparation for some monstrous tales later on. In particular I have drawn up some data on the celebrated & unmentionable Necronomicon of the mad Arab Abdul Alhazred! It seems that this shocking blasphemy was produced by a native of Sanaá, in Yemen, who flourished about 700 A.D. & made many mysterious pilgrimages to Babylon's ruins, Memphis's catacombs, & the devil-haunted & untrodden wastes of the great southern deserts of Arabia -- the Roba el Khaliyeh, where he claimed to have found records of things older than mankind, & to have learnt the worship of Yog-Sothoth & Cthulhu. The book was a product of Abdul's old age, which was spent in Damascus, & the original title was Al Azif -- azif (cf. Henley's notes to Vathek) being the name applied to those strange night noises (of insects) which the Arabs attribute to the howling of daemons. Alhazred died -- or disappeared -- under terrible circumstances in the year 738. In 950 Al Azif was translated into Greek by the Byzantine Theodorus Philetas under the title Necronomicon, & a century later it was burnt at the order of Michael, Patriarch of Constantinople. It was translated into Latin by Olaus in 1228, but placed on the Index Expurgatorius by Pope Gregory IX in 1232. [Note that this does not appear in the final version of the essay. The explanation is that the Index did not exist at this time, as further research must have revealed to Lovecraft.] The original Arabic was lost before Olaus' time, & the last known Greek copy perished in Salem in 1692. The work was printed in the 15th, 16th, & 17th centuries, but few copies are extant. Wherever existing, it is carefully guarded for the sake of the world's welfare & sanity. Once a man read through the copy in the library of Miskatonic University at Arkham -- read it through & fled wild-eyed into the hills ...... but that is another story!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In yet another letter (to James Blish and William Miller, 1936), Lovecraft says:
You are fortunate in securing copies of the hellish and abhorred Necronomicon. Are they the Latin texts printed in Germany in the fifteenth century, or the Greek version printed in Italy in 1567, or the Spanish translation of 1623? Or do these copies represent different texts?
Note that this is not entirely consistent with the accounts given earlier.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Annotated Version
From Kendrick Kerwin Chua's Necronomicon FAQ
With further annotation by Dan Clore
(Note: I have substituted the corrected text for the older, corrupt text used in the FAQ. -- D.C.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"History of the Necronomicon", by H.P. Lovecraft, written in 1937 with footnotes and references by Kendrick Kerwin Chua, 1993.
See above for the date of this essay.
Original title Al Azif -- azif being the word used by Arabs to designate that nocturnal sound (made by insects) suppos'd to be the howling of daemons.
Composed by Abdul Alhazred, a mad poet of Sanaá, in Yemen, who is said to have flourished during the period of the Ommiade caliphs, circa 700 A.D. He visited the ruins of Babylon and the subterranean secrets of Memphis and spent ten years alone in the great southern desert of Arabia -- the Roba el Khaliyeh or "Empty Space" of the ancients -- and "Dahna" or "Crimson" desert of the modern Arabs, which is held to be inhabited by protective evil spirits and monsters of death. Of this desert many strange and unbelievable marvels are told by those who pretend to have penetrated it. In his last years Alhazred dwelt in Damascus, where the Necronomicon (Al Azif) was written, and of his final death or disappearance (738 A.D.) many terrible and conflicting things are told. He is said by Ebn Khallikan (12th cent. biographer) to have been seized by an invisible monster in broad daylight and devoured horribly before a large number of fright-frozen witnesses. Of his madness many things are told. He claimed to have seen fabulous Irem, or City of Pillars, and to have found beneath the ruins of a certain nameless desert town the shocking annals and secrets of a race older than mankind. [The Rebel Press edition adds this editor's note: "A full description of the nameless city, and the annals and secrets of its one time inhabitants will be found in the story THE NAMELESS CITY, published in the first issue of Fanciful Tales, and written by the author of this outline."] He was only an indifferent Moslem, worshipping unknown entities whom he called Yog-Sothoth and Cthulhu.
(9) Note already how Lovecraft skirts the fine line between campy parody and seriousness. In Lovecraft at Last, Conover writes that Lovecraft wrote the history in order to allow people with any understanding of Arab studies to see through the mock scholarship. Note also the inconsistencies here with the description of Al-Hazred in the Simon Necronomicon. Al-Hazred there supposedly witnessed the horrible rituals at Masshu, a mythical island at the mouth of the Euphrates upon which Utnapishtim, the Babylonian Noah, supposedly still resides today. Whereas Lovecraft describes the Crimson Desert as the place where Al-Hazred witnessed much of what he wrote down. Note also that in the Simon version, Al-Hazred warns against worshipping "Iak-Sakkak" and "Kutulu", whereas Lovecrafts claims he did just that. Note also the improper use of the A.D. prefix until the next paragraph. KKC
In A.D. 950 the Azif, which had gained a considerable tho' surreptitious circulation amongst the philosophers of the age, was secretly translated into Greek by Theodorus Philetas of Constantinople under the title Necronomicon.
(10) Another inconsistency. Simon claims that Al-Hazred rendered the Necronomicon in Greek first, rather than Arabic. KKC
I haven't been able to find this claim in Simon's text, but he does claim that the manuscript he translated is a Greek version. As noted below, Lovecraft states that the Greek version was lost.
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For a century it impelled certain experimenters to terrible attempts, when it was suppressed and burnt by the patriarch Michael. After this it is only heard of furtively, but (1228) Olaus Wormius made a Latin translation later in the Middle Ages, and the Latin text was printed twice -- once in the fifteenth century in black-letter (evidently in Germany) and once in the seventeenth (prob. Spanish) -- both editions being without identifying marks, and located as to time and place by internal typographical evidence only.
(11) Interesting to note that Lovecraft does not say outright that someone in our time had apparently found and identified these renditions of the book. KKC
The work both Latin and Greek was banned by Pope Gregory IX in 1232, shortly after its Latin translation, which called attention to it.
(12) The archivist has thusfar been unable to find Al Azif, Necronomicon, or anything even remotely similar on any of the forbidden book lists of the era. But do consider that paper records from the 13th century are incomplete and unpreserved, to say the least. KKC
The Arabic original was lost as early as Wormius' time, as indicated by his prefatory note; [the Rebel Press edition adds paranthetically: "there is, however, a vague account of a secret copy appearing in San Francisco during the present century, but later perished in fire" -- a transparent reference to Clark Ashton Smith's tale "The Return of the Sorcerer".] and no sight of the Greek copy -- which was printed in Italy between 1500 and 1550 -- has been reported since the burning of a certain Salem man's library in 1692.
(13) Again, Simon claims to have translated a Greek edition. KKC
An English translation made by Dr. Dee was never printed, and exists only in fragments recovered from the original manuscript.
(14) An internal Lovecraft inconsistency. In his short story "The Dunwich Horror", the old wizard called Whately utilizes a Dee translation of the Necronomicon in order to produce children for Yog-Sothoth. A complete listing of John Dee's books reveals none titled Necronomicon. KKC
This is not an inconsistency, as old Wizard Whateley uses an incomplete manuscript of the Dee translation. Wilbur Whateley, Yog-Sothoth's son, requires the complete edition housed in the Miskatonic University Library to fill in the gaps in the fragmentary Dee version.
Of the Latin texts now existing one (15th cent.) is known to be in the British Museum under lock and key, while another (17th cent.) is in the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris. A seventeenth-century edition is in the Widener Library at Harvard, and in the library of Miskatonic University at Arkham. Also in the library of the University of Buenos Ayres.
(15) Other than the Harvard copy, which the archivist knows for sure does not exist, and the fact that Miskatonic University is totally fictional, I cannot say with absolute certainty that the other locations Lovecraft lists do not have some copy of a book they may call the Necronomicon. Interested parties may contact the archivist to confirm or deny posession of the book, if they wish. KKC
They don't.
Numerous other copies probably exist in secret, and a fifteenth-century one is persistently rumoured to form part of the collection of a celebrated American millionaire. A still vaguer rumour credits the preservation of a sixteenth-century Greek text in the Salem family of Pickman; but if it was so preserved, it vanished with the artist R.U. Pickman, who disappeared early in 1926. The book is rigidly suppressed by the authorities of most countries, and by all branches of organised ecclesiasticism. Reading leads to terrible consequences. It was from rumours of this book (of which relatively few of the general public know) that R.W. Chambers is said to have derived the idea of his early novel The King in Yellow.
(16) Much of the latter part of this paragraph is in fact derived from Lovecraft's own short stories, most notably "The Picture in the House", which featured the sadistic Robert Pickman character. Also, Lovecraft repeatedly cites Chambers' book as his main inspiration, although he created the Necronomicon before he first read Chambers. KKC
The story featuring Robert Upton Pickman is, of course, "Pickman's Model", not "The Picture in the House". See above on Chambers. I am unaware of any serious statement by Lovecraft attesting to any significant influence from Chambers' work.
(11) Interesting to note that Lovecraft does not say outright that someone in our time had apparently found and identified these renditions of the book. KKC
The work both Latin and Greek was banned by Pope Gregory IX in 1232, shortly after its Latin translation, which called attention to it.
(12) The archivist has thusfar been unable to find Al Azif, Necronomicon, or anything even remotely similar on any of the forbidden book lists of the era. But do consider that paper records from the 13th century are incomplete and unpreserved, to say the least. KKC
The Arabic original was lost as early as Wormius' time, as indicated by his prefatory note; [the Rebel Press edition adds paranthetically: "there is, however, a vague account of a secret copy appearing in San Francisco during the present century, but later perished in fire" -- a transparent reference to Clark Ashton Smith's tale "The Return of the Sorcerer".] and no sight of the Greek copy -- which was printed in Italy between 1500 and 1550 -- has been reported since the burning of a certain Salem man's library in 1692.
(13) Again, Simon claims to have translated a Greek edition. KKC
An English translation made by Dr. Dee was never printed, and exists only in fragments recovered from the original manuscript.
(14) An internal Lovecraft inconsistency. In his short story "The Dunwich Horror", the old wizard called Whately utilizes a Dee translation of the Necronomicon in order to produce children for Yog-Sothoth. A complete listing of John Dee's books reveals none titled Necronomicon. KKC
This is not an inconsistency, as old Wizard Whateley uses an incomplete manuscript of the Dee translation. Wilbur Whateley, Yog-Sothoth's son, requires the complete edition housed in the Miskatonic University Library to fill in the gaps in the fragmentary Dee version.
Of the Latin texts now existing one (15th cent.) is known to be in the British Museum under lock and key, while another (17th cent.) is in the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris. A seventeenth-century edition is in the Widener Library at Harvard, and in the library of Miskatonic University at Arkham. Also in the library of the University of Buenos Ayres.
(15) Other than the Harvard copy, which the archivist knows for sure does not exist, and the fact that Miskatonic University is totally fictional, I cannot say with absolute certainty that the other locations Lovecraft lists do not have some copy of a book they may call the Necronomicon. Interested parties may contact the archivist to confirm or deny posession of the book, if they wish. KKC
They don't.
Numerous other copies probably exist in secret, and a fifteenth-century one is persistently rumoured to form part of the collection of a celebrated American millionaire. A still vaguer rumour credits the preservation of a sixteenth-century Greek text in the Salem family of Pickman; but if it was so preserved, it vanished with the artist R.U. Pickman, who disappeared early in 1926. The book is rigidly suppressed by the authorities of most countries, and by all branches of organised ecclesiasticism. Reading leads to terrible consequences. It was from rumours of this book (of which relatively few of the general public know) that R.W. Chambers is said to have derived the idea of his early novel The King in Yellow.
(16) Much of the latter part of this paragraph is in fact derived from Lovecraft's own short stories, most notably "The Picture in the House", which featured the sadistic Robert Pickman character. Also, Lovecraft repeatedly cites Chambers' book as his main inspiration, although he created the Necronomicon before he first read Chambers. KKC
The story featuring Robert Upton Pickman is, of course, "Pickman's Model", not "The Picture in the House". See above on Chambers. I am unaware of any serious statement by Lovecraft attesting to any significant influence from Chambers' work.
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The Names
Necronomicon
and
Al Azif:
Where They Came From,
What They Mean.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Necronomicon
The name Necronomicon was coined by H.P. Lovecraft. He stated in a letter that the name occurred to him in the course of a dream, and there is no reason to doubt this. As no occurrence of the term has been found that predates Lovecraft's usage of it, and as all later uses can be traced back to his, he was certainly the sole source of the title.
While the origin of the name offers us no ambiguities, however, this is not the case with its interpretation. Most interpret the title The Necronomicon as "The Book of Dead Names". This, however, is certainly incorrect. The derivation of the first root from (nekros, dead, corpse) is definitely right, but the second root cannot derive from (onoma, name, title, noun) as the combining form of that word is onomat-, as in onomatomania, the uncontrollable obsession with words or names or their meanings or sounds.
Some may also have in mind the Greek (onyma, name), as in pseudonym, antonym, etc., or the Latin nomen (name), root nomin-, but it is easily seen that these are equally impossible.
Another attempt to etymologize the title as "The Book of Dead Names" breaks it down into nekros plus the non-existent and impossible form nomikon, a book of names.
Lovecraft himself offered a translation of the title:
The name Necronomicon ( [nekros], corpse; [nomos], law; [eikôn], image = An Image [or Picture -- HPL's brackets] of the Law of the Dead) occurred to me in the course of a dream, although the etymology is perfectly sound. In assigning an Arabic author to a Greek-named book I was whimsically reversing the condition whereby the monumental astronomical work of the Greek Ptolemy
( ' [Megalê Syntaxis Tês `Astronomias]) is commonly known by the Arabic name Almagest (or more truly, Tabrir al Magesthi), which was evolved from a corruption of the original title when the Arabs made their translation ( [megistê] is the superlative of [megalê], & the Arabs probably found it in common use to distinguish the work from another of Ptolemy's) (Selected Letters V, 418).
Those concerned with authorial intent will feel bound by Lovecraft's interpretation, while it is certainly of interest to anyone reading his work. While he was on the right track with nomos, however, the interpretation of the final root as deriving from eikôn is definitely mistaken, as we shall see later.
The exact meaning of the root nom- has caused some differences of opinion. It comes from a family of words including the verb (nemein, to distribute, pasture, manage), the noun (nomos, usage, custom, law), and the combining form -nomia, (-nomos, distributing, arranging) used in the naming of sciences such as astronomy. The last would seem to be the interpretation favored by Lovecraft, the title thus indicating a treatise on the scientific study of the dead, which science would be named in this interpretation necronomy. Others have suggested the second choice, translating the title as "The Customs of the Dead". Still others have proposed deriving the nom- element from another set of related Greek words, with meanings such as "pasture", "region" "(political) division", thus giving the translation: "Guide[book] to the Regions of the Dead". Yet another possibility which suggests itself (though I do not recall seeing it mentioned before) is taking -nomia (management, control) as in economy, economics, "the art of household management"; -- thus giving "The Management of the Dead", which is not too far out of line of the conception of the book in the stories where it first appeared, "The Festival" & "The Hound". It would thus perhaps belong to the science of necronomics.
Yet another attempt to interpret the name views as combining two roots instead of three: nekros, dead, with nomikos, lawyer. As attractive as many might find "The Book of Dead Lawyers", however, this is not an accurate translation.
Finally, to resolve these nagging doubts we may turn to S.T. Joshi's "Afterword" to Lovecraft's "History of the Necronomicon". In addition to being the preëminent Lovecraft scholar, Joshi has a degree in Classics, and so is in his area of specialty twice over. He analyzes the title by comparison with that of the Astronomica (plural; singular Astronomicôn) of Manilius, a Latin work on astronomy which Lovecraft knew and cited. (E.g., in an article titled "Mysteries of the Heavens", published in the Asheville Gazette-News April 3, 1915, he says: "Manilius, referring to the Milky Way in his 'Astronomicon.'...") He breaks it down as follows: : nekros, dead person, corpse; : nemein, to consider; and -: -ikon, an adjectival suffix equivalent to Latin -icum, English -ic, -ical. From this last it can be seen that the strained interpretation of -icon as eikôn, picture, image = "book", is totally unnecessary. Joshi thus gives the Greek title the following rendering: "Book Concerning the Dead".
In the movies Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness there appears a variant form of the name. There, the book is called the Necronomicon ex Mortis. This is apparently a bit of flubbed Latin: it should presumably be either ex Morte, "from death", or more probably ex Mortuis, "from the dead".
Hearty thanks go out to Christophe Thill for providing the gifs of Greek words used on this page.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Al Azif
In his "History of the Necronomicon" Lovecraft begins: "Original title Al Azif -- azif being the word used by Arabs to designate that nocturnal sound (made by insects) suppos'd to be the howling of daemons." Again, in Selected Letters II he states: "The book was a product of Abdul's old age, which was spent in Damascus, & the original title was Al Azif -- azif (cf. Henley's notes to Vathek) being the name applied to those strange night noises (of insects) which the Arabs attribute to the howling of daemons."
Oddly, his only use of the title in his fiction seems to occur in his revision of Adolphe de Castro's "The Last Test" (unlike many of the "revisions", this was actually a revision of a work written by de Castro, rather than a ghost-writing job); there, the mad scientist is made to shout: "Be careful, you -- -- ! There are powers against your powers -- I didn't go to China for nothing, and there are things in Alhazred's Azif which weren't known in Atlantis!"
The meaning of azif in this context is not entirely clear. One speculation, that it indicates that the book was inspired by Alhazred hearing voices, certainly makes sense in the context of his status as a "mad poet" and Arab beliefs about such in the period in which he lived.
Still, a different interpretation emerges when one considers Lovecraft's acknowledged source for the word. He stated that he derived the word from a note to Henley's translation of Beckford's Vathek. The text to which the note is appended runs as follows:
The good Mussulmans fancied that they heard the sullen hum of those nocturnal insects which presage evil, and importuned Vathek to beware how he ventured his sacred person.
The note runs:
It is observable that, in the fifth verse of the Ninety-first Psalm, "the terror by night," is rendered, in the old English version, "the bugge by night." In the first settled parts of North America, every nocturnal fly of a noxious quality is still generically named a bug; whence the term bugbear signifies one that carries terror wherever he goes. Beelzebub, or the Lord of Flies, was an Eastern appellative given to the Devil; and the nocturnal sound called by the Arabians azif was believed to be the howling of demons. Analogous to this is a passage in Comus as it stood in the original copy:--
But for that damn'd magician, let him be girt
With all the grisly legions that troop
Under the sooty flag of Acheron,
Harpies and Hydras, or all the monstrous buggs
'Twixt Africa and Inde, I'll find him out.
From all this it is clear that the noises referred to are not intelligible speech; and it would appear that the correct translation of the title would be something like The Bug; more specifically, The Hum, The Humming, The Buzzing, or The Rustling; or less literally, The Omen or The Portent (we respectfully refrain from suggesting Humbug as the title's true translation, however).
In any case, however, the word is not a real term from Arabic. The source of Henley's note is unknown. There is, however, an Arabic word aziz, which translates as "buzzing, rumbling (as of thunder)" and other buzzing or rumbling sounds in general.
Embarrassingly enough, after having the above placed on this website for several years, I have discovered that azif is in fact a legitimate Arabic term, with precisely the meaning the Henley and Lovecraft ascribe to it.
A variant form, Kitab al-Azif, was never used by Lovecraft and seems to have first appeared in the seventies. The word kitab simply means "book" in Arabic, and appears in many titles in that language. Those who have added it have probably had in mind, however, a specific work. This is the Kitab-al-Uhud, or Book of Power, by Abdul-Kadir, and identified with a book supposedly dictated to Solomon by the demon Asmodeus. Only one copy of this work is known to exist; that copy was tracked down by the Sufi expert Idries Shah, who tells of his search for it in Oriental Magic (1956). This text is mentioned in both the Simon Necronomicon and the Hay-Wilson-Turner-Langford Necronomicon.
Necronomicon
and
Al Azif:
Where They Came From,
What They Mean.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Necronomicon
The name Necronomicon was coined by H.P. Lovecraft. He stated in a letter that the name occurred to him in the course of a dream, and there is no reason to doubt this. As no occurrence of the term has been found that predates Lovecraft's usage of it, and as all later uses can be traced back to his, he was certainly the sole source of the title.
While the origin of the name offers us no ambiguities, however, this is not the case with its interpretation. Most interpret the title The Necronomicon as "The Book of Dead Names". This, however, is certainly incorrect. The derivation of the first root from (nekros, dead, corpse) is definitely right, but the second root cannot derive from (onoma, name, title, noun) as the combining form of that word is onomat-, as in onomatomania, the uncontrollable obsession with words or names or their meanings or sounds.
Some may also have in mind the Greek (onyma, name), as in pseudonym, antonym, etc., or the Latin nomen (name), root nomin-, but it is easily seen that these are equally impossible.
Another attempt to etymologize the title as "The Book of Dead Names" breaks it down into nekros plus the non-existent and impossible form nomikon, a book of names.
Lovecraft himself offered a translation of the title:
The name Necronomicon ( [nekros], corpse; [nomos], law; [eikôn], image = An Image [or Picture -- HPL's brackets] of the Law of the Dead) occurred to me in the course of a dream, although the etymology is perfectly sound. In assigning an Arabic author to a Greek-named book I was whimsically reversing the condition whereby the monumental astronomical work of the Greek Ptolemy
( ' [Megalê Syntaxis Tês `Astronomias]) is commonly known by the Arabic name Almagest (or more truly, Tabrir al Magesthi), which was evolved from a corruption of the original title when the Arabs made their translation ( [megistê] is the superlative of [megalê], & the Arabs probably found it in common use to distinguish the work from another of Ptolemy's) (Selected Letters V, 418).
Those concerned with authorial intent will feel bound by Lovecraft's interpretation, while it is certainly of interest to anyone reading his work. While he was on the right track with nomos, however, the interpretation of the final root as deriving from eikôn is definitely mistaken, as we shall see later.
The exact meaning of the root nom- has caused some differences of opinion. It comes from a family of words including the verb (nemein, to distribute, pasture, manage), the noun (nomos, usage, custom, law), and the combining form -nomia, (-nomos, distributing, arranging) used in the naming of sciences such as astronomy. The last would seem to be the interpretation favored by Lovecraft, the title thus indicating a treatise on the scientific study of the dead, which science would be named in this interpretation necronomy. Others have suggested the second choice, translating the title as "The Customs of the Dead". Still others have proposed deriving the nom- element from another set of related Greek words, with meanings such as "pasture", "region" "(political) division", thus giving the translation: "Guide[book] to the Regions of the Dead". Yet another possibility which suggests itself (though I do not recall seeing it mentioned before) is taking -nomia (management, control) as in economy, economics, "the art of household management"; -- thus giving "The Management of the Dead", which is not too far out of line of the conception of the book in the stories where it first appeared, "The Festival" & "The Hound". It would thus perhaps belong to the science of necronomics.
Yet another attempt to interpret the name views as combining two roots instead of three: nekros, dead, with nomikos, lawyer. As attractive as many might find "The Book of Dead Lawyers", however, this is not an accurate translation.
Finally, to resolve these nagging doubts we may turn to S.T. Joshi's "Afterword" to Lovecraft's "History of the Necronomicon". In addition to being the preëminent Lovecraft scholar, Joshi has a degree in Classics, and so is in his area of specialty twice over. He analyzes the title by comparison with that of the Astronomica (plural; singular Astronomicôn) of Manilius, a Latin work on astronomy which Lovecraft knew and cited. (E.g., in an article titled "Mysteries of the Heavens", published in the Asheville Gazette-News April 3, 1915, he says: "Manilius, referring to the Milky Way in his 'Astronomicon.'...") He breaks it down as follows: : nekros, dead person, corpse; : nemein, to consider; and -: -ikon, an adjectival suffix equivalent to Latin -icum, English -ic, -ical. From this last it can be seen that the strained interpretation of -icon as eikôn, picture, image = "book", is totally unnecessary. Joshi thus gives the Greek title the following rendering: "Book Concerning the Dead".
In the movies Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness there appears a variant form of the name. There, the book is called the Necronomicon ex Mortis. This is apparently a bit of flubbed Latin: it should presumably be either ex Morte, "from death", or more probably ex Mortuis, "from the dead".
Hearty thanks go out to Christophe Thill for providing the gifs of Greek words used on this page.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Al Azif
In his "History of the Necronomicon" Lovecraft begins: "Original title Al Azif -- azif being the word used by Arabs to designate that nocturnal sound (made by insects) suppos'd to be the howling of daemons." Again, in Selected Letters II he states: "The book was a product of Abdul's old age, which was spent in Damascus, & the original title was Al Azif -- azif (cf. Henley's notes to Vathek) being the name applied to those strange night noises (of insects) which the Arabs attribute to the howling of daemons."
Oddly, his only use of the title in his fiction seems to occur in his revision of Adolphe de Castro's "The Last Test" (unlike many of the "revisions", this was actually a revision of a work written by de Castro, rather than a ghost-writing job); there, the mad scientist is made to shout: "Be careful, you -- -- ! There are powers against your powers -- I didn't go to China for nothing, and there are things in Alhazred's Azif which weren't known in Atlantis!"
The meaning of azif in this context is not entirely clear. One speculation, that it indicates that the book was inspired by Alhazred hearing voices, certainly makes sense in the context of his status as a "mad poet" and Arab beliefs about such in the period in which he lived.
Still, a different interpretation emerges when one considers Lovecraft's acknowledged source for the word. He stated that he derived the word from a note to Henley's translation of Beckford's Vathek. The text to which the note is appended runs as follows:
The good Mussulmans fancied that they heard the sullen hum of those nocturnal insects which presage evil, and importuned Vathek to beware how he ventured his sacred person.
The note runs:
It is observable that, in the fifth verse of the Ninety-first Psalm, "the terror by night," is rendered, in the old English version, "the bugge by night." In the first settled parts of North America, every nocturnal fly of a noxious quality is still generically named a bug; whence the term bugbear signifies one that carries terror wherever he goes. Beelzebub, or the Lord of Flies, was an Eastern appellative given to the Devil; and the nocturnal sound called by the Arabians azif was believed to be the howling of demons. Analogous to this is a passage in Comus as it stood in the original copy:--
But for that damn'd magician, let him be girt
With all the grisly legions that troop
Under the sooty flag of Acheron,
Harpies and Hydras, or all the monstrous buggs
'Twixt Africa and Inde, I'll find him out.
From all this it is clear that the noises referred to are not intelligible speech; and it would appear that the correct translation of the title would be something like The Bug; more specifically, The Hum, The Humming, The Buzzing, or The Rustling; or less literally, The Omen or The Portent (we respectfully refrain from suggesting Humbug as the title's true translation, however).
In any case, however, the word is not a real term from Arabic. The source of Henley's note is unknown. There is, however, an Arabic word aziz, which translates as "buzzing, rumbling (as of thunder)" and other buzzing or rumbling sounds in general.
Embarrassingly enough, after having the above placed on this website for several years, I have discovered that azif is in fact a legitimate Arabic term, with precisely the meaning the Henley and Lovecraft ascribe to it.
A variant form, Kitab al-Azif, was never used by Lovecraft and seems to have first appeared in the seventies. The word kitab simply means "book" in Arabic, and appears in many titles in that language. Those who have added it have probably had in mind, however, a specific work. This is the Kitab-al-Uhud, or Book of Power, by Abdul-Kadir, and identified with a book supposedly dictated to Solomon by the demon Asmodeus. Only one copy of this work is known to exist; that copy was tracked down by the Sufi expert Idries Shah, who tells of his search for it in Oriental Magic (1956). This text is mentioned in both the Simon Necronomicon and the Hay-Wilson-Turner-Langford Necronomicon.
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ALLEGED QUOTATIONS
FROM THE
NECRONOMICON
(AL AZIF)
OF THE MAD ARAB
ABDUL ALHAZRED
Compiled by Dan Clore from sundry sources
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fake title page of the Dee edition
from the Hay-Wilson-Turner-Langford Necronomicon
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
H.P. Lovecraft
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Nameless City" (1921); also, "The Call of Cthulhu" (1926):
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.
Translation of unknown provenance.
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From "The Festival" (1923):
The nethermost caverns are not for the fathoming of eyes that see; for their marvels are strange and terrific. Cursed the ground where dead thoughts live new and oddly bodied, and evil the mind that is held by no head. Wisely did Ibn Schacabao say, that happy is the tomb where no wizard hath lain, and happy the town at night whose wizards are all ashes. For it is of old rumour that the soul of the devil-bought hastes not from his charnel clay, but fats and instructs the very worm that gnaws; till out of corruption horrid life springs, and the dull scavengers of earth wax crafty to vex it and swell monstrous to plague it. Great holes are digged where earth's pores ought to suffice, and things have learnt to walk that ought to crawl.
Translated from the awkward Low Latin of Olaus Wormius' forbidden translation by a patient at St. Mary's Hospital in Arkham while recovering from a "psychosis".
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From "The Dunwich Horror" (1928):
Nor is it to be thought, that man is either the oldest or the last of earth's masters, or that the common bulk of life and substance walks alone. The Old Ones were, the Old Ones are, and the Old Ones shall be. Not in the spaces we know, but between them, They walk serene and primal, undimensioned and to us unseen. Yog-Sothoth knows the gate. Yog-Sothoth is the gate. Yog-Sothoth is the key and guardian of the gate. Past, present, future, all are one in Yog-Sothoth. He knows where the Old Ones broke through of old, and where They shall break through again. He knows where They have trod earth's fields, and where They still tread them, and why no one can behold Them as They tread. By Their smell can men sometimes know Them near, but of Their semblance can no man know, saving only in the features of those They have begotten on mankind; and of those are there many sorts, differing in likeness from man's truest eidolon to that shape without sight or substance which is Them. They walk unseen and foul in lonely places where the Words have been spoken and the Rites howled through at their Seasons. The wind gibbers with Their voices, and the earth mutters with Their consciousness. They bend the forest and crush the city, yet may not forest or city behold the hand that smites. Kadath in the cold waste hath known Them, and what man knows Kadath? The ice desert of the South and the sunken isles of Ocean hold stones whereon Their seal is engraven, but who hath seen the deep frozen city or the sealed tower long garlanded with seaweed and barnacles? Great Cthulhu is Their cousin, yet can he spy Them only dimly. Iä! Shub-Niggurath! As a foulness shall ye know Them. Their hand is at your throats, yet ye see Them not; and Their habitation is even one with your guarded threshold. Yog-Sothoth is the key to the gate, whereby the spheres meet. Man rules now where They ruled once; They shall soon rule where man rules now. After summer is winter, and after winter summer. They wait patient and potent, for here shall They rule again.
Mentally translated by Dr. Henry Armitage, looking over the shoulder of Wilbur Whateley in the Library of Miskatonic University, from the Latin version of Olaus Wormius, as printed in Spain in the seventeenth century.
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From "The Dunwich Horror" (1928):
N'gai, n'gha'ghaa, bugg-shoggog, y'hah;
Yog-Sothoth, Yog-Sothoth [....]
Fragment of an incantation as recited by Wilbur Whateley and as recalled by Henry Armitage; language unknown.
Cf. this pair of formulae from The Case of Charles Dexter Ward (1927):
Y'AI 'NG'NGAH,
YOG-SOTHOTH
H'EE--L'GEB
F'AI THRODOG
UAAAH
OGTHROD AI'F
GEB'L--EE'H
YOG-SOTHOTH
'NGAH'NG AI'Y
ZHRO
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From Selected Letters III (1929):
******************************************************************
Some things are just too horrible to write, even for a mad Arab....
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "Through the Gates of the Silver Key" (1932-33; with E. Hoffmann Price):
And while there are those who have dared to seek glimpses beyond the Veil, and to accept HIM as a Guide, they would have been more prudent had they avoided commerce with HIM; for it is written in the Book of Thoth how terrific is the price of a single glimpse. Nor may those who pass ever return, for in the Vastnesses transcending our world are Shapes of darkness that seize and bind. The Affair that shambleth about in the night, the Evil that defieth the Elder Sign, the Herd that stand watch at the secret portal each tomb is known to have, and that thrive on that which groweth out of the tenants within -- all these Blacknesses are lesser than HE Who guardeth the Gateway; HE Who will guide the rash one beyond all the worlds into the Abyss of unnamable Devourers. For HE is 'UMR AT-TAWIL, the Most Ancient One, which the scribe rendereth as THE PROLONGED OF LIFE.
Translation of unknown provenance.
In E. Hoffman's Price's original draft of this story, which was produced under the title "The Lord of Illusion", this quotation runs as follows:
And while there are those who have had the temerity to seek glimpses of beyond the Veil, and to accept HIM as a guide, they would be more prudent to avoid commerce with HIM; for it is written in the Book of Thoth how terrific is the price of but one glimpse; and none who pass may return, for they will be firmly bound by those who lurk in the vastnesses that transcend our world. The terrors of the night, and the evils of creation, and those that stand watch at the secret exit that it is known each grave has, and thrive on that which grows out of the tenants thereof; these are lesser powers than he who guards the Gateway, and offers to guide the unwary into the realm beyond this world and all its unnamed and unnameable Devourers. For HE is 'UMR AT-TAWIL, which signifieth, THE MOST ANCIENT ONE, which the scribe hath rendered as THE PROLONGED OF LIFE.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From Letters to Henry Kuttner (1936):
"the volume that cannot be" (perhaps the Book of Iod.)
IX, 21 -- p. 598 of the black-letter German copy (in Latin) in the Miskatonic University Library. Translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Frank Belknap Long
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From "The Space Eaters" (1928):
The cross is not a passive agent. It protects the pure of heart, and it has often appeared in the air above our sabbats, confusing and dispersing the powers of Darkness.
From the English translation of John Dee.
The mention of the cross, as well as the anachronistic reference to mediaeval-renaissance witch-sabbats, marks this passage as a later, Christian, interpolation.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "A Fragment" (?date):
It must not be thought that the powers capable of greatest wickedness appear to us in the form of repellent familiars, and other, closely related demons. They do not. Small, visible demons are merely the effluvia which those vast forms of destructiveness have left in Their wake -- skin scrapings and even more tenuous shreds of evil that attach themselves to the living like leeches from some great slain leviathan of the deep that has wreaked havoc on a hundred coastal cities before plunging to its death with a thousand hurled harpoons quivering in its flesh.
For the mightiest powers there can be no death and the hurled harpoons inflict, at most, surface injuries which heal quickly. I have said before and I shall say again until my tardily earned wisdom is accepted by my brethren as fact--in confronting that which has always been and always will be a master of magic can know only self-reproach and despair if he mistakes a temporary victory for one that he can never hope permanently to win.
Paragraphs Seven and Eight -- Page 30, Book Three, of the John Dee translation. Slightly modernized.
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Clark Ashton Smith
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From "The Nameless Offspring" (1931):
Many and multiform are the dim horrors of Earth, infesting her ways from the prime. They sleep beneath the unturned stone; they rise from the tree with its root; they move beneath the sea and in subterranean places; they dwell in the inmost adyta; they emerge betimes [sic; see note below] from the shutten sepulchre of haughty bronze and the low grave that is sealed with clay. There be some that are long known to man, and others as yet unknown that abide the terrible latter days of their revealing. Those which are the most dreadful and the loathliest of all are haply still to be declared. But among those that have revealed themselves aforetime and have made manifest their veritable presence, there is one which may not openly be named for its exceeding foulness. It is that spawn which the hidden dweller in the vaults has begotten upon mortality.
Translation of unknown provenance.
Smith has been criticized for the apparent inaccuracy of the use of the word "betimes", which normally means in good time, early, soon, etc. However, "betimes" can also mean "from time to time", as this quotation from Charles Maturin's classic Gothic romance Melmoth the Wanderer: A Tale demonstrates:
When his honour sat in the kitchen in winter, to save a fire in his own room, he could never bear the talk of the old women that came in to light their pipes betimes, (from time to time).
A letter from Smith to Lovecraft gives an earlier version of this quotation:
Manifold and multiform are the horrors that infest the visible ways and the ways unseen. They sleep beneath the unturned stone; they rise with the tree from its root; they move beneath the sea and in subterranean places; they dwell unchallenged in the inmost adyta; they emerge betimes from the shutten sepulcher of haughty bronze and the low grave that is sealed with earth. There be some that are long known to man, and others as yet unknown that abide the terrible future days of their revealing. Those which are the most dreadful and the loathliest of all, are haply still to be declared. But among those that have revealed themselves aforetime and have made manifest their veritable presence, there is one which may not openly be named for its exceeding foulness. It is that spawn which the hidden dweller in the vaults has begotten upon mortality.
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From "The Return of the Sorcerer" (1931):
It is verily known by few, but is nevertheless an attestable fact, that the will of a dead sorcerer hath power upon his own body and can raise it up from the tomb and perform therewith whatever action was unfulfilled in life. And such resurrections are invariably for the doing of malevolent deeds and for the detriment of others. Most readily can the corpse be animated if all its members have remained intact; and yet there are cases in which the excelling will of the wizard hath reared up from death the sundered pieces of a body hewn in many fragments, and hath caused them to serve his end, either seperately or in a temporary reunion. But in every instance, after the action hath been completed, the body lapseth into its former state.
Translated from the Arabic by a certain Mr. Ogden from a manuscript in a private collector's possession; the passage is wholly omitted in the Latin of Olaus Wormius.
FROM THE
NECRONOMICON
(AL AZIF)
OF THE MAD ARAB
ABDUL ALHAZRED
Compiled by Dan Clore from sundry sources
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Fake title page of the Dee edition
from the Hay-Wilson-Turner-Langford Necronomicon
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H.P. Lovecraft
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From "The Nameless City" (1921); also, "The Call of Cthulhu" (1926):
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.
Translation of unknown provenance.
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From "The Festival" (1923):
The nethermost caverns are not for the fathoming of eyes that see; for their marvels are strange and terrific. Cursed the ground where dead thoughts live new and oddly bodied, and evil the mind that is held by no head. Wisely did Ibn Schacabao say, that happy is the tomb where no wizard hath lain, and happy the town at night whose wizards are all ashes. For it is of old rumour that the soul of the devil-bought hastes not from his charnel clay, but fats and instructs the very worm that gnaws; till out of corruption horrid life springs, and the dull scavengers of earth wax crafty to vex it and swell monstrous to plague it. Great holes are digged where earth's pores ought to suffice, and things have learnt to walk that ought to crawl.
Translated from the awkward Low Latin of Olaus Wormius' forbidden translation by a patient at St. Mary's Hospital in Arkham while recovering from a "psychosis".
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From "The Dunwich Horror" (1928):
Nor is it to be thought, that man is either the oldest or the last of earth's masters, or that the common bulk of life and substance walks alone. The Old Ones were, the Old Ones are, and the Old Ones shall be. Not in the spaces we know, but between them, They walk serene and primal, undimensioned and to us unseen. Yog-Sothoth knows the gate. Yog-Sothoth is the gate. Yog-Sothoth is the key and guardian of the gate. Past, present, future, all are one in Yog-Sothoth. He knows where the Old Ones broke through of old, and where They shall break through again. He knows where They have trod earth's fields, and where They still tread them, and why no one can behold Them as They tread. By Their smell can men sometimes know Them near, but of Their semblance can no man know, saving only in the features of those They have begotten on mankind; and of those are there many sorts, differing in likeness from man's truest eidolon to that shape without sight or substance which is Them. They walk unseen and foul in lonely places where the Words have been spoken and the Rites howled through at their Seasons. The wind gibbers with Their voices, and the earth mutters with Their consciousness. They bend the forest and crush the city, yet may not forest or city behold the hand that smites. Kadath in the cold waste hath known Them, and what man knows Kadath? The ice desert of the South and the sunken isles of Ocean hold stones whereon Their seal is engraven, but who hath seen the deep frozen city or the sealed tower long garlanded with seaweed and barnacles? Great Cthulhu is Their cousin, yet can he spy Them only dimly. Iä! Shub-Niggurath! As a foulness shall ye know Them. Their hand is at your throats, yet ye see Them not; and Their habitation is even one with your guarded threshold. Yog-Sothoth is the key to the gate, whereby the spheres meet. Man rules now where They ruled once; They shall soon rule where man rules now. After summer is winter, and after winter summer. They wait patient and potent, for here shall They rule again.
Mentally translated by Dr. Henry Armitage, looking over the shoulder of Wilbur Whateley in the Library of Miskatonic University, from the Latin version of Olaus Wormius, as printed in Spain in the seventeenth century.
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From "The Dunwich Horror" (1928):
N'gai, n'gha'ghaa, bugg-shoggog, y'hah;
Yog-Sothoth, Yog-Sothoth [....]
Fragment of an incantation as recited by Wilbur Whateley and as recalled by Henry Armitage; language unknown.
Cf. this pair of formulae from The Case of Charles Dexter Ward (1927):
Y'AI 'NG'NGAH,
YOG-SOTHOTH
H'EE--L'GEB
F'AI THRODOG
UAAAH
OGTHROD AI'F
GEB'L--EE'H
YOG-SOTHOTH
'NGAH'NG AI'Y
ZHRO
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From Selected Letters III (1929):
******************************************************************
Some things are just too horrible to write, even for a mad Arab....
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From "Through the Gates of the Silver Key" (1932-33; with E. Hoffmann Price):
And while there are those who have dared to seek glimpses beyond the Veil, and to accept HIM as a Guide, they would have been more prudent had they avoided commerce with HIM; for it is written in the Book of Thoth how terrific is the price of a single glimpse. Nor may those who pass ever return, for in the Vastnesses transcending our world are Shapes of darkness that seize and bind. The Affair that shambleth about in the night, the Evil that defieth the Elder Sign, the Herd that stand watch at the secret portal each tomb is known to have, and that thrive on that which groweth out of the tenants within -- all these Blacknesses are lesser than HE Who guardeth the Gateway; HE Who will guide the rash one beyond all the worlds into the Abyss of unnamable Devourers. For HE is 'UMR AT-TAWIL, the Most Ancient One, which the scribe rendereth as THE PROLONGED OF LIFE.
Translation of unknown provenance.
In E. Hoffman's Price's original draft of this story, which was produced under the title "The Lord of Illusion", this quotation runs as follows:
And while there are those who have had the temerity to seek glimpses of beyond the Veil, and to accept HIM as a guide, they would be more prudent to avoid commerce with HIM; for it is written in the Book of Thoth how terrific is the price of but one glimpse; and none who pass may return, for they will be firmly bound by those who lurk in the vastnesses that transcend our world. The terrors of the night, and the evils of creation, and those that stand watch at the secret exit that it is known each grave has, and thrive on that which grows out of the tenants thereof; these are lesser powers than he who guards the Gateway, and offers to guide the unwary into the realm beyond this world and all its unnamed and unnameable Devourers. For HE is 'UMR AT-TAWIL, which signifieth, THE MOST ANCIENT ONE, which the scribe hath rendered as THE PROLONGED OF LIFE.
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From Letters to Henry Kuttner (1936):
"the volume that cannot be" (perhaps the Book of Iod.)
IX, 21 -- p. 598 of the black-letter German copy (in Latin) in the Miskatonic University Library. Translation of unknown provenance.
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Frank Belknap Long
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From "The Space Eaters" (1928):
The cross is not a passive agent. It protects the pure of heart, and it has often appeared in the air above our sabbats, confusing and dispersing the powers of Darkness.
From the English translation of John Dee.
The mention of the cross, as well as the anachronistic reference to mediaeval-renaissance witch-sabbats, marks this passage as a later, Christian, interpolation.
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From "A Fragment" (?date):
It must not be thought that the powers capable of greatest wickedness appear to us in the form of repellent familiars, and other, closely related demons. They do not. Small, visible demons are merely the effluvia which those vast forms of destructiveness have left in Their wake -- skin scrapings and even more tenuous shreds of evil that attach themselves to the living like leeches from some great slain leviathan of the deep that has wreaked havoc on a hundred coastal cities before plunging to its death with a thousand hurled harpoons quivering in its flesh.
For the mightiest powers there can be no death and the hurled harpoons inflict, at most, surface injuries which heal quickly. I have said before and I shall say again until my tardily earned wisdom is accepted by my brethren as fact--in confronting that which has always been and always will be a master of magic can know only self-reproach and despair if he mistakes a temporary victory for one that he can never hope permanently to win.
Paragraphs Seven and Eight -- Page 30, Book Three, of the John Dee translation. Slightly modernized.
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Clark Ashton Smith
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From "The Nameless Offspring" (1931):
Many and multiform are the dim horrors of Earth, infesting her ways from the prime. They sleep beneath the unturned stone; they rise from the tree with its root; they move beneath the sea and in subterranean places; they dwell in the inmost adyta; they emerge betimes [sic; see note below] from the shutten sepulchre of haughty bronze and the low grave that is sealed with clay. There be some that are long known to man, and others as yet unknown that abide the terrible latter days of their revealing. Those which are the most dreadful and the loathliest of all are haply still to be declared. But among those that have revealed themselves aforetime and have made manifest their veritable presence, there is one which may not openly be named for its exceeding foulness. It is that spawn which the hidden dweller in the vaults has begotten upon mortality.
Translation of unknown provenance.
Smith has been criticized for the apparent inaccuracy of the use of the word "betimes", which normally means in good time, early, soon, etc. However, "betimes" can also mean "from time to time", as this quotation from Charles Maturin's classic Gothic romance Melmoth the Wanderer: A Tale demonstrates:
When his honour sat in the kitchen in winter, to save a fire in his own room, he could never bear the talk of the old women that came in to light their pipes betimes, (from time to time).
A letter from Smith to Lovecraft gives an earlier version of this quotation:
Manifold and multiform are the horrors that infest the visible ways and the ways unseen. They sleep beneath the unturned stone; they rise with the tree from its root; they move beneath the sea and in subterranean places; they dwell unchallenged in the inmost adyta; they emerge betimes from the shutten sepulcher of haughty bronze and the low grave that is sealed with earth. There be some that are long known to man, and others as yet unknown that abide the terrible future days of their revealing. Those which are the most dreadful and the loathliest of all, are haply still to be declared. But among those that have revealed themselves aforetime and have made manifest their veritable presence, there is one which may not openly be named for its exceeding foulness. It is that spawn which the hidden dweller in the vaults has begotten upon mortality.
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From "The Return of the Sorcerer" (1931):
It is verily known by few, but is nevertheless an attestable fact, that the will of a dead sorcerer hath power upon his own body and can raise it up from the tomb and perform therewith whatever action was unfulfilled in life. And such resurrections are invariably for the doing of malevolent deeds and for the detriment of others. Most readily can the corpse be animated if all its members have remained intact; and yet there are cases in which the excelling will of the wizard hath reared up from death the sundered pieces of a body hewn in many fragments, and hath caused them to serve his end, either seperately or in a temporary reunion. But in every instance, after the action hath been completed, the body lapseth into its former state.
Translated from the Arabic by a certain Mr. Ogden from a manuscript in a private collector's possession; the passage is wholly omitted in the Latin of Olaus Wormius.
The Spawn
Better Than You
- Joined
- Aug 10, 2002
- Messages
- 19,505
- Reaction score
- 1
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- 31
Robert Bloch
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From "The Fane of the Black Pharaoh" (1937):
[....] the Place of the Blind Apes where Nephren-Ka bindeth up the threads of truth [....]
Translation of unknown provenance.
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Henry Kuttner
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From "The Salem Horror" (1937):
Men knew him as the Dweller in Darkness, that brother of the Old Ones called Nyogtha, the Thing that should not be. He can be summoned to Earth's surface through certain secret caverns and fissures, and sorcerers have seen him in Syria and below the black tower of Leng; from the Thang Grotto of Tartary he has come ravening to bring terror and destruction among the pavilions of the great Khan. Only by the looped cross, by the Vach-Viraj incantation and by the Tikkoun elixir may he be driven back to the nighted caverns of hidden foulness where he dwelleth.
Translation of unknown provenance. Transcribed from a copy in the Kester Library.
The anachronistic reference to the great Khan (Jenghiz Khan), marks this passage as a later interpolation.
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Manly Wade Wellman
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From "The Terrible Parchment" (1937):
Chant out the spell and give me life again.
Many minds and many wishes give substance to the worship of Cthulhu.
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"H.P. Lovecraft and August Derleth"
(i.e., August Derleth)
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From The Lurker at the Threshold (1945):
Never is it to be thought that man is either oldest or last of the Masters of Earth; nay, nor that the great'r part of life and substance walks alone. The Old Ones were, the Old Ones are, and the Old Ones shall be. Not in the spaces known to us, but between them, They walk calm and primal, of no dimensions, and to us unseen. Yog-Sothoth knows the gate, for Yog-Sothoth is the gate. Yog-Sothoth is the key and guardian of the gate. Past, present, future -- what has been, what is, what will be, all are one in Yog-Sothoth. He knows where the Old Ones broke through of old, and where They shall break through in time to come until the Cycle is complete. He knows why no one can behold Them as They walk. Sometimes men can know Them near by Their smell, which is strange to the nostrils, and like unto a creature of great age; but of Their semblance no man can know, save seldom in features of those They have begotten on mankind, which are awful to behold, and thrice awful are Those who sired them; yet of those Offspring there are divers kinds, in likeness greatly differing from man's truest image and fairest eidolon to that shape without sight or substance which is Them. They walk unseen, They walk foul in lonely places where the Words have been spoken and the Rites howled through at Their Seasons, which are in the blood and differ from the seasons of men. The winds gibber with Their voices; the Earth mutters with Their consciousness. They bend the forest. They raise up the waves. They crush the city -- yet not forest or ocean or city beholds the hand that smites. Kadath in the cold waste knows them, and what man knows Kadath? The ice desert of the South and the sunken isles of Ocean hold stones whereon Their seal is engraven, but who has seen the deep frozen city of the sealed tower long garlanded with seaweed and barnacles? Great Cthulhu is Their cousin, yet can he spy Them only dimly. As a foulness shall They be known to the race of man. Their hands are at the throats of men forever, from beginning of known time to end of time known, yet none sees Them; and Their habitation is even one with your guarded threshold. Yog-Sothoth is the key to the gate whereby the spheres meet. Man rules now where once They ruled; soon They shall rule again where man rules now. After summer is winter, and after winter summer.They wait patient and potent, for here shall They reign again, and at Their coming again none shall dispute Them and all shall be subject to Them. Those who know of the gates shall be impelled to open the way for Them and shall serve Them as They desire, but those who open the way unwitting shall know but a brief while thereafter.
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'Twas done then as it had been promis'd aforetime, that He was tak'n by Those Whom He Defy'd, and thrust into ye Neth'rmost Deeps und'r ye Sea, and placed within ye barnacl'd Tower that is said to rise amidst ye great ruin that is ye Sunken City (R'lyeh), and seal'd within by ye Elder Sign, and, rag'g at Those who had imprison'd Him, He furth'r incurr'd Their anger, and they, descend'g upon him for ye second time, did impose upon Him ye semblance of Death, but left Him dream'g in that place under ye great waters, and return'd to that place from whence they had come, Namely, Glyu-Vho, which is among ye stars, and looketh upon Earth from ye time when ye leaves fall to that time when ye ploughman becomes habit'd once again to his fields. And there shall He lie dream'g forever, in His House at R'lyeh, toward which at once all His minions swam and strove against all manner of obstacles, and arrang'd themselves to wait for His awaken'g powerless to touch ye Elder Sign and fearful of its great pow'r know'g that ye Cycle returneth, and He shall be freed to embrace ye Earth again and make of it His Kingdom and defy ye Elder Gods anew. And to His brothers it happen'd likewise, that They were tak'n by Those Whom They Defy'd and hurl'd into banishment, Him Who Is Not to Be Nam'd be'g sent into Outermost space, beyond ye Stars and with ye others likewise, until ye Earth was free of Them, and Those Who Came in ye shape of Towers of Fire, return'd whence They had come, and were seen no more, and on all Earth then peace came was unbrok'n while Their minions gather'd and sought means and ways with which to free ye Old Ones, and waited while man came to pry into secret, forbidd'n places and open ye gate.
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Concern'g ye Old Ones, 'tis writ, they wait ev'r at ye Gate, & ye Gate is all places and all times, for They know noth'g of time or place but are in all time & in all place togeth'r without appear'g to be, & there are those amongst Them which can assume divers shapes & Features & any Giv'n Shape & any giv'n Face & ye Gates are for Them ev'rywhere, but ye 1st. was that which I caus'd to be op'd, Namely, in Irem, ye City of Pillars, ye city under ye desert, but wher'r men sett up ye Stones and sayeth thrice ye forbidden Words, they shall cause there a Gate to be establish'd & shall wait upon Them Who Come through ye gate, ev'n as Dholes, & ye Abom. Mi-Go, & ye Tcho-Tcho peop., & ye Deep Ones, & ye Gugs, & ye Gaunts of ye Night & ye Shoggoths, & ye Voormis, & ye Shantaks which guard Kadath in ye Cold Waste & ye Plateau Leng. All are alike ye Children of ye Elder Gods, but ye Great Race of Yith & ye Gt. Old Ones fail'g to agree, one with another, & boath with ye Elder Gods, separat'd, leav'g ye Great Old Ones in possession of ye Earth, while ye Great Race, return'g from Yith took up Their Abode forward in Time in Earth-Land not yet known to those who walk ye Earth today, & there wait till there shall come again ye winds & ye Voices which drove Them forth before & That which Walketh on ye Winds over ye Earth & in ye spaces that are among ye Stars For'r.
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Then shal They return & on this great Return'g shal ye Great Cthulhu be fre'd from R'lyeh beneath ye Sea & Him Who Is Not to Be Nam'd shal come from His City which is Carcosa near ye Lake of Hali, & Shub-Niggurath shal come forth & multiply in his Hideousness, & Nyarlathotep shal carry ye word, to all the Gr. Old Ones & their Minions, & Cthugha shal lay His Hand upon all that oppose Him & Destroy, & ye blind idiot, ye noxious Azathoth shal arise from ye middle of ye World where all is Chaos & Destruction where He hath bubbl'd & blasphem'd at Ye centre which is of All Things, which is to say infinity, & Yog-Sothoth, who is ye All-in-One & One-in-All, shal bring his globes, & Ithaqua shal walk again, & from ye black-litt'n caverns within ye Earth shal come Tsathoggua, & togeth'r shal take possession of Earth and all things that live upon it, & shal prepare to do battle with ye Elder Gods when ye Lord of ye Great Abyss is apprised of their return'g & shal come with His Brothers to disperse ye Evill.
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From The Lurker at the Threshold (1945):
... be they visible or invisible, to them it maketh no difference, for they feel them, & give voice.
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From The Lurker at the Threshold (1945):
Ubbo-Sathla is that unforgotten [sic: "unbegotten"?] source whence came those daring to oppose the Elder Gods who ruled from Betelgeuze; the Great Old Ones who fought against the Elder Gods; and these Old Ones were instructed by Azathoth, who is the blind, idiot god, and by Yog-Sothoth, who is the All-in-One and One-in-All, and upon whom are no strictures of time or space, and whose aspects on earth are 'Umr At-Tawil and the Ancient Ones. The Great Old Ones dream forever of that coming time when they shall once more rule Earth and all that Universe of which it is a part.... Great Cthulhu shall rise from R'lyeh; Hastur, who is Him Who Is Not to Be Named, shall come again from the dark star which is near Aldebaran in the Hyades; Nyarlathotep shall howl forever in darkness where he abideth; Shub-Niggurath, who is the Black Goat With a Thousand Young, shall spawn and spawn again, and shall have dominion over all the wood nymphs, satyrs, leprechauns, and the Little People; Lloigor, Zhar, and Ithaqua shall ride the spaces among the stars and shall ennoble those who are their followers, who are the Tcho-Tcho; Cthugha shall encompass his dominion from Fomalhaut; Tsathoggua shall come from N'kai.... They wait forever at the Gates, for the time draws near, the hour is soon at hand, while the Elder Gods sleep, dreaming, unknowing there are those who know the spells put upon the Great Old Ones by the Elder Gods, and shall learn how to break them, as already they can command the followers waiting beyond the doors from Outside.
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Armor against witches and daemons, against the Deep Ones, the Dholes, the Voormis, the Tcho-Tcho, the Abominable Mi-Go, the Shoggoths, the Ghasts, the Valusians and all such peoples and beings who serve the Great Old Ones and their Spawn lies within the five-pointed star carven of grey stone from ancient Mnar, which is less strong against the Great Old Ones themselves. The possessor of the stone shall find himself able to command all beings which creep, swim, crawl, walk, or fly even to the source from which there is no returning. In Yhe as in great R'lyeh, in Y'ha-nthlei as in Yoth, in Yuggoth as in Zothique, in N'kai as in K'n-yan, in Kadath in the Cold Waste as at the Lake of Hali, in Carcosa as in Ib, it shall have power; yet, even as stars wane and grow cold, even as stars die and the spaces between stars grow more wide, so wanes the power of all things -- of the five-pointed star-stone as of the spells put upon the Great Old Ones by the benign Elder Gods, and there cometh a time as once was a time, when it shall be shown that:
That is not dead which can eternal lie.
And with strange eons even death may die.
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From "The Fane of the Black Pharaoh" (1937):
[....] the Place of the Blind Apes where Nephren-Ka bindeth up the threads of truth [....]
Translation of unknown provenance.
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Henry Kuttner
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From "The Salem Horror" (1937):
Men knew him as the Dweller in Darkness, that brother of the Old Ones called Nyogtha, the Thing that should not be. He can be summoned to Earth's surface through certain secret caverns and fissures, and sorcerers have seen him in Syria and below the black tower of Leng; from the Thang Grotto of Tartary he has come ravening to bring terror and destruction among the pavilions of the great Khan. Only by the looped cross, by the Vach-Viraj incantation and by the Tikkoun elixir may he be driven back to the nighted caverns of hidden foulness where he dwelleth.
Translation of unknown provenance. Transcribed from a copy in the Kester Library.
The anachronistic reference to the great Khan (Jenghiz Khan), marks this passage as a later interpolation.
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Manly Wade Wellman
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From "The Terrible Parchment" (1937):
Chant out the spell and give me life again.
Many minds and many wishes give substance to the worship of Cthulhu.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"H.P. Lovecraft and August Derleth"
(i.e., August Derleth)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From The Lurker at the Threshold (1945):
Never is it to be thought that man is either oldest or last of the Masters of Earth; nay, nor that the great'r part of life and substance walks alone. The Old Ones were, the Old Ones are, and the Old Ones shall be. Not in the spaces known to us, but between them, They walk calm and primal, of no dimensions, and to us unseen. Yog-Sothoth knows the gate, for Yog-Sothoth is the gate. Yog-Sothoth is the key and guardian of the gate. Past, present, future -- what has been, what is, what will be, all are one in Yog-Sothoth. He knows where the Old Ones broke through of old, and where They shall break through in time to come until the Cycle is complete. He knows why no one can behold Them as They walk. Sometimes men can know Them near by Their smell, which is strange to the nostrils, and like unto a creature of great age; but of Their semblance no man can know, save seldom in features of those They have begotten on mankind, which are awful to behold, and thrice awful are Those who sired them; yet of those Offspring there are divers kinds, in likeness greatly differing from man's truest image and fairest eidolon to that shape without sight or substance which is Them. They walk unseen, They walk foul in lonely places where the Words have been spoken and the Rites howled through at Their Seasons, which are in the blood and differ from the seasons of men. The winds gibber with Their voices; the Earth mutters with Their consciousness. They bend the forest. They raise up the waves. They crush the city -- yet not forest or ocean or city beholds the hand that smites. Kadath in the cold waste knows them, and what man knows Kadath? The ice desert of the South and the sunken isles of Ocean hold stones whereon Their seal is engraven, but who has seen the deep frozen city of the sealed tower long garlanded with seaweed and barnacles? Great Cthulhu is Their cousin, yet can he spy Them only dimly. As a foulness shall They be known to the race of man. Their hands are at the throats of men forever, from beginning of known time to end of time known, yet none sees Them; and Their habitation is even one with your guarded threshold. Yog-Sothoth is the key to the gate whereby the spheres meet. Man rules now where once They ruled; soon They shall rule again where man rules now. After summer is winter, and after winter summer.They wait patient and potent, for here shall They reign again, and at Their coming again none shall dispute Them and all shall be subject to Them. Those who know of the gates shall be impelled to open the way for Them and shall serve Them as They desire, but those who open the way unwitting shall know but a brief while thereafter.
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'Twas done then as it had been promis'd aforetime, that He was tak'n by Those Whom He Defy'd, and thrust into ye Neth'rmost Deeps und'r ye Sea, and placed within ye barnacl'd Tower that is said to rise amidst ye great ruin that is ye Sunken City (R'lyeh), and seal'd within by ye Elder Sign, and, rag'g at Those who had imprison'd Him, He furth'r incurr'd Their anger, and they, descend'g upon him for ye second time, did impose upon Him ye semblance of Death, but left Him dream'g in that place under ye great waters, and return'd to that place from whence they had come, Namely, Glyu-Vho, which is among ye stars, and looketh upon Earth from ye time when ye leaves fall to that time when ye ploughman becomes habit'd once again to his fields. And there shall He lie dream'g forever, in His House at R'lyeh, toward which at once all His minions swam and strove against all manner of obstacles, and arrang'd themselves to wait for His awaken'g powerless to touch ye Elder Sign and fearful of its great pow'r know'g that ye Cycle returneth, and He shall be freed to embrace ye Earth again and make of it His Kingdom and defy ye Elder Gods anew. And to His brothers it happen'd likewise, that They were tak'n by Those Whom They Defy'd and hurl'd into banishment, Him Who Is Not to Be Nam'd be'g sent into Outermost space, beyond ye Stars and with ye others likewise, until ye Earth was free of Them, and Those Who Came in ye shape of Towers of Fire, return'd whence They had come, and were seen no more, and on all Earth then peace came was unbrok'n while Their minions gather'd and sought means and ways with which to free ye Old Ones, and waited while man came to pry into secret, forbidd'n places and open ye gate.
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Concern'g ye Old Ones, 'tis writ, they wait ev'r at ye Gate, & ye Gate is all places and all times, for They know noth'g of time or place but are in all time & in all place togeth'r without appear'g to be, & there are those amongst Them which can assume divers shapes & Features & any Giv'n Shape & any giv'n Face & ye Gates are for Them ev'rywhere, but ye 1st. was that which I caus'd to be op'd, Namely, in Irem, ye City of Pillars, ye city under ye desert, but wher'r men sett up ye Stones and sayeth thrice ye forbidden Words, they shall cause there a Gate to be establish'd & shall wait upon Them Who Come through ye gate, ev'n as Dholes, & ye Abom. Mi-Go, & ye Tcho-Tcho peop., & ye Deep Ones, & ye Gugs, & ye Gaunts of ye Night & ye Shoggoths, & ye Voormis, & ye Shantaks which guard Kadath in ye Cold Waste & ye Plateau Leng. All are alike ye Children of ye Elder Gods, but ye Great Race of Yith & ye Gt. Old Ones fail'g to agree, one with another, & boath with ye Elder Gods, separat'd, leav'g ye Great Old Ones in possession of ye Earth, while ye Great Race, return'g from Yith took up Their Abode forward in Time in Earth-Land not yet known to those who walk ye Earth today, & there wait till there shall come again ye winds & ye Voices which drove Them forth before & That which Walketh on ye Winds over ye Earth & in ye spaces that are among ye Stars For'r.
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Then shal They return & on this great Return'g shal ye Great Cthulhu be fre'd from R'lyeh beneath ye Sea & Him Who Is Not to Be Nam'd shal come from His City which is Carcosa near ye Lake of Hali, & Shub-Niggurath shal come forth & multiply in his Hideousness, & Nyarlathotep shal carry ye word, to all the Gr. Old Ones & their Minions, & Cthugha shal lay His Hand upon all that oppose Him & Destroy, & ye blind idiot, ye noxious Azathoth shal arise from ye middle of ye World where all is Chaos & Destruction where He hath bubbl'd & blasphem'd at Ye centre which is of All Things, which is to say infinity, & Yog-Sothoth, who is ye All-in-One & One-in-All, shal bring his globes, & Ithaqua shal walk again, & from ye black-litt'n caverns within ye Earth shal come Tsathoggua, & togeth'r shal take possession of Earth and all things that live upon it, & shal prepare to do battle with ye Elder Gods when ye Lord of ye Great Abyss is apprised of their return'g & shal come with His Brothers to disperse ye Evill.
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From The Lurker at the Threshold (1945):
... be they visible or invisible, to them it maketh no difference, for they feel them, & give voice.
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From The Lurker at the Threshold (1945):
Ubbo-Sathla is that unforgotten [sic: "unbegotten"?] source whence came those daring to oppose the Elder Gods who ruled from Betelgeuze; the Great Old Ones who fought against the Elder Gods; and these Old Ones were instructed by Azathoth, who is the blind, idiot god, and by Yog-Sothoth, who is the All-in-One and One-in-All, and upon whom are no strictures of time or space, and whose aspects on earth are 'Umr At-Tawil and the Ancient Ones. The Great Old Ones dream forever of that coming time when they shall once more rule Earth and all that Universe of which it is a part.... Great Cthulhu shall rise from R'lyeh; Hastur, who is Him Who Is Not to Be Named, shall come again from the dark star which is near Aldebaran in the Hyades; Nyarlathotep shall howl forever in darkness where he abideth; Shub-Niggurath, who is the Black Goat With a Thousand Young, shall spawn and spawn again, and shall have dominion over all the wood nymphs, satyrs, leprechauns, and the Little People; Lloigor, Zhar, and Ithaqua shall ride the spaces among the stars and shall ennoble those who are their followers, who are the Tcho-Tcho; Cthugha shall encompass his dominion from Fomalhaut; Tsathoggua shall come from N'kai.... They wait forever at the Gates, for the time draws near, the hour is soon at hand, while the Elder Gods sleep, dreaming, unknowing there are those who know the spells put upon the Great Old Ones by the Elder Gods, and shall learn how to break them, as already they can command the followers waiting beyond the doors from Outside.
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Armor against witches and daemons, against the Deep Ones, the Dholes, the Voormis, the Tcho-Tcho, the Abominable Mi-Go, the Shoggoths, the Ghasts, the Valusians and all such peoples and beings who serve the Great Old Ones and their Spawn lies within the five-pointed star carven of grey stone from ancient Mnar, which is less strong against the Great Old Ones themselves. The possessor of the stone shall find himself able to command all beings which creep, swim, crawl, walk, or fly even to the source from which there is no returning. In Yhe as in great R'lyeh, in Y'ha-nthlei as in Yoth, in Yuggoth as in Zothique, in N'kai as in K'n-yan, in Kadath in the Cold Waste as at the Lake of Hali, in Carcosa as in Ib, it shall have power; yet, even as stars wane and grow cold, even as stars die and the spaces between stars grow more wide, so wanes the power of all things -- of the five-pointed star-stone as of the spells put upon the Great Old Ones by the benign Elder Gods, and there cometh a time as once was a time, when it shall be shown that:
That is not dead which can eternal lie.
And with strange eons even death may die.
The Spawn
Better Than You
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- Aug 10, 2002
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August Derleth
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From The Trail of Cthulhu (1943-62):
For within the five-pointed star carven of grey stone from ancient Mnar lies armor against witches and daemons, against the Deep Ones, the Dholes, the Voormis, the Tcho-Tcho, the Abominable Mi-Go, the Shoggoths, the Valusians and all such peoples and beings who serve the Great Old Ones and their Spawn, but it is less potent against the Great Old Ones themselves. He who hath the five-pointed stone shall find himself able to command all beings who creep, swim, crawl, walk, or fly even to the source from which there is no returning.
In the land of Yhe as in great R'lyeh, in Y'ha-nthlei as in Yoth, in Yuggoth as in Zothique, in N'kai as in K'n-yan, in Kadath-in-the-Cold-Waste, as in the Lake of Hali, in Carcosa as in Ib, it shall have power; but even as the stars wane and grow cold, as the suns die, and the spaces between the stars grow more great, so wanes the power of all things -- of the five-pointed star-stone as of the spells put upon the Great Old Ones by the benign Elder Gods, and there shall come a time as once there was a time, and it shall be shown that:
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange eons even death may die.
Translated from page 177 of the Latin translation of Olaus Wormius, copy residing at Miskatonic University Library.
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From The Trail of Cthulhu (1943-62):
Whosoever speaketh of Cthulhu shall remember that he but seemeth dead; he sleeps, and yet he does not sleep; he has died, and yet he is not dead; asleep and dead though he is, he shall rise again. Again, it should be shown that:
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange eons even death may die.
Great Cthulhu shall rise from R'lyeh, Hastur the Unspeakable shall return from the dark star which is in the Hyades near Aldebaran, the red eye of the bull, Nyarlathotep shall howl forever in the darkness where he abideth, Shub-Niggurath shall spawn its thousand young, and they shall spawn in turn and take dominion over all wood nymphs, satyrs, leprechauns, and the Little People, Lloigor, Zhar, and Ithaqua shall ride the spaces among the stars....
He who hath the five-pointed stone shall find himself able to command all beings which creep, swim, crawl, walk, or fly even to the source from which there is no returning....
Fragments from a translation of unknown provenance.
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Richard Tierney
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From "The Howler in the Dark" (1957):
There are Ways in which the Mind of a man is like unto an Eye, in that it can be used as a Lens to focus the Powers that exist in the Spaces between the Worlds. Indeed, the Mind of any Man can be used, when severed from the confining ties of the Flesh and put into a state of Trance, as a Weapon of great Power. To the sorcerer who brings such a Mind under his Control, nothing is impossible, for he will be able to see into the farthest Lands of the World by means of that Mind's Eye, and shall be able to inflict upon his Enemies a Vengeance of such Type as will leave no slightest Mark, but shall cause them to expire with Fear and great Terrors.
From the autograph manuscript of Dr. John Dee's translation.
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Robert Silverberg
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From "Demons of Cthulhu" (1959):
A Warning To Those Who Peruse This Book.
Title of opening section.
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[....] Lightest of all are the slumbers of Narrathoth, who may be awakened by the veriest novice in the art. Narrathoth lies drowsing beyond the Great Gate, hideous in form, servant to the sleeping Old Ones who wait for their day once more to dawn. But Narrathoth may be summoned from his blasphemous dreams and forced to serve. One who achieves control over him has access to the wealth of the world; but great care must be exercised, for fear of Narrathoth's wrath, for even he shares the might of the Old Ones, and pity be upon him who summons him and loses control.
Narrathoth is called by simple incantations. The blood of a male cat is needed, and the undergarment of a woman and [....]
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Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn. Iä! Shub-Niggurath! Narrathoth! Narrathoth! Narrathoth!
End of the invocation from the summoning ritual of Narrathoth, found on page 638.
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I have called you by your True Name, Old One, and I command you to do my bidding.
Binding formula from the ritual to summon Narrathoth.
Version of unknown provenance, according to the title page: "Translated from the Latin version of Olaus Wormius as printed in Spain in the seventeenth century."
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Ramsey Campbell
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From "The Church in High Street" (1964);
The tomb-herd confer no benefits upon their worshippers. Their powers are few, for they can but disparage space in small regions and make tangible that which cometh forth from the dead in other dimensions. They have power wherever the chants of Yog-Sothoth have been cried out at their seasons, and can draw to them those who will open their gates in the charnel-houses. They have no substance in this dimension, but enter earthly tenants to feed through them while they await the time when the stars become fixed and the gate of infinite sides opens to free That Which Claws at the Barrier.
Copy in the British Museum; presumably, the Latin translation of Olaus Wormius.
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From "The Horror from the Bridge" (1964):
As in the days of the seas' covering all the earth, when Cthulhu walked in power across the world and others flew in the gulfs of space, so in certain places of the earth shall be found a great race which came from Outside and lived in cities and worshipped in dark fanes in the depths. Their cities remain under the land, but rarely do They come up from Their subterranean places. They have been sealed in certain locations by the seal of the Elder Gods, but They may be released by words not known to many. What made its home in water shall be released by water, and when Glyu'uho is rightly placed, the words shall cause a flood to rise and remove at last the seal of those from Glyu'uho.
Copy in the British Museum; presumably, the Latin translation of Olaus Wormius.
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From "The Plain of Sound" (1964):
Verily do we know little of the other universes beyond the gate which YOG-SOTHOTH guards. Of those which come through the gate and make their habitation in this world none can tell; although Ibn Schacabao tells of the beings which crawl from the Gulf of S'glhuo that they may be known by Their sound. In that Gulf the very worlds are of sound, and matter is known but as an odor; and the notes of our pipes in this world may create beauty or bring forth abominations in S'glhuo. For the barrier between haply grows thin, and when sourceless sounds occur we may justly look to the denizens of S'glhuo. They can do little harm to those of Earth, and fear only that shape which a certain sound may form in Their universe.
Translation of unknown provenance.
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From "The Mine on Yuggoth" (1964):
The lizard-crustaceans arrive on Earth through their towers.
As Azathoth rules now as he did in his bivalvular shape, his name subdues all, from the incubi which haunt Tond to the servants of Y'golonac. Few can resist the power of the name Azathoth, and even the haunters of the blackest night of Yuggoth cannot battle the power of N-------, his other name.
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[....] at those times of the year the lizard-crustaceans are glad of the lightlessness of Yuggoth.
Copy in the British Museum; presumably, the Latin translation of Olaus Wormius. The "other name" of Azathoth is not given in the Necronomicon.
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Gerald W. Page
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From "Preface to the Necronomicon" (1966):
I, Abdul Al-Hazred, say this to you:
The Elder Gods have put the damned
To sleep. And they that tamper with the seals
And wake the sleepers, too, are damned.
And I say further, herein lies those spells
To break the seals that hold in thrall
Cthulhu and his ebon horde. For I
Have spent my life to learn them all.
So, fool, the darkness is pent up in space:
The gates to Hell are closed. You
Meddle at your own expense: When you call
They will wake and answer you.
This is my gift to mankind -- here are the keys.
Find your own locks; be glad.
I, Abdul Al-Hazred say this to you:
I, who tampered, and am mad.
Translation of unknown provenance.
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From The Trail of Cthulhu (1943-62):
For within the five-pointed star carven of grey stone from ancient Mnar lies armor against witches and daemons, against the Deep Ones, the Dholes, the Voormis, the Tcho-Tcho, the Abominable Mi-Go, the Shoggoths, the Valusians and all such peoples and beings who serve the Great Old Ones and their Spawn, but it is less potent against the Great Old Ones themselves. He who hath the five-pointed stone shall find himself able to command all beings who creep, swim, crawl, walk, or fly even to the source from which there is no returning.
In the land of Yhe as in great R'lyeh, in Y'ha-nthlei as in Yoth, in Yuggoth as in Zothique, in N'kai as in K'n-yan, in Kadath-in-the-Cold-Waste, as in the Lake of Hali, in Carcosa as in Ib, it shall have power; but even as the stars wane and grow cold, as the suns die, and the spaces between the stars grow more great, so wanes the power of all things -- of the five-pointed star-stone as of the spells put upon the Great Old Ones by the benign Elder Gods, and there shall come a time as once there was a time, and it shall be shown that:
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange eons even death may die.
Translated from page 177 of the Latin translation of Olaus Wormius, copy residing at Miskatonic University Library.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From The Trail of Cthulhu (1943-62):
Whosoever speaketh of Cthulhu shall remember that he but seemeth dead; he sleeps, and yet he does not sleep; he has died, and yet he is not dead; asleep and dead though he is, he shall rise again. Again, it should be shown that:
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange eons even death may die.
Great Cthulhu shall rise from R'lyeh, Hastur the Unspeakable shall return from the dark star which is in the Hyades near Aldebaran, the red eye of the bull, Nyarlathotep shall howl forever in the darkness where he abideth, Shub-Niggurath shall spawn its thousand young, and they shall spawn in turn and take dominion over all wood nymphs, satyrs, leprechauns, and the Little People, Lloigor, Zhar, and Ithaqua shall ride the spaces among the stars....
He who hath the five-pointed stone shall find himself able to command all beings which creep, swim, crawl, walk, or fly even to the source from which there is no returning....
Fragments from a translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Richard Tierney
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Howler in the Dark" (1957):
There are Ways in which the Mind of a man is like unto an Eye, in that it can be used as a Lens to focus the Powers that exist in the Spaces between the Worlds. Indeed, the Mind of any Man can be used, when severed from the confining ties of the Flesh and put into a state of Trance, as a Weapon of great Power. To the sorcerer who brings such a Mind under his Control, nothing is impossible, for he will be able to see into the farthest Lands of the World by means of that Mind's Eye, and shall be able to inflict upon his Enemies a Vengeance of such Type as will leave no slightest Mark, but shall cause them to expire with Fear and great Terrors.
From the autograph manuscript of Dr. John Dee's translation.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Robert Silverberg
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "Demons of Cthulhu" (1959):
A Warning To Those Who Peruse This Book.
Title of opening section.
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[....] Lightest of all are the slumbers of Narrathoth, who may be awakened by the veriest novice in the art. Narrathoth lies drowsing beyond the Great Gate, hideous in form, servant to the sleeping Old Ones who wait for their day once more to dawn. But Narrathoth may be summoned from his blasphemous dreams and forced to serve. One who achieves control over him has access to the wealth of the world; but great care must be exercised, for fear of Narrathoth's wrath, for even he shares the might of the Old Ones, and pity be upon him who summons him and loses control.
Narrathoth is called by simple incantations. The blood of a male cat is needed, and the undergarment of a woman and [....]
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Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn. Iä! Shub-Niggurath! Narrathoth! Narrathoth! Narrathoth!
End of the invocation from the summoning ritual of Narrathoth, found on page 638.
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I have called you by your True Name, Old One, and I command you to do my bidding.
Binding formula from the ritual to summon Narrathoth.
Version of unknown provenance, according to the title page: "Translated from the Latin version of Olaus Wormius as printed in Spain in the seventeenth century."
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Ramsey Campbell
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Church in High Street" (1964);
The tomb-herd confer no benefits upon their worshippers. Their powers are few, for they can but disparage space in small regions and make tangible that which cometh forth from the dead in other dimensions. They have power wherever the chants of Yog-Sothoth have been cried out at their seasons, and can draw to them those who will open their gates in the charnel-houses. They have no substance in this dimension, but enter earthly tenants to feed through them while they await the time when the stars become fixed and the gate of infinite sides opens to free That Which Claws at the Barrier.
Copy in the British Museum; presumably, the Latin translation of Olaus Wormius.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Horror from the Bridge" (1964):
As in the days of the seas' covering all the earth, when Cthulhu walked in power across the world and others flew in the gulfs of space, so in certain places of the earth shall be found a great race which came from Outside and lived in cities and worshipped in dark fanes in the depths. Their cities remain under the land, but rarely do They come up from Their subterranean places. They have been sealed in certain locations by the seal of the Elder Gods, but They may be released by words not known to many. What made its home in water shall be released by water, and when Glyu'uho is rightly placed, the words shall cause a flood to rise and remove at last the seal of those from Glyu'uho.
Copy in the British Museum; presumably, the Latin translation of Olaus Wormius.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Plain of Sound" (1964):
Verily do we know little of the other universes beyond the gate which YOG-SOTHOTH guards. Of those which come through the gate and make their habitation in this world none can tell; although Ibn Schacabao tells of the beings which crawl from the Gulf of S'glhuo that they may be known by Their sound. In that Gulf the very worlds are of sound, and matter is known but as an odor; and the notes of our pipes in this world may create beauty or bring forth abominations in S'glhuo. For the barrier between haply grows thin, and when sourceless sounds occur we may justly look to the denizens of S'glhuo. They can do little harm to those of Earth, and fear only that shape which a certain sound may form in Their universe.
Translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Mine on Yuggoth" (1964):
The lizard-crustaceans arrive on Earth through their towers.
As Azathoth rules now as he did in his bivalvular shape, his name subdues all, from the incubi which haunt Tond to the servants of Y'golonac. Few can resist the power of the name Azathoth, and even the haunters of the blackest night of Yuggoth cannot battle the power of N-------, his other name.
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[....] at those times of the year the lizard-crustaceans are glad of the lightlessness of Yuggoth.
Copy in the British Museum; presumably, the Latin translation of Olaus Wormius. The "other name" of Azathoth is not given in the Necronomicon.
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Gerald W. Page
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From "Preface to the Necronomicon" (1966):
I, Abdul Al-Hazred, say this to you:
The Elder Gods have put the damned
To sleep. And they that tamper with the seals
And wake the sleepers, too, are damned.
And I say further, herein lies those spells
To break the seals that hold in thrall
Cthulhu and his ebon horde. For I
Have spent my life to learn them all.
So, fool, the darkness is pent up in space:
The gates to Hell are closed. You
Meddle at your own expense: When you call
They will wake and answer you.
This is my gift to mankind -- here are the keys.
Find your own locks; be glad.
I, Abdul Al-Hazred say this to you:
I, who tampered, and am mad.
Translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Spawn
Better Than You
- Joined
- Aug 10, 2002
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- 19,505
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- 1
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Colin Wilson
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From The Philosopher's Stone (1969):
The book of the black name, containing the history of that which came before men. The great old ones were both one and many. They were not separate souls like men, yet they were separate wills. Some say they came from the stars; some say that they were the soul of the earth when it was formed from a cloud. For all life comes from the beyond, where there is no consciousness. Life needed a mirror, therefore it invaded the world of matter. There it became its own enemy, because they [bodies? -- note in original] possess form. The great old ones wanted to avoid form; therefore they rejected the heavy material of the body. But then they lost the power to act. Therefore they needed servants.
Quoted by a thirteenth-century monk called Martin the Gardener, in a commentary on the Necronomicon itself.
The phrase "The book of the black name" is apparently a very poor attempt at a translation of the title Necronomicon, confusing the Greek nekros, dead, with the Latin niger, black.
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"Antonius Quine"
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From the Quine translation of the Necronomicon ("1972"):
YOG-SOTHOTH knows the gate. YOG-SOTHOTH is the gate. YOG-SOTHOTH is the keeper and guardian of the gate. YOG-SOTHOTH knows where the Old Ones broke through of old and where they shall come again. Past, present, future ... all are one in YOG-SOTHOTH.
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That is not dead which has the capacity to eternally lie,
And when the strange (things/aeons) arrive death itself may cease to be.
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Think not the Great Old Ones are all of darkness. The fire of Azathoth is all brightness and heat as it devours. The globes of Yog-Sothoth shimmer with the stellar blaze.
Note: the purported translation by Antonius Quine apparently does not exist. The quotations above were derived from various newsposts on UseNet; if anyone has information as to their true source, please contact me: [email protected].
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Brian Lumley
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From The Burrowers Beneath (1974):
Ye Power in ye Five-Pointed Star
Armor against Witches & Daemons, Against ye Deep Ones, ye Dools, ye Voormais, ye Tacho-Tacho, ye Mi-Go, ye Shoggaoths, ye Ghasts, ye Valusians, & all such Peoples & Beings that serve ye Great Olde Ones & ye Spawn of Them, lies within ye Five-Pointed Star carven of gray Stone from ancient Mnar; which is less strong against ye Great Olde Ones Themselves. Ye Possessor of ye Stone shall find himself able to command all Beings which creep, swim, crawl, walk, or fly even to ye Source from which there is no returning. In Yhe as in Great R'lyeh, in Y'ha-nthlei as in Yoth, in Yuggoth as in Zothique, in N'kai as in Naa-Hk & K'n-yan, in Carcosa as in G'harne, in ye twin Cities of Ib and Lh-yib, in Kadath in ye Cold Waste as at ye Lake of Hali, it shall have Power; yet even as Stars wane & grow cold, even as Suns die & ye Spaces between Stars grow more wide, so wanes ye Power of all things -- of ye Five-Pointed Star-Stone as of ye Spells put upon ye Great Olde Ones by ye benign Elder Gods, & that Time shall come as once was a Time, when it shall be known:
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange Aeons even Death may die.
From Joachim Feery's Notes on the Necronomicon.
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(The Vach-Viraj Incantation)
Ya na kadishtu nilgh'ri stell'bsna Nyogtha,
K'yarnak phlegethor l'ebumna syha'h n'ghft,
Ya hai kadishtu ep r'luh-eeh Nyogtha eeh,
S'uhn-ngh athg li'hee orr'e syha'h.
From Joachim Feery's Notes on the Necronomicon.
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[....] Sunken G'lohee, in the Isles of Mist [....]
Translation of unknown provenance.
(Reference is to G'll-ho.)
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Many & multiform are ye dim horrors of Earth, infesting her ways from ye very prime. They sleep beneath ye unturned stone; they rise with ye tree from its root; they move beneath ye sea, & in subterranean places they dwell in ye inmost adyta. Some there are long known to man, & others as yet unknown, abiding ye terrible latter days of their revealing. Those which are ye most dreadful & ye loathliest of all are haply still to be declared.
From Joachim Feery's Notes on the Necronomicon.
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From The Transition of Titus Crow (1975):
'Tis a veritable & attestable Fact, that between certain related Persons there exists a Bond more powerful than the strongest Ties of Flesh and Family, whereby one such Person may be aware of all the Trials & Pleasures of the other, yea, even to experiencing the Pains or Passions of one far distant; & further, there are those whose skills in such Matters are aided by forbidden Knowledge of Intercourse through dark Magic with Spirits & Beings of outside Spheres. Of the latter: I have sought them out, both Men & Women, & upon Examination have in all Cases discovered them to be Users of Divination, Observors of Times, Enchanters, Witches, Charmers, or Necromancers. All claimed to work their Wonders through Intercourse with dead & departed Spirits, but I fear that often such Spirits were evil Angels, the Messengers of the Dark One & yet more ancient Evils. Indeed, among them were some whose Powers were prodigious, who might at will inhabit the Body of another even at a great Distance & against the Will & often unbeknown to the Sufferer of such Outrage.
Moreover, I have dreamed it that of the aforementioned most ancient of Evils, there is One which slumbers in Deeps unsounded so nearly Immortal that Life & Death are one to Him. Being ultimately corrupt, He fears Death's Corruption not, but when true Death draws nigh will prepare Himself until, fleeing His ancient Flesh, His Spirit will plumb Times-to-come & there cleave unto Flesh of His Flesh, & all the Sins of this Great Father shall be visited upon His Child's Child. I have dreamed it, & my Dreams have been His Dreams who is the greatest Dreamer of all....
Translation of unknown provenance; from the rarest Al Azif of all.
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From "Aunt Hester" (1977):
'Tis a veritable & attestable Fact, that between certain related Persons there exists a Bond more powerful than the strongest Ties of Flesh and Family, whereby one such Person may be aware of all the Trials & Pleasures of the other, yea, even to experiencing the Pains or Passions of one far distant; & further, there are those whose skills in such Matters are aided by forbidden Knowledge of Intercourse through dark Magic with Spirits & Beings of outside Spheres. Of the latter: I have sought them out, both Men & Women, & upon Examination have in all Cases discovered them to be Users of Divination, Observors of Times, Enchanters, Witches, Charmers, or Necromancers. All claimed to work their Wonders through Intercourse with dead & departed Spirits, but I fear that often such Spirits were evil Angels, the Messengers of the Dark One & yet more ancient Evils. Indeed, among them were some whose Powers were prodigious, who might at will inhabit the Body of another even at a great Distance & against the Will & often unbeknown to the Sufferer of such Outrage. Yea, & I discovered how one might, be he an Adept & his familiar Spirits powerful enough, control the Wanderings or Migration of his Essence into all manner of Beings & Persons -- even from beyond the Grave of Sod or the Door of the Stone Sepulcher.
From Joachim Feery's Notes on the Necronomicon.
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Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea
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From the Illuminatus! trilogy (1975):
Onlie those who have eaten a certain alkaloid herb, whose name it were wise not to disclose to the unilluminated, maye in the fleshe see a Shoggothe.
English translation of John Dee, copy residing in Miskatonic University Library.
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From the Illuminatus! trilogy (1975):
They ruled once where man rules now, summer. Where man rules now, after summer is winter. They shall rule again, and after winter.
Olaus Wormius' Latin translation, 1472 Lyons edition with its numerous misprints and errors. Translation into English of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From the Illuminatus! trilogy (1975):
Past, present, future: all are one in Yog-Sothoth.
Translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From the Illuminatus! trilogy (1975):
Their hand is at your throat but you see them not. They walk serene and unsuspected, not in the spaces we know, but between them.
Translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From the Illuminatus! trilogy (1975):
Kadath in the cold waste hath known him [i.e., Yog-Sothoth].
Translation of unknown provenance. "Known" in the Biblical sense....
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Brian McNaughton
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From Satan's Mistress (1978):
Call not upon Yog-Sothoth until ye be certaine that ye Bones be compleat and culled of forraine contamination. For it hath been known in antient Tymes that ye Bones of a Man mingled with ye Bones of a Beare or Lyon, or even with ye Offaile of a lowly Coney or Porpentine, hath produced for a hapless Necromancer not a Ressurection of that which was, but a Creation of Abomination that should not be.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
He who would be a Master of the Runes and possessor of Life eternaille must consecrate to Crom Cruach on Lammas Night ye Flesh of an infant newborn and eat thereof. Nor is the consecration to be made by those faint of heart or doubting in their souls, for Crom Cruach knows all, Crom Cruach sees all, Crom Cruach is all. Iä! Crom Cruach!
From the English translation of Dr. John Dee, London edition of 1589.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From Satan's Seductress (1980):
Whenas Aldebaran riseth to the Sixth House, and agreeth in all ways with ye Conjunctions of Phutatorius as shall hereinafter be inscribed, then that is no Door which openeth on its Rising, but a Gate to ye Outside, through which All may pass but None may return save a Master of ye Runes, or ye Host of Ekron.
From the English translation of Dr. John Dee, London edition of 1589.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From The Philosopher's Stone (1969):
The book of the black name, containing the history of that which came before men. The great old ones were both one and many. They were not separate souls like men, yet they were separate wills. Some say they came from the stars; some say that they were the soul of the earth when it was formed from a cloud. For all life comes from the beyond, where there is no consciousness. Life needed a mirror, therefore it invaded the world of matter. There it became its own enemy, because they [bodies? -- note in original] possess form. The great old ones wanted to avoid form; therefore they rejected the heavy material of the body. But then they lost the power to act. Therefore they needed servants.
Quoted by a thirteenth-century monk called Martin the Gardener, in a commentary on the Necronomicon itself.
The phrase "The book of the black name" is apparently a very poor attempt at a translation of the title Necronomicon, confusing the Greek nekros, dead, with the Latin niger, black.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Antonius Quine"
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From the Quine translation of the Necronomicon ("1972"):
YOG-SOTHOTH knows the gate. YOG-SOTHOTH is the gate. YOG-SOTHOTH is the keeper and guardian of the gate. YOG-SOTHOTH knows where the Old Ones broke through of old and where they shall come again. Past, present, future ... all are one in YOG-SOTHOTH.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
That is not dead which has the capacity to eternally lie,
And when the strange (things/aeons) arrive death itself may cease to be.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Think not the Great Old Ones are all of darkness. The fire of Azathoth is all brightness and heat as it devours. The globes of Yog-Sothoth shimmer with the stellar blaze.
Note: the purported translation by Antonius Quine apparently does not exist. The quotations above were derived from various newsposts on UseNet; if anyone has information as to their true source, please contact me: [email protected].
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Brian Lumley
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From The Burrowers Beneath (1974):
Ye Power in ye Five-Pointed Star
Armor against Witches & Daemons, Against ye Deep Ones, ye Dools, ye Voormais, ye Tacho-Tacho, ye Mi-Go, ye Shoggaoths, ye Ghasts, ye Valusians, & all such Peoples & Beings that serve ye Great Olde Ones & ye Spawn of Them, lies within ye Five-Pointed Star carven of gray Stone from ancient Mnar; which is less strong against ye Great Olde Ones Themselves. Ye Possessor of ye Stone shall find himself able to command all Beings which creep, swim, crawl, walk, or fly even to ye Source from which there is no returning. In Yhe as in Great R'lyeh, in Y'ha-nthlei as in Yoth, in Yuggoth as in Zothique, in N'kai as in Naa-Hk & K'n-yan, in Carcosa as in G'harne, in ye twin Cities of Ib and Lh-yib, in Kadath in ye Cold Waste as at ye Lake of Hali, it shall have Power; yet even as Stars wane & grow cold, even as Suns die & ye Spaces between Stars grow more wide, so wanes ye Power of all things -- of ye Five-Pointed Star-Stone as of ye Spells put upon ye Great Olde Ones by ye benign Elder Gods, & that Time shall come as once was a Time, when it shall be known:
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange Aeons even Death may die.
From Joachim Feery's Notes on the Necronomicon.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
(The Vach-Viraj Incantation)
Ya na kadishtu nilgh'ri stell'bsna Nyogtha,
K'yarnak phlegethor l'ebumna syha'h n'ghft,
Ya hai kadishtu ep r'luh-eeh Nyogtha eeh,
S'uhn-ngh athg li'hee orr'e syha'h.
From Joachim Feery's Notes on the Necronomicon.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[....] Sunken G'lohee, in the Isles of Mist [....]
Translation of unknown provenance.
(Reference is to G'll-ho.)
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Many & multiform are ye dim horrors of Earth, infesting her ways from ye very prime. They sleep beneath ye unturned stone; they rise with ye tree from its root; they move beneath ye sea, & in subterranean places they dwell in ye inmost adyta. Some there are long known to man, & others as yet unknown, abiding ye terrible latter days of their revealing. Those which are ye most dreadful & ye loathliest of all are haply still to be declared.
From Joachim Feery's Notes on the Necronomicon.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From The Transition of Titus Crow (1975):
'Tis a veritable & attestable Fact, that between certain related Persons there exists a Bond more powerful than the strongest Ties of Flesh and Family, whereby one such Person may be aware of all the Trials & Pleasures of the other, yea, even to experiencing the Pains or Passions of one far distant; & further, there are those whose skills in such Matters are aided by forbidden Knowledge of Intercourse through dark Magic with Spirits & Beings of outside Spheres. Of the latter: I have sought them out, both Men & Women, & upon Examination have in all Cases discovered them to be Users of Divination, Observors of Times, Enchanters, Witches, Charmers, or Necromancers. All claimed to work their Wonders through Intercourse with dead & departed Spirits, but I fear that often such Spirits were evil Angels, the Messengers of the Dark One & yet more ancient Evils. Indeed, among them were some whose Powers were prodigious, who might at will inhabit the Body of another even at a great Distance & against the Will & often unbeknown to the Sufferer of such Outrage.
Moreover, I have dreamed it that of the aforementioned most ancient of Evils, there is One which slumbers in Deeps unsounded so nearly Immortal that Life & Death are one to Him. Being ultimately corrupt, He fears Death's Corruption not, but when true Death draws nigh will prepare Himself until, fleeing His ancient Flesh, His Spirit will plumb Times-to-come & there cleave unto Flesh of His Flesh, & all the Sins of this Great Father shall be visited upon His Child's Child. I have dreamed it, & my Dreams have been His Dreams who is the greatest Dreamer of all....
Translation of unknown provenance; from the rarest Al Azif of all.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "Aunt Hester" (1977):
'Tis a veritable & attestable Fact, that between certain related Persons there exists a Bond more powerful than the strongest Ties of Flesh and Family, whereby one such Person may be aware of all the Trials & Pleasures of the other, yea, even to experiencing the Pains or Passions of one far distant; & further, there are those whose skills in such Matters are aided by forbidden Knowledge of Intercourse through dark Magic with Spirits & Beings of outside Spheres. Of the latter: I have sought them out, both Men & Women, & upon Examination have in all Cases discovered them to be Users of Divination, Observors of Times, Enchanters, Witches, Charmers, or Necromancers. All claimed to work their Wonders through Intercourse with dead & departed Spirits, but I fear that often such Spirits were evil Angels, the Messengers of the Dark One & yet more ancient Evils. Indeed, among them were some whose Powers were prodigious, who might at will inhabit the Body of another even at a great Distance & against the Will & often unbeknown to the Sufferer of such Outrage. Yea, & I discovered how one might, be he an Adept & his familiar Spirits powerful enough, control the Wanderings or Migration of his Essence into all manner of Beings & Persons -- even from beyond the Grave of Sod or the Door of the Stone Sepulcher.
From Joachim Feery's Notes on the Necronomicon.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Robert Anton Wilson and Robert Shea
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From the Illuminatus! trilogy (1975):
Onlie those who have eaten a certain alkaloid herb, whose name it were wise not to disclose to the unilluminated, maye in the fleshe see a Shoggothe.
English translation of John Dee, copy residing in Miskatonic University Library.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From the Illuminatus! trilogy (1975):
They ruled once where man rules now, summer. Where man rules now, after summer is winter. They shall rule again, and after winter.
Olaus Wormius' Latin translation, 1472 Lyons edition with its numerous misprints and errors. Translation into English of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From the Illuminatus! trilogy (1975):
Past, present, future: all are one in Yog-Sothoth.
Translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From the Illuminatus! trilogy (1975):
Their hand is at your throat but you see them not. They walk serene and unsuspected, not in the spaces we know, but between them.
Translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From the Illuminatus! trilogy (1975):
Kadath in the cold waste hath known him [i.e., Yog-Sothoth].
Translation of unknown provenance. "Known" in the Biblical sense....
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Brian McNaughton
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From Satan's Mistress (1978):
Call not upon Yog-Sothoth until ye be certaine that ye Bones be compleat and culled of forraine contamination. For it hath been known in antient Tymes that ye Bones of a Man mingled with ye Bones of a Beare or Lyon, or even with ye Offaile of a lowly Coney or Porpentine, hath produced for a hapless Necromancer not a Ressurection of that which was, but a Creation of Abomination that should not be.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
He who would be a Master of the Runes and possessor of Life eternaille must consecrate to Crom Cruach on Lammas Night ye Flesh of an infant newborn and eat thereof. Nor is the consecration to be made by those faint of heart or doubting in their souls, for Crom Cruach knows all, Crom Cruach sees all, Crom Cruach is all. Iä! Crom Cruach!
From the English translation of Dr. John Dee, London edition of 1589.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From Satan's Seductress (1980):
Whenas Aldebaran riseth to the Sixth House, and agreeth in all ways with ye Conjunctions of Phutatorius as shall hereinafter be inscribed, then that is no Door which openeth on its Rising, but a Gate to ye Outside, through which All may pass but None may return save a Master of ye Runes, or ye Host of Ekron.
From the English translation of Dr. John Dee, London edition of 1589.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The Spawn
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Thomas Ligotti
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Sect of the Idiot" (1988):
The primal chaos, Lord of all ... the blind idiot god -- Azathoth.
Translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fred Chappell
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Adder" (1989):
Wisely did ibn Mushacab say, that happy is the tomb where no wizard hath lain, and happy the town at night whose wizards are all ashes. For the spirit of the devil-indentured hastes not from his charnel clay, but feeds and instructs the very worm that gnaws. Then an awful life from corruption springs and feeds again the appointed scavengers upon the earth. Great holes are dug hidden where are the open pores of the earth, and things have learned to walk that ought to crawl.
[....] they dwell in the inmost adyta [....]
[....] Yog-Sothoth knows the gate [....]
[....] in the Gulf the worlds themselves are made of sounds [....]
[....] the dim horrors of Earth [....]
[....] iä iä iä, Shub-Niggurath! [....]
The affair that shambleth about in the night, the evil that defieth the Elder Sign, the Herd that stand watch at the secret portal each tomb is known to have and that thrive on that which groweth out of the tenants thereof: All these Blacknesses are lesser than He Who guardeth the Gateway [....]
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.
From a handwritten copy of Al Azif in the original Arabic, translating itself into English, little by little.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
David A. MacIntee
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From White Darkness (1993):
Even as the Great Ones may return from their resting slumber, so the adept may, by use of the Ashes of Noah, and essential Saltes, call his fellow man back from the great beyond.
Translated by Dr. Who as he reads from an unknown edition in the eocene language (a reference to a pre-human reptilian race slumbering in cites beneath the earth and sea). The edition is described as "unexpurgated" and contains "all of Roerich's original illustrations".
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Allen Mackey
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Plague Jar" (1994):
[....] concerning Irem, the City of Pillars, I spake of the Elder Days and of the four nations that had ruled this land of old, Thamood of the north, and Ad of the south, and Tasm, and Jadis; and I spake of many-columned Irem and of Shaddad the Accursed who had raised up its walls around an Elder central obelisk and who did build therein an Thousand pillars to Those better left unnamed.
Translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
William Browning Spencer
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From Résumé with Monsters (1995):
Na'ghimgor thdid lym.
Myn th'x barsoom lu'gndar.
In'path gix mth'nabor.
In'path nox vel'dekk.
Yig sudeth M'cylorum.
M'xxlit kraddath Soggoth im'betnk.
Nog s'dath blexmed!
Version unknown. Banishing spell against the Old Ones; translation approximately as follows:
You will leave this spot, which spot denies the logic of your coming and going, and you will take, in the Name of the Nameless One, all your minions and their devices with you. And even the uttering of your name will be lost to this world until Time has eaten its Own Head.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Have any further information on the quotations here, or know of others that should be included?
Please inform me: [email protected].
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright © 1997-2002 Dan Clore.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Sect of the Idiot" (1988):
The primal chaos, Lord of all ... the blind idiot god -- Azathoth.
Translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Fred Chappell
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Adder" (1989):
Wisely did ibn Mushacab say, that happy is the tomb where no wizard hath lain, and happy the town at night whose wizards are all ashes. For the spirit of the devil-indentured hastes not from his charnel clay, but feeds and instructs the very worm that gnaws. Then an awful life from corruption springs and feeds again the appointed scavengers upon the earth. Great holes are dug hidden where are the open pores of the earth, and things have learned to walk that ought to crawl.
[....] they dwell in the inmost adyta [....]
[....] Yog-Sothoth knows the gate [....]
[....] in the Gulf the worlds themselves are made of sounds [....]
[....] the dim horrors of Earth [....]
[....] iä iä iä, Shub-Niggurath! [....]
The affair that shambleth about in the night, the evil that defieth the Elder Sign, the Herd that stand watch at the secret portal each tomb is known to have and that thrive on that which groweth out of the tenants thereof: All these Blacknesses are lesser than He Who guardeth the Gateway [....]
That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange aeons even death may die.
From a handwritten copy of Al Azif in the original Arabic, translating itself into English, little by little.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
David A. MacIntee
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From White Darkness (1993):
Even as the Great Ones may return from their resting slumber, so the adept may, by use of the Ashes of Noah, and essential Saltes, call his fellow man back from the great beyond.
Translated by Dr. Who as he reads from an unknown edition in the eocene language (a reference to a pre-human reptilian race slumbering in cites beneath the earth and sea). The edition is described as "unexpurgated" and contains "all of Roerich's original illustrations".
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Allen Mackey
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From "The Plague Jar" (1994):
[....] concerning Irem, the City of Pillars, I spake of the Elder Days and of the four nations that had ruled this land of old, Thamood of the north, and Ad of the south, and Tasm, and Jadis; and I spake of many-columned Irem and of Shaddad the Accursed who had raised up its walls around an Elder central obelisk and who did build therein an Thousand pillars to Those better left unnamed.
Translation of unknown provenance.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
William Browning Spencer
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
From Résumé with Monsters (1995):
Na'ghimgor thdid lym.
Myn th'x barsoom lu'gndar.
In'path gix mth'nabor.
In'path nox vel'dekk.
Yig sudeth M'cylorum.
M'xxlit kraddath Soggoth im'betnk.
Nog s'dath blexmed!
Version unknown. Banishing spell against the Old Ones; translation approximately as follows:
You will leave this spot, which spot denies the logic of your coming and going, and you will take, in the Name of the Nameless One, all your minions and their devices with you. And even the uttering of your name will be lost to this world until Time has eaten its Own Head.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Have any further information on the quotations here, or know of others that should be included?
Please inform me: [email protected].
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright © 1997-2002 Dan Clore.
The Spawn
Better Than You
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Jack Rabbit
i roll twenties
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CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS! CLASS PETS!
The Spawn
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Mythical animals and beasts
How did myths of dragons and mermaids and one-eyed creatures and numerous other wild sounding tales come to be? Man has always liked to be able to put explanations behind anything they did not fully understand. In todays world, this often means groups of scientists studying one facet of some new discovery for months or even years. In past times, and in all truth, even today, when something can not be explained fully, a myth will often grow from the original item in discussion.
Before modern man was capable of viewing the sun and moon up close, or even through telescopes, myths created about these heavenly bodies grew in the hundreds. Some cultures believed that they were the eyes of gods or whatever supreme beings the particular culture believed in. Always one or the other keeping a close watch on us humans below. Others believed that they were holding grounds for the gods before their final descents to the earth. From here, they could both be close to the heavens from where they came, and earth, where they were needed to help keep order and rule over the lower humans. Greek mythology is home to some of the most well known myths of all time. From Apollo to the Minotaur, this early culture has left us with, and given a start, to some of our best-known myths and mythical creatures.
Some of the creatures that have been the subject of hundreds of years of discussion include dragons, mermaids, phoenix and thunderbirds, unicorns, siren, and the Minotaur. While these are only a handful, they are some of the best known. Where did they originate? The dragon and the mermaid both were first talked about from persons who had traveled the seas and oceans. The finding of huge bones and other remnants of dinosaurs also fed tales of dragons. The depths of the oceans held, and still hold animals and fish of very large sizes and never before seen contortions. Great sea otters and walruses have been mistaken for women with tails, or mermaids. In thick mist, a boat approaching a shore would scatter a group of these animals into the water, with all the men on board seeing nothing more than the tail before they slipped back into the water. Quickly, tales of women with bodies that were half fish spread from port to port. The legend of the mermaid was born. Giant squid and octopus were turned into stories of giant fire breathing serpents, or dragons.
The siren falls somewhere between a mermaid and a bird. Legend tells of a half bird, half women, who would sit on the edge of rocky shores, singing sweetly to sailors, calling them into their deaths against the rocks. Wind whipping against the rocks and in and out of seaside caves can cause many strange sounds. To sailors, who knew nothing of this, they were sure they were listening to a sweetheart singing to them, and only someone with wings could escape the rocks that fast. From this, the legend of the siren grew.
The Minotaur was supposedly half man, half bull. The legs and lower torso of a human man topped with a bulls head and upper legs, would indeed be a mighty creature. Worse, he was portrayed as a man-eater! This, along with many of the other ancient Greek myths, can only leave us in wonder of how they came to be portrayed. The satyr, also part man, the upper half human, the lower part of his body that of a goat, portrayed a milder mix of man and beast, as not a man-eater, just a womanizer.
The phoenix and thunderbird are both mighty myths symbolized by the form of a bird. The phoenix originates from ancient Egypt, and is such a strong symbol, that it exists as a symbol representing long life in todays modern world. Only one of these mighty birds was believed to be able to exist at one time, with a life span of hundreds of years, and went hand in hand with the worship of the sun. As a great bird that ascended from the sun, and would return the same way, they were believed to bring with them eternal life. The thunderbird grew as a myth out of the Native American culture. A Great Spirit in bird form believed to bring many of lives necessities to those on earth, including water, by being a carrier of storms, bringing forth rain, lightening, and thunder.
The unicorn, a favorite mythical creature of many, portrayed today in cartoons and comic books, to clothing and figurines. Lost through the years though is part of the true image of the unicorn, as it is mostly portrayed as just a horse with a horn. A real unicorn is part horse, always white, with legs of an antelope, and with a spiral horn emanating from the center of the forehead. Unicorns most likely were traveled description of a rhinoceros. As an ancient tale was carried from tribe to tribe of beasts and animals that were sighted in a land not seen by the listener, descriptions of a real animal would become distorted. New animals grew through the years from these altered descriptions.
If something can not be explained, or part of the description is lost in telling, something new added, an important part taken out, any and all of these can lead to something that can almost seem to be real. A myth has begun.
Written by Christina VanGinkel
How did myths of dragons and mermaids and one-eyed creatures and numerous other wild sounding tales come to be? Man has always liked to be able to put explanations behind anything they did not fully understand. In todays world, this often means groups of scientists studying one facet of some new discovery for months or even years. In past times, and in all truth, even today, when something can not be explained fully, a myth will often grow from the original item in discussion.
Before modern man was capable of viewing the sun and moon up close, or even through telescopes, myths created about these heavenly bodies grew in the hundreds. Some cultures believed that they were the eyes of gods or whatever supreme beings the particular culture believed in. Always one or the other keeping a close watch on us humans below. Others believed that they were holding grounds for the gods before their final descents to the earth. From here, they could both be close to the heavens from where they came, and earth, where they were needed to help keep order and rule over the lower humans. Greek mythology is home to some of the most well known myths of all time. From Apollo to the Minotaur, this early culture has left us with, and given a start, to some of our best-known myths and mythical creatures.
Some of the creatures that have been the subject of hundreds of years of discussion include dragons, mermaids, phoenix and thunderbirds, unicorns, siren, and the Minotaur. While these are only a handful, they are some of the best known. Where did they originate? The dragon and the mermaid both were first talked about from persons who had traveled the seas and oceans. The finding of huge bones and other remnants of dinosaurs also fed tales of dragons. The depths of the oceans held, and still hold animals and fish of very large sizes and never before seen contortions. Great sea otters and walruses have been mistaken for women with tails, or mermaids. In thick mist, a boat approaching a shore would scatter a group of these animals into the water, with all the men on board seeing nothing more than the tail before they slipped back into the water. Quickly, tales of women with bodies that were half fish spread from port to port. The legend of the mermaid was born. Giant squid and octopus were turned into stories of giant fire breathing serpents, or dragons.
The siren falls somewhere between a mermaid and a bird. Legend tells of a half bird, half women, who would sit on the edge of rocky shores, singing sweetly to sailors, calling them into their deaths against the rocks. Wind whipping against the rocks and in and out of seaside caves can cause many strange sounds. To sailors, who knew nothing of this, they were sure they were listening to a sweetheart singing to them, and only someone with wings could escape the rocks that fast. From this, the legend of the siren grew.
The Minotaur was supposedly half man, half bull. The legs and lower torso of a human man topped with a bulls head and upper legs, would indeed be a mighty creature. Worse, he was portrayed as a man-eater! This, along with many of the other ancient Greek myths, can only leave us in wonder of how they came to be portrayed. The satyr, also part man, the upper half human, the lower part of his body that of a goat, portrayed a milder mix of man and beast, as not a man-eater, just a womanizer.
The phoenix and thunderbird are both mighty myths symbolized by the form of a bird. The phoenix originates from ancient Egypt, and is such a strong symbol, that it exists as a symbol representing long life in todays modern world. Only one of these mighty birds was believed to be able to exist at one time, with a life span of hundreds of years, and went hand in hand with the worship of the sun. As a great bird that ascended from the sun, and would return the same way, they were believed to bring with them eternal life. The thunderbird grew as a myth out of the Native American culture. A Great Spirit in bird form believed to bring many of lives necessities to those on earth, including water, by being a carrier of storms, bringing forth rain, lightening, and thunder.
The unicorn, a favorite mythical creature of many, portrayed today in cartoons and comic books, to clothing and figurines. Lost through the years though is part of the true image of the unicorn, as it is mostly portrayed as just a horse with a horn. A real unicorn is part horse, always white, with legs of an antelope, and with a spiral horn emanating from the center of the forehead. Unicorns most likely were traveled description of a rhinoceros. As an ancient tale was carried from tribe to tribe of beasts and animals that were sighted in a land not seen by the listener, descriptions of a real animal would become distorted. New animals grew through the years from these altered descriptions.
If something can not be explained, or part of the description is lost in telling, something new added, an important part taken out, any and all of these can lead to something that can almost seem to be real. A myth has begun.
Written by Christina VanGinkel
Jack Rabbit
i roll twenties
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*raises hand*
Can you teach us about Springheel Jack?
Can you teach us about Springheel Jack?
The Spawn
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Springheel Jack
UNSOLVED MYSTERY
Victorian England was the setting for one of the most enigmatic mysteries of the nineteenth century . September of 1837 brought with it the begining of a legend . The Legend of Springheel Jack .
At first he was nothing more than a rumor . It was in that september of 37 after four separate attacks ( three of them on women ) that rumor became legend . One victim , a miss Polly Adams had the top of her dress ripped off and her belly scratched by iron like fingers .
By early 1838 The Lord Mayor of London , Sir John Cowan had declared Springheel Jack a public menace and formed a vigilance committee in an attempt to bring this rather strange criminal to justice . Springheel Jack had the incredible ability to leap great distances from roof to roof , making it impossible to catch him .
In February of 1838 18 year old Jane Alsop of London answered a violent knocking at her door and found what she thought was a law enforcement officer who said " For Gods sake bring me a light , for we have caught Springheel Jack in the Lane " . Excited by the prospect of seeing the legendary Springheel Jack , Jane grabbed a lighted candle and ran outside . She handed the candle to a man that was standing at the gate . The man threw off his cloak and spew forth blue and white flames from his mouth . He tore at Janes dress and body , his eyes resembling red balls of fire . She tried to pull away but he grabbed her by the hair and clawed face and neck . Janes sister hearing her screams ran out into the street and cried out for help . Before anybody could help Jack would leap away .
Jane would later describe her otherworldly attacker to the authoriies " He was wearing a kind of helmet and a tight fitting white costume like an oilskin . His face was hideous and his eyes were like balls of fire . His hands had great claws and he vomited blue and white flames ".
Sporadic attacks would continue throughout 1839 . Attacks would also be reported in 1843 , 1845 and throughout the 1850's and 60's . In the 1870's the army would set a trap for him after frightened sentries reported a man dashing out of the darkness and slapping their faces with an icy cold hand and then springing onto the roof of their sentry boxes .
In 1877 angry townspeople shot at Jack in the streets one night . A sentrywho fired at him claimed that he hit Springheel Jack but the bullet went right through seemingly doing no damage whatsoever . Early on their were rumors that Jack was in fact Henry the Marquis Of Waterford , an Irish nobleman . However those rumors were put to rest in 1859 with the passing of The Marquis .
The last sighting of Springheel Jack was more than 60 years after the initial sighting . It was 1904 and there was panic in the streets as Springheel Jack was seen for the last time leaping from rooftop to cobblestone and back . This sighting was in liverpool where Jack would vanish into the darkness never to be seen again .LINKS- http://www.theunexplainedsite.com ,
http://www.qsl.net/w5www/springheeljack.html , sites on
other paranormal topics include http://expage.com/oblio
http://www.bardic.on.ca/ancient http://expage.com/etal http://www.witchvox.com , http://www.witchesweb.com ..
http://www.lorenasimon.com , http://www.psychicnikki.com
http://www.expage.com/plut , http://nativesearch.com ,
http://www.psychic-tymes.com , http://www.lenore.com ..
http://www.godserver.com , http://www.necrosoft.net ...
http://www.staciwilson.com , http://www.wiccan.com .....
http://www.classicrockrevisited.com - rock resources -
http://www.shelleybuffitt.com - country songstress ....
http://expage.com/godevil , http://www.dreaman.org ....
http://realmagick.com , http://expage.com/valdesept ...
http://www.roswell.org , http://fleckem.diaryland.com ..
http://www.witchkarma.com , http://expage.com/yeval ....
http://www.celticsoul.net , http://expage.com/lucien
http://www.peggy4esp.com , http://www.drgerri.com
UNSOLVED MYSTERY
Victorian England was the setting for one of the most enigmatic mysteries of the nineteenth century . September of 1837 brought with it the begining of a legend . The Legend of Springheel Jack .
At first he was nothing more than a rumor . It was in that september of 37 after four separate attacks ( three of them on women ) that rumor became legend . One victim , a miss Polly Adams had the top of her dress ripped off and her belly scratched by iron like fingers .
By early 1838 The Lord Mayor of London , Sir John Cowan had declared Springheel Jack a public menace and formed a vigilance committee in an attempt to bring this rather strange criminal to justice . Springheel Jack had the incredible ability to leap great distances from roof to roof , making it impossible to catch him .
In February of 1838 18 year old Jane Alsop of London answered a violent knocking at her door and found what she thought was a law enforcement officer who said " For Gods sake bring me a light , for we have caught Springheel Jack in the Lane " . Excited by the prospect of seeing the legendary Springheel Jack , Jane grabbed a lighted candle and ran outside . She handed the candle to a man that was standing at the gate . The man threw off his cloak and spew forth blue and white flames from his mouth . He tore at Janes dress and body , his eyes resembling red balls of fire . She tried to pull away but he grabbed her by the hair and clawed face and neck . Janes sister hearing her screams ran out into the street and cried out for help . Before anybody could help Jack would leap away .
Jane would later describe her otherworldly attacker to the authoriies " He was wearing a kind of helmet and a tight fitting white costume like an oilskin . His face was hideous and his eyes were like balls of fire . His hands had great claws and he vomited blue and white flames ".
Sporadic attacks would continue throughout 1839 . Attacks would also be reported in 1843 , 1845 and throughout the 1850's and 60's . In the 1870's the army would set a trap for him after frightened sentries reported a man dashing out of the darkness and slapping their faces with an icy cold hand and then springing onto the roof of their sentry boxes .
In 1877 angry townspeople shot at Jack in the streets one night . A sentrywho fired at him claimed that he hit Springheel Jack but the bullet went right through seemingly doing no damage whatsoever . Early on their were rumors that Jack was in fact Henry the Marquis Of Waterford , an Irish nobleman . However those rumors were put to rest in 1859 with the passing of The Marquis .
The last sighting of Springheel Jack was more than 60 years after the initial sighting . It was 1904 and there was panic in the streets as Springheel Jack was seen for the last time leaping from rooftop to cobblestone and back . This sighting was in liverpool where Jack would vanish into the darkness never to be seen again .LINKS- http://www.theunexplainedsite.com ,
http://www.qsl.net/w5www/springheeljack.html , sites on
other paranormal topics include http://expage.com/oblio
http://www.bardic.on.ca/ancient http://expage.com/etal http://www.witchvox.com , http://www.witchesweb.com ..
http://www.lorenasimon.com , http://www.psychicnikki.com
http://www.expage.com/plut , http://nativesearch.com ,
http://www.psychic-tymes.com , http://www.lenore.com ..
http://www.godserver.com , http://www.necrosoft.net ...
http://www.staciwilson.com , http://www.wiccan.com .....
http://www.classicrockrevisited.com - rock resources -
http://www.shelleybuffitt.com - country songstress ....
http://expage.com/godevil , http://www.dreaman.org ....
http://realmagick.com , http://expage.com/valdesept ...
http://www.roswell.org , http://fleckem.diaryland.com ..
http://www.witchkarma.com , http://expage.com/yeval ....
http://www.celticsoul.net , http://expage.com/lucien
http://www.peggy4esp.com , http://www.drgerri.com
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