O
HPL Test (online text) 23.
CAS Return suburbs of 33.
HPL Innsmouth (online text) 337.
Town and college in Ohio. HPL Innsmouth (online text) 363.
Reincarnation of Conan the reaver. REH People (online text) narrator 161-162, 164-166, 168.
A boxer. HPL Herbert (online text) 146.
REH Dark (online text) 67, 69, 78-80, (81), 85-86: Daughter of Murtagh na Kilbaha, a chief of the Dalcassians. She had deep gray eyes, black hair, and fair skin. Thorfel the Fair captured her and took her to his skalli on the Isle of Slyne, intending to marry her. Although the Christian priest Jerome was present to perform the rites in her own faith, Moira stabbed herself to avoid the marriage. As she lay dying, Turlogh O'Brien brought her the severed head of Thorfel and promised her vengeance.
A Gael of the Dalcassian tribe, raised on the wild west coast of Ireland. He was black-haired with smoldering blue eyes. His favored weapon was an axe with a slim, graceful haft and a back spike. Once a chief of Clan na O’Brien, he was outlawed by his clan, due to the jealousy of a cousin and the spiteful intrigues of a powerful woman. He was accused of conspiring with the Danes, and his clan drove him out to starve in the heather. He had a fierce hatred of the Norse for their long history of attacks on the Irish. Men said there was madness in him. He traveled widely as a soldier of fortune, and learned many languages. He retained a strong clan loyalty, despite being outlawed. After Moira O'Brien was taken captive by Thorfel the Fair, Turlogh sailed single-handed to the Isle of Slyne to try to rescue her. When Moira stabbed herself to avoid marrying Thorfel, Turlogh went mad, shouted the war-cry of the O'Briens "Lamh Laidir Abu!" and attempted to kill all of Thorfel's party single-handed. Only the supernatural help of the Dark Man and the lucky arrival of Brogar's Picts saved him from certain death. He wounded Athelstane the Saxon but spared his life at the request of the priest Jerome. [REH Dark (online text) 64-90]
Later, while traveling on a French vessel, he was captured by the ship of Lodbrug the Viking, and his life spared in turn by Athelstane. By that point Turlogh had slain a hundred-odd Vikings. He and Athelstane washed up together on the Isle of the Gods and helped Brunhild regain the queenship. After her death, and amidst an invasion by red-skinned savages, they fled the island and joined up with Don Roderigo del Cortez of Castile, aboard the vessel Gray Friar, on a mission to harry Moorish Corsairs. [Gods (online text) 185~234]
Hun 151~173.
San Francisco area newspaper. HPL Test (online text) 25.
HPL Aeons (online text) published a highly learned article by Etienne-Laurent de Marigny regarding hieroglyphs on T'yog scroll 270.
AWD Gorge 109.
By Heiriarchus. Little is known of this work but the Latin occultus means hidden, secret, occult, concealed, or mysterious.
Strange pondered a maggot-eaten volume of Heiriarchus' Occultus. [RB Tomb (online text) 14]
RB Kiss (online text) 49.
REH Skull (online text): Legends fortold the coming of an ocean-man who would lead all the colored races of the world to vanquish the white race. Apparently these legends were in reference to Kathulos of Atlantis.
One of the Seven Stewards of Heaven, invoked in White Magic [RB Hell (online text) 60].
Images of Tulu (Cthulhu), made by the Old Ones of K'n-yan. HPL Mound (online text) 109, 114, 126-127.
AWD Valley (online text) Probably Cthulhu 137 & 147.
Of Bel-Yarnak. HK Jest (online text) 60.
O'Dare, Lord Donal
An Irish lord. He was a tall dark man with a great scar on his jaw, caused by a wound from a rival chieftain. On midsummer night of 1600, he apparently ventured through a fairy ring in County Kerry to another world and stole a gold ring from Xathra of Balrahar, only to be stabbed to death by someone named Zaga. The next morning, O'Dare's dead body was found clutching the gold ring, which was eventually inherited by his descendant, John O'Dare. [REH Door]
O'Dare, John
A writer whose works were known for stark realism and a savage materialism. He was hardened by struggle in his youth and early manhood. Nevertheless, he had dreamed since childhood of shimmering kingdoms of tinsel and gossamer. His books included The Jaws of the Vise. He was a fan of Justin Geoffrey and Benjamin de Casseres. From his ancestor, Lord Donal O'Dare, he had inherited a gold ring with a blue stone and unknown carved characters, somewhat resembling Phoenician. One night while he was reading Towers in the Sky by Justin Geoffrey, Xathra of Balrahar burst in through his window, and claimed to be the owner of O'Dare's ring. Following the arrival of the villainous Begog, O'Dare and Xathra fell through a dimensional portal called the Door of the World, and O'Dare awoke in an alien landscape. [REH Door]
REH Children (online text) (narrator) (149-159), 160-162, (163), 164: A friend of John Conrad. After Ketrick accidentally struck O'Donnel with an ancient Welsh flint mallet, O'Donnel remembered a past life in Bronze-age Britain as Aryara of the Sword People. On recovering consciousness, O'Donnel was instantly convinced that Ketrick was one of the Children of the Night, and attempted to strangle him. Although the attempt was interrupted, O'Donnel still nursed the intention to kill Ketrick some day. Dwellers (narrator) 113, 118, 120, 123, 127-128; Ring (online text) (narrator) (49-65), 50, 54, 57.
Manor: O'Donnel may have been the unnamed narrator who went with John Conrad to visit Tavarel (possibly the same as Taverel) at Dagon Manor and were greeted by the sinister Ketric.
Aka: O'Donnel, Black John?
REH Bear (narrator) (35), 36-37.
Synonym for: O'Donnel, John?
HK Bells (online text) 87.
Of Evill Sorceries done in New-England of Daemons in no Humane Shape
An excerpt from Thaumaturgical Prodigies in the New-English Canaan, by Rev. Ward Phillips. The excerpt tells that Richard Billington called down a being called Ossadagowah at a stone ring near New Plymouth. [HPL Sorceries (online text)]
Ambrose Dewart found a partially legible, handwritten copy of a portion of this document in Billington House. Stephen Bates and Seneca Lapham also read it. In this version of the fragement, the ring of stones was near New Dunnich. [AWD Lurker 14, 69, 139]
CAS Return (online text) (narrator) 34.
RFS Mists widow 26.
A city. HPL Kadath (online text) 358, 360.
AWD Seal (online text) 152.
Incl: Oberlin.
A ship that Albert Keith and Ronald Abbott hired in Tahiti to voyage to the location of R'lyeh. Commanded by Captain Sato. The crew were cultists with the Innsmouth look, who fed Keith to Cthulhu. [RB Strange]
HPL Mound (online text) 97-98, 116; Yig (online text) (throughout, and) 80-81, 84.
Incl:
Caddo Indians; Compton, Clyde; Compton, Joe; Compton, Sally; Davis, Audrey; Davis, Walker; Grey Eagle; Kukulcan; McNeill, Dr.; Moore, Major; Quetzalcoatl; Rigby, Tom and Jennie; Smith, Lafayette; Stevens; Tirawa; Wichita Indians; Wolf; Yig; Zeke
Binger; Caddo County; Canadian river; Creek country; El Reno; Guthrie; Kickapoo country; Newcastle; Okmulgee; Pawnee country; Scott County?; Wichita country; Wichita Mountains; Wichita River
Creek County, Okalahoma. HPL Yig (online text) 85.
Manitoba. AWD Ithaqua 106, 108, 110-111, 115-116; Wind (online text) Allison Wentworth and James Macdonald used it to travel from Nelson to Stillwater, and later in an attempt to escape back. Ithaqua was sometimes seen against the sky by travelers on this trail.
Lomar. HPL Iranon (online text) 114; Kadath (online text) 310; Mound (online text) 141; Mountains (online text) 47; Polaris (online text) 21-23.
JVS Dead 28-31, 36-37: Innsmouth is referred to as "nearby". Graveyard 227, 229, (230-232), 233-234, (235), 236-237, (238-240), 241.
Incl: Carmody, Russell; Carter family; Carter, Obediah; Harrod Place; Kent, Jeremy; Peabody, Benjamin; Witches' Hollow.
New York. REH House (online text) 118-120, 128, 130.
New England--Salem? HPL Case (online text) 194.
RB Faceless 39.
Synonym for: Nyarlathotep.
Synonym for Ancient Ones. AWD OutThere Mentioned in occult lore studied by Geoffrey Malvern and his friends.
AWD Whippoorwills 43.
Manager or owner of the Stellar Brothers Circus [RB Elephant (online text) 39-44, 46-49, 51-52, 54].
RB Kiss (online text) 48.
Associated with Zushakon. HK Bells (online text) 86.
An ancient race of extraterrestrial origin, whose population on earth centered in Antarctica. Most of our information about this race was collected by Lake, Dyer, and Danforth, of the Miskatonic Antarctic Expedition of 1930-31.
In rock of Cambrian or pre-Cambrian date, Lake found a triangular, striated footprint of the Old Ones, about a foot in greatest diameter [HPL Mountains (online text) 10, 12]. Later he found a similar footprint, but slightly smaller and more primitive or decadent, in strata from Comanchian times [19].
Physiology
The rather outre physique of the Old Ones has been minutely described for us by Lake [20-21, 24], and can be summarized as follows:
- The are roughly barrel-shaped, about six feet tall. They are dark grey, flexible, and infinitely tough.
- At the top of the body, there is a yellowish, five pointed head with an eye at the end of each point. Red tubes extend from the inner angles of the head and terminate in mouths.
- At the bottom of the body, there is a starfish-like arrangement of five flexible legs, each ending in a triangular paddle. Between each leg there extends a reddish tube used for excretion.
- On the body there are five bulging lengthwise ridges. In furrows between the ridges are wings that can fold up or spread out like fans, to an almost seven-foot wing spread. From each ridge, at the equator, grows a light grey flexible arm that divides and subdivides into a total of 25 tentacles.
During dissection, Lake found the blood to be a thick, dark-green fluid. He noted many evidences of both animal and vegetable characteristics. He concluded that the beings were amphibian, capable of breathing but also adapted to long airless periods [24-25]. Like vegetables, they are able to obtain nourishment from inorganic sources, but greatly prefer organic and especially animal food [64].
The physiology of the Old Ones gradually degenerated after settling on earth; they became smaller, coarser and simpler, with many atrophied and vestigial organs [25].
Dyer concluded that the Old Ones are strictly material and originated within our own space-time continuum, in contrast to the Cthulhu spawn and Outer Ones, whose first sources can only be guessed at [68].
Dogs show an intinctive hostility to the Old Ones [21, 22, 32, 36-37], their acrid scent [24, 26], and their soapstone stars [20].
Life Cycle
The Old Ones reproduce like certain primitive vegetables, by way of spore-cases at the tips of the wings [25, 64]. Very few of the Old Ones die except by violence [63], and they bury their dead vertically in five-pointed mounds with indented dots [33, 64].
Lake and his party discovered to their cost that Old Ones can be revived after millions of years of frozen dormancy: "awakening in the cold of an unknown epoch" [96], perhaps as a result of exposure to (slightly) increased heat; in the heated tents, Lake noted a thawing of the specimens that restored their "blood" to its fluid state [24]. Later it was observed that "the ceaseless antarctic sun had begun to limber up their tissues a trifle" [25].
Language
Lake speculated that they could vocalize a wide range of musical piping notes, but no articulate syllables [24]. Later, Dyer and Danforth heard a shoggoth utter the phrase Tekeli-li, in piping tones covering a wide range; they concluded that the shoggoth was imitating the speach of the Old Ones [97-98, 100-101].
The Old Ones' written language consisted of groups of dots; these were observed on their bas-reliefs [55, 57], on their five pointed soapstones [20, 32], on their improvised snow graves for their fallen companions [33, 39], near the cave mouths on the mountains [42], on the buildings of the antarctic city [46], and on scraps of paper written on by the recently deceased Old Ones [82]. The shoggoths left similar marks in slime on walls near the dead Old Ones [95].
Five Pointed Stones
They used small five-pointed stones for currency [65] and possibly for other unknown reasons; five-pointed soapstones were found near the specimens discovered by Lake. (See: soapstones.)
Space Travel
The Old Ones traveled through the interstellar ether on their vast membraneous wings, and arrived when earth was still devoid of life [61]. For their their prehistoric flights through cosmic space, they absorbed certain chemicals and became almost independent of eating, breathing, or heat conditions [64]. During the Jurassic, the Old Ones discovered that they were no longer able to leave the atmosphere [68].
Creators of Earth Life
The bodies of the Old Ones reminded Lake of references in the Necronomicon to Elder Things supposed to have created all earth-life as a jest or mistake [22]. Lake also recalled the primal myths about Great Old Ones who filtered down from the stars and concocted earth life as a joke or mistake [25]. The Old Ones were the makers and enslavers of earth life, and the originals of the fiendish elder myths which things like the Pnakotic Manuscripts and the Necronomicon affrightedly hint about [59].The Old Ones created earth-life for food and other purposes. They created viscous, living masses called shoggoths to be their servants. They allowed various cell-groups to develop into other forms of animal and vegetable life, exterminating any that became troublesome [62, 65]. They used a primitive simian ancestor of humanity for food and amusement [65]. Eventually the Old Ones lost the art of creating new life from inorganic matter, but remained able to mold species already in existence [67].
History
The history of the Old Ones was inferred by Prof. William Dyer and Danforth, on the evidence of bas-reliefs they observed in the antarctic city of the Old Ones. Since Dyer and Danforth had no knowledge of the Old Ones' language, their conclusions should be considered incomplete and tentative at best.
The Old Ones arrived in the Archaean period [12, 19, 22, 25, 30, 32, 37, 39, 59, 103]. At that time, the entire globe was covered with water. Their earliest settlements were in the Antarctic Ocean, but spread further north over time. After a land mass developed near the south pole, they began creating cities on land as well. Few or none of their first cities remained beyond the Archaean stage. [66]
Sometime after the early Achaean and before the Carboniferous period, continents separated from the antarctic land mass and drifted north. Upheavals created new land in the South Pacific. A land-dwelling race of octopi arrived, presumably the spawn of Cthulhu. The Cthulhu spawn and the Old Ones battled over territory, and only the new lands were given to the Cthulhu spawn. Later, the lands of the Pacific sank again, taking with it the city of R'lyeh and the Cthulhu spawn, so that the Old Ones were again supreme on the planet. [66]
Gradually the Old Ones shifted to living mostly on land. By the Carboniferous period, the whole globe, both land and underwater, was scattered with the Old One's vast stone cities. But the antarctic remained the center of their civilisation [66-67, 69].
In the middle of the Permian age, the Old Ones waged and eventually won a war of subjugation against their rebellious shoggoth slaves [67].
During the Jurassic, earth was invaded by the Mi-Go or Outer Ones. The Outer Ones drove the Old Ones out of the northern lands [68]. Still, the Old Ones gradually receded to the south, and by Pliocene times had no land cities except on the antarctic continent and the tip of South America, and even their ocean cities extended no further than the fiftieth parallel of South Latitude. [69]
Dyer suspected that the Old One's history might be mythologized or censored for reasons of pride, and noted that their annals failed to mention many advanced races of beings who figure in legend [68].
Antarctic City and Environs
The mountains surrounding the antarctic city of the Old Ones are dotted with stone cubes [14, 29] and ramparts [34, 40] and cavemouths [41, 43]. The cavemouths are often approximately square or semicircular [42].
The city itself, first revealed through a mirage reflected by the atmosphere over the mountains, features stone buildings with a variety of geometrical shapes such as cones, cylinders, pyramids, and spires in clusters of five [30, 44-47]. The city extends alongside the mountains for about three hundred miles [48, 70], but only about thirty miles in width [48]. At least one of the ramparts is star-shaped [50], and many other features are five-pointed [52].
The city is near a far older city reputed to have been the original settlement of the Old Ones, when the area was still on a primal sea-bottom [70].
The Mountains of Madness
The Old Ones of the antarctic city shunned and feared a range of violet mountains, some 300 miles to the west, and over forty thousand feet in height. During the decadent period, some of the Old Ones made strange prayers to those mountains. Dyer suspected that Kadath in the Cold Waste might lie beyond those peaks [71]. The Old Ones recoiled in terror from certain objects that washed down in a river from these mountains [73]. In a mirage, Danforth thought he saw a reflection of what lay beyond those mountains, and never fully recovered his sanity. Although he would never clearly discuss what he saw, his arcane hints included a mention of Yog-Sothoth [105-106].
Final Retreat
With the advent of glacial periods between 1 million and 500,000 years ago, the Old Ones withdrew gradually to undersea cities off the antarctic coast and to an abyss of underground water near their antarctic city, kept warm by the Earth's internal heat. There the Old Ones built a new city, partly out of reused elements from the old one [73-76]. On exploring a tunnel leading downward from the antarctic city toward this abyss, Dyer and Danforth encountered a shoggoth and concluded that that entire race of the Old Ones had probably been destroyed by their shoggoth slaves [96-101].
Nyarlathotep
Robert Blake said that the Shining Trapezohedron was fashioned on Yuggoth, and the Old Ones later brought it to earth. The Old Ones treasured it and placed it in its curious box. This fact suggests a link between the Old Ones and Nyarlathotep, since the Shining Trapezohedron is a device for summoning an avatar of that being [HPL Haunter (online text) 106].
Captives of the Great Race
The psychically-transplanted captives of the Great Race included some from the winged, star-headed, half-vegetable race of paleogean Antarctica [Time (online text) 395]. The Great Race sometimes waged war against the winged, star-headed Old Ones who centered in the antarctic [400]. S'gg'ha, a captive mind from the star-headed vegetable carnivores of Antarctica, chiselled pictures on the walls in the city of the Great Race in Western Australia [417].
Survivors on Another Planet
In one of his visions, Gilman visited a city where he saw shining metal carvings of the Old Ones, and then a couple of living Old Ones [HPL WitchHouse (online text) 277-278].
AWD Space (238).
Synonyms: Elder Ones (1); Great Old Ones (2)
Beings associated with Yog-Sothoth. Speaking of Wilbur Whateley's older brother, a spawn of Yog-Sothoth, Old Whateley said that "Only them from beyont kin make it multiply and work. . . . Only them, the old uns as wants to come back" [HPL Dunwich (online text) 167]. A long quote from the Necronomicon gives hints about the Old Ones. They have long existed; even now they live undimensioned and unseen, between the spaces we know. They have broken through to our world before and trodden earth's fields; they ruled here once, and will reign again. They have begotten offspring on humanity, but the appearance of such offspring varies from entirely human to that shape without sight or substance which is Them. They are invisible to human eyes, but their foulness can be smelled. Yog-Sothoth is the gate or the keeper of the gate between the spheres, through which they will return [170].
Their form can perhaps be inferred from the brief glimpse that Curtis Whateley got of Wilbur's brother; See Yog-Sothoth.
Great Cthulhu is their cousin, yet he can spy them only dimly [170]. Perhaps the Old Ones represent a more alien mode of being than Cthulhu and his spawn? It is not clear whether the Old Ones are likely to be allies or enemies of Cthulhu. Of the Old Ones, Alhazred says that "the sunken isles of Ocean hold stones whereon Their seal is engraven, but who hath seen... the sealed tower long garlanded with seaweed and barnacles" [170]. It may be implied that the Old Ones vanquished Cthulhu and left their seal on sunken R'lyeh to help keep him imprisoned. If this is true, then these might be the "One Ones" whose magic sign has power against the Deep Ones; See magic sign.
Of K'n-yan. HPL Mound (online text) (97-98, 101, 103, 105, 108, 109), 117-118, original stock who peopled Earth as soon as the crust was fit to live on 131, great surface civilizations between glacial ages, esp. at South Pole near Mt. Kadath 131, traffic with upper world cut off 131, million or two years of cleavage 133.
Synonym for: Ancient Ones (2). AWD Gable (online text) 213; Survivor (online text) 162.
Synonym for: Great Old Ones (3). AWD Lair = Lloigor, Zhar and friends 132 & 133; Lurker =Great Old Ones? 60, 81, 83, 110, 133; Sky and immediate servitors 86.
In Mt. Voormithadreth. CAS Coming (online text) subterrene, submarine, or supermundane dwellings 71, 79; Seven (online text) 50, 55.
Synonym for: Elder Gods (1). AWD Lair = Elder Gods 126.
Miscellaneous references:
Arthur Feldon mentioned the term "Old Ones" in connection with a number of gods of apparently Native American mythology [HPL Electric (online text) 68]. Later he babbled of European pagan deities [70] and even "Cthulhutl" [74], so it is possible that for Feldon, "Old Ones" was an encompassing term for old and pagan deities of whatever tradition.
Magic signs of the Old Ones provide protection against the Deep Ones [HPL Innsmouth (online text) 331, 333]. The paleogean magic of the Old Ones might sometimes check the Deep Ones, but could never destroy them [367].
George Rogers said that if Rhan-Tegoth dies, the Old Ones can never come back [HPL Museum (online text) 235].
HC Pits A secret cult in Haiti worships deities called Old Ones. The deities include at least Tulu (Cthulhu), Nigguratl-Yig, Nug, Yeb, and Yig. While the cult resembles Vodun (Voodoo), the Old Ones are more ancient than most of the Voodoo gods and have long since been banned from African religions.
AWD Dweller 133 = Great Old Ones, 134, 151; Hastur = Elder Gods in this story, good guys 11, nameless and always stronger than Evil Ones 11; Whippoorwills 47.
REH Bear 36.
HK Bells (online text) 86; Salem (online text) Nyogtha a brother of 261.
FBL Gift: The Ice-Goddess Ythillin spoke of a group of beings called the Old Ones, which include at least Cthulhu, Yog-Sothoth, and the Hounds of Tindalos. The Old Ones lie dreaming and sway in a way that only seems mindless. "A day will come when the Old Ones will awaken and earth will quake with their unchained rage, for they were cast into outer darkness by an accident of Time. But that day is far in the future . . . " According to Ythillin, the Old Ones cannot be influenced by lesser beings such as humanity or the Ice Gods. But animals, when in peril, have an instinctive ability to make use of the power of the Old Ones, and to bend it to their purpose. In humans, the faculty of reason blocks this ability. After the warrior Ghor was given the gift of lycanthropy, Ythillin told him that he would be able to access the powers of the Old Ones whenever he was in his wolf form.
RFS Warder 164.
CAS Holiness (online text) 119, 134.
DW Lady (online text) 105.
A race of snake-like subterranean cave dwellers in Texas. REH Lost (76, description 77, had once been human 78, 79), 81-83, (84, poisonous 85), 86, (87), 90.
Compare with: Little People.
Innsmouth HPL Innsmouth 324, 336.
See Bible. Laban Shrewsbury quoted Josuah 10:11 and 10:13 as evidence for the battle between the Elder Gods and the Great Old Ones [AWD Island 181]. Here is the full passage:
11 And it came to pass, as they fled from before Israel, and were in the going down to Bethhoron, that the LORD cast down great stones from heaven upon them unto Azekah, and they died: they were more which died with hailstones than they whom the children of Israel slew with the sword. 12 Then spake Joshua to the LORD in the day when the LORD delivered up the Amorites before the children of Israel, and he said in the sight of Israel, Sun, stand thou still upon Gibeon; and thou, Moon, in the valley of Ajalon. 13 And the sun stood still, and the moon stayed, until the people had avenged themselves upon their enemies. Is not this written in the book of Jasher? So the sun stood still in the midst of heaven, and hasted not to go down about a whole day. [King James Version]
Incl: Book of Job.
Old Town of King Harold Haardrada
HPL Call (online text) 148.
RB Creeper (online text) 103.
35-25 million years ago. HPL Mountains (online text) 18.
Owner of the North End Warehouse and Storage Company, Boston. He inherited it from his uncle. He received anonymous phonecalls asking about Richard Upton's effects. He showed Simon Waverly the area where Upton's things had been stored. [RB Strange]
HPL Pickman (online text) 12.
Olmstead, Robert
Name for the Shadow Over Innsmouth narrator in Lovecraft's preliminary notes for the story. For further information, see The Descent of Robert Olmstead.
South America. AWD Curwen 10; Gorge 125.
Providence. HPL Case (online text) 111, 117, 127, 148, 152-154, 156, 174-175, 203, 227.
Of Providence. HPL Case (online text) 152, 188.
Kingsport; Narragansett Bay. HPL Mist (online text) 278-285
HPL Haunter (online text) 98, 103.
AWD Keeper 148, 156, 171.
HPL History (online text) 1.
Of Hyperborea. CAS Tale (online text) 3-5, (6-8), 9, 11, 16-17.
Indian man, of Cold Harbor. AWD Ithaqua 107.
AWD Island 190.
HPL Diary (online text) 317.
A show that Eve Vernon sang in [RB Hell (online text) 39].
On the Sending Out of the Soul
A pamphlet found by Robert Ludwig in swap shop in San Pedro, CA. It was about four by five inches, bound in coarse brown paper, and yellowed and crumbling with age. The printing—in Eighteenth Century type with the long S—was crudely done, and there was neither a date-line nor a publisher’s imprint. There were eight pages; seven of them filled with the usual banal sophisms of mysticism, and the eighth giving specific directions for projecting one’s astral to visit another person.
According to occultist Kenneth Scott, the pamphlet was printed in Salem in 1783. Scott had believed that there were no copies surviving. Scott said that the pamphlet is a trap, created by the worshippers of the Hydra to lure victims to their god. The experimenter, following the instructions, inhales the fumes of a drug and concentrates upon the person whom he wishes to visit. The Hydra, using the experimenter’s astral as a host, comes to earth and takes its prey—which is the person whom the experimenter was trying to visit. The experimenter is not harmed, but the other is taken by the Hydra for its own. The victim is doomed to eternal torment, except in certain unusual cases where he can maintain a psychic link with an earthly mind. When the booklets were first distributed, through secret underground channels, there was an epidemic of deaths in New England. Dozens of men and women were found headless, with no trace of any human murderer.
After Ludwig found the pamphlet, he and Paul Edmond began experiments that ultimately led to the death of Edmonds and the stranding of Ludwig and Scott in alien dimensions.
None of the local booksellers has heard of it, and Russell Hodgkins, California’s most noted bibliophile, declared that the title and the volume must have originated in the mind of the ill-fated Paul Edmond.
[HK Hydra (online text) 126-127, (128, 134-135, 137, 140)]
Arkham, Massachusetts. Publishers of Azathoth and Other Horrors by Edward Pickman Derby [FL Terror2 267].
A place in dream, beyond the Karthian hills. HPL Iranon (online text) 111, 113-116.
Where Celephaïs is. HPL Celephaïs (online text) 85-89; Kadath (online text) 309, 333, 338-339, 345, 352-353, 356.
AWD Lurker 134.
Synonym for Anubis. RB Opener 156-157, 160-161, 167.
AWD Sky 68.
One of the Seven Stewards of Heaven, invoked in White Magic [RB Hell (online text) 60].
HPL Cats (online text) the cat is bearer of tales from forgotten cities in Ophir 55.
A mysterious blazing being who had done a terrible wrong to Joe Slater's dream self, and which shook and laughed and mocked at him. Algol is the blinking beacon of the oppressor [HPL Sleep (online text) (27, 28), 34]
Dark foreign attendent at Rogers' Museum. HPL Museum (online text) (218-219), 220-221, 223-227, 231-232, 234, 238-241.
Of High Street, Bloemfontein. HPL Winged (online text) 242, 260, 262.
Kingsport. HPL Festival (online text) 216.
Synonym for Esoteric Order of Dagon. AWD Clay 378.
Innsmouth. HPL Innsmouth (online text) 320, 325, 339, 350.
AWD Shuttered 271; Sky 65, 74-75, (76), 80, 83-84.
Aka: Dagon Hall.
See also: Esoteric Order of Dagon.
Of Texas. REH Lost 188.
Of Texas. REH Lost 65-79, 88-89.
500-425 million years ago. HPL Mountains (online text) 18.
Isle, in Southern Sea of dreamland. HPL Kadath (online text) 312-313, 315, 324-328, 332, 334, 345.
HPL Aeons (online text) burst of activity among Oriental religious cults 278.
RB Demon 65.
AWD Gorge 99; Seal (online text) 153.
HPL Aeons (online text) Cabot Museum acquired T'yog mummy from 265.
Constellation. AWD Island 182; Keeper 141; Lair 124, 126, 134; Lurker 106; Hastur 27, 32.
RFS Casket mightiest of wizards 11; Mists 25.
Islands off Scotland. REH Gods (online text) 195, 213-218.
Incl: Brunhild; Thorfin, Rane.
Of Dunwich. AWD Watchers 400.
Family of Arkham and Innsmouth. HPL Innsmouth (online text) 363-364.
AWD Sky 64, 83-84.
Father of Eliza. HPL Innsmouth (online text) 362.
Ancestor of Innsmouth narrator. HPL Innsmouth (online text) 362.
Of Kingsport. HPL Mist (online text) 279.
Letters. HPL Case (online text) 112, 138-139, 147, 149, 150-151, 157, 161, 195, 208.
Synonym for Orne, Jebediah, alias Nadek, Joseph. HPL Case (online text) 138, 149-151, address 152, Simon 162, Simon O. 194, 195-197, 203-204, 208, 222-223, 233.
HPL WitchHouse (online text) 288.
Miskatonic University Antarctic Expedition. HPL Mountains (online text) 20.
Orthodox Church of the Massachusetts Bay
RB Satan 6.
Author. AWD Wood 82.
Arkham area. AWD Whippoorwills 38, 54, farm 57, 58, 67-69.
Of Dunwich. AWD Lurker 56, 72, 95, 97-99, 101.
HPL Dunwich (online text) 191, 197.
Cousin of Willie Osborne. RB Notebook (online text) 236-245, 248-249.
Salem witch; ancestor of Willie Osborne on father's side. RB Notebook (online text) 233.
Nephew of Aunt Lucy and Uncle Fred; descendent of Mehitabel Osborne. RB Notebook (online text) (narrator) 231, 240, 243-244, 248.
The sole retail establishment in Dunwich, located in a broken-steepled former church. The proprietor in 1928 may have been Joe Osborn (the only Osborn who is specifically mentioned in the story). Wilbur Whateley used the telephone at the store once, and bought a cheap valise there before his first trip to Arkham. [HPL Dunwich (online text)]
The store was later run by Tobias Whateley. It is not clear whether the name of the store changed, or whether it ever had a formal name in the first place.
Egyptian god. HPL Pyramids (online text) 221, 234, 241.
RB Fane 133; Opener 163; Sebek 116-117, 125.
The Probilski Foundation had a statue of Osiris, King of the Dead. [RB Strange]
Norway. HPL Call (online text) 148.
A being said to be the child of Sadogowah, who was raised by Richard Billington at a ring of stones near New Plymouth. The creature was later imprisoned by Misquamicus and other indians in a hole under a stone with the Elder Sign. [HPL Sorceries (online text)]
AWD Lurker 15, 16, description? 43, description? 85, description? 88, 139, 146-147.
Genus of saurians. AWD Survivor (online text) 152.
An old name for Tahiti. HPL Innsmouth (online text) 329.
Entity called on by Graag for his sorceries. Earthly remains, resembling a large white worm, buried by Graag and protected by the curse called the mantle of the sorcerer. On being uncovered by Roche, Paulsen, Hank Klarney, and Frank Hartley, crumbled into dust. RAL Graag (online text) 15.
Aka: worm; white worm.
Of dreamlands. Gods of the outer hells, who guard the feeble gods of earth. They snatched Barzai up into the sky when he attempted to view earth's gods [HPL Other (online text)]. The high priest of Celephaïs said that the Other Gods from Outside subject Earth's Gods to strange protection. Kurances warned that the Other Gods had strange ways of protecting Earth's Gods from impertinent curiousity. [Kadath (online text)]
The Other Gods from Outside left their seal upon earth's primal granite at least twice: once in antediluvian times, as recorded by a drawing in the Pnakotic Manuscripts, and once on Hatheg-Kla after they took Barzai the Wise [Other (online text), Kadath]. When men living in a valley near Ngranek angered Earth's Gods, the latter spoke to the Other Gods, who drowned the valley in sinister lava [Kadath]. That valley is overlooked by a carven face of Earth's Gods, but it is not clear whether the carving was made before or after the valley was laid waste; it is conceivable that the Other Gods left the face as a sign of warning, much as they did the seal on Hatheg-Kla.
The Other Gods dance slowly, awkwardly, and absurdly to the pounding and piping that accompanies Azathoth. They roll and tumble mindlessly in the black ultimate void where broods the daemon sultan. Their soul and messenger is the Crawling Chaos Nyarlathotep. [Kadath]
Though the Other Gods are mindless [Kadath (online text), Nyarlathotep (online text)], Nyarlathotep appears as a cultured and devious being [Kadath], suggesting that he is either the smartest of the bunch, or else that the Other Gods form a sort of corporate mind, far greater than the individuals who compose it. On this theory, Nyarlathotep could be the name for any form that the Other Gods manifest in order to communicate their will.
In the empty space beyond the Basalt Pillar of the West, the larvae of the Other Gods lurk; they are shapeless black things with slimy paws, blind and mindless, given to leering or pawing at any passersby. Though said to be mindless like the adults of their kind, they are curious and have singular hungers and thirsts. Carter also encountered these larvae when the shantak bird was carrying him toward the void of Azathoth. [Kadath]
Devotees of the Other Gods and Nyarlathotep include the gugs, who reared stone circles and made strange sacrifices. Eventually, however, the gugs committed an abomination that caused Earth's Gods to banish them to carverns below. (It seems curious that worshippers of the powerful Other Gods could be banished by the week and feeble Gods of Earth.) Another devotee is the high-priest not to be described, who dwells in the remote and prehistoric monastery on Leng. [Kadath]
The Other Gods are not feared by the night-gaunts, since the night-guants' only lord is Nodens. Nor do the ghouls serve the Other Gods, for ghouls have no masters. Yet the Other Gods can control both night-gaunts and ghouls when they must. [Kadath]
Some places in dreamland have known the presence of the Other Gods. Thus, certain white hemisperical buildings on curious knolls in Leng's northward reaches are unpleasantly associated with the Other Gods and Nyarlathotep in common folklore. And when Carter reached Kadath, he felt the presence of the Other Gods there. After Earth's Gods were lured away by Carter's fabulous sunset city, only the Other Ones from outser space held sway on unremembered Kadath; though Earth's Gods were later returned to Kadath by Nyarlathotep. [Kadath]
The Other Gods are also referred to as the ultimate gods [Nyarlathotep (online text) 3].
Nyarlathotep told Carter to "remember the Other Gods; they are great and mindless and terrible, and they lurk in the outer voids. They are good gods to shun". [Kadath]
Canada. HPL Herbert (online text) 154.
R. Carter boyhood realm. HPL Gates (online text) 431, 440; Kadath (online text) 334, 348-349; Silver (online text) 408.
HPL Gates (online text) 434.
A race of fungoid, crablike alien beings with outposts on earth.
Anatomy
The bodies of the Outer Ones resemble a five-foot long, pink crab with many pairs of legs and two bat-like wings in the middle of the back. The head is a convoluted ellipsoid, resembling a pyramided set of rings or knots of thick ropy stuff, all covered with multitudes of very short antennae. Sometimes they walk on all their legs, sometimes on the hindmost pair only, using the others to carry objects.[HPL Whisperer (online text) description 210-211 & 236] The footprints or clawprints of the Outer Ones are hideously crab-like. The prints are about the size of a human foot, with a central pad from which pairs of saw-toothed nippers projected in opposite directions, thus making it difficult to infer the direction of travel [221].
The Outer Ones are more vegetable than animal, and have a somewhat fungoid structure [239] Their blood or juice is a foul-smelling, green sticky stuff [234, 236], perhaps because of the presence of a chlorophyll-like substance [239].
The Outer Ones have subtle senses that do not require light, for they originated in the outer void where there is no light. Light even hurts and hampers and confuses them [254]. They seem to generally avoid moonlight [231, 232, 233, 234, 235]; though on one occasion, one was seen flying past the full moon [211].
The Outer Ones usually communicate telepathically. However, they have rudimentary vocal organs that can be surgically modified to allow them to emulate speech [240]. Their voices have a severe buzzing quality [211-212, 217, 234].
The Outer Ones are able to live in interstellar space and fly through it with their wings, which have a way of resisting the ether [217]. The Outer Ones' wings are too poor at steering to be of much use traveling on earth [217-218]. Nevertheless, one specimen was seen flying from a hilltop [211], and Akeley feared that the Outer Ones were learning to steer better with their space wings [234].
The Outer Ones can be seen by humans, but are invisible to ordinary cameras, due to being composed of matter alien to our part of space. However, a chemist with the right knowledge could create a photograpic emulsion that would capture their images [236, 240]. After the Outer Ones die, their bodies evaporate in a few hours [236].
Origin
The Outer Ones originated in a black cosmos outside time and space, far outside the Einsteinian space-time continuum or greatest known cosmos [Whisperer (online text) 228, 254]. Most of the Outer Ones still inhabit strangely organized abysses of infinite vastness, outside the space-time globule that we consider to be the cosmos [240].
The Pennacook myths taught that the Outer Ones came from the Great Bear in the sky [212].
Yuggoth
Some of the Outer Ones populated the dark planet Yuggoth (Pluto), at the rim of our solar system, amidst the giant ruins left by some elder race [Whisperer (online text) 228, 254].
Albert Wilmarth spoke to Georg Reuter Fischer of the Outer Ones as "Plutonians" [FL Terror2 300, 301].
See: Yuggoth.
Earth and the Old Ones
According to Von Junzt, the Outer Ones colonized earth before terrestrial life [HPL Aeons (online text) 272].
However, according to Prof. Dyer, the Outer Ones seem to have arrived later, during the Jurassic age. The Outer Ones invaded earth from Pluto and drove the crinoid Old Ones out of the northern lands [HPL Mountains (online text) 68]. The Mi-Go were composed of more exotic matter than the Old Ones, and were able to undergo transformations and reintegrations impossible for the latter [68]. Dyer wondered whether the Mi-Go were still a threat during the declining years of the Old Ones [76].
Mu and Yaddith-Gho
According to Von Junzt, the Outer Ones left monstrous ruins in a region that later became the human kingdom of K'naa, on Mu. The Outer Ones perished from that region aeons before humans arrived, but left behind a fortress atop Yaddith-Gho, wherein dwelt their demon-god Ghatanothoa, who later became a bane to the human population [Aeons (online text) 272].
Continuing Outposts
The Outer Ones maintain a secret colony on this planet [Whisperer (online text) 238], with outposts including ones in Vermont and on certain remote peaks in the Old World [240].
Albert Wilmarth compared the sightings of Outer Ones to the legends of Mi-Go or Abominable Snow-Men of the Himalayas [214]. The formerly human brain called B-67 told Wilmarth that he originally met the Outer Ones in the Himalayas [260].
There are multiple varieties of the Outer Ones, and only the variety represented in Vermont is able to bodily fly through space without mechanical aid or special surgery. Those Outer Ones inhabiting certain remote peaks in the Old World were brought in other ways [240].
Metallurgists
According to Pennacook legends, the Outer Ones have mines on earth where they take a mineral they cannot get from any other world [Whisperer (online text) 212]. According to Von Junzt, the Outer Ones also brought a special metal from Yuggoth; this lagh metal cannot be found in any mine on earth [Aeons (online text) 274].
Humanity
For the most part, the Outer Ones are content to let mankind alone, as long as we stay away from certain mountains and valleys where they are active [Whisperer (online text) 211]. However, the Outer Ones have occasionally been known to accost lone travelers with surprising offers [212]. They have alliances with certain members of the human race [228]. Akeley got information from a human who spied for the Outer Ones and later killed himself [217, 220]; Akeley believed that there were other spies [217], including Walter Brown (q.v.).
Pseudo-Akeley said that the Outer Ones have an increasing desire to make themselves known to humanity and establish peaceful coexistence, now that mankind's increasing knowledge is making it more and more difficult for the Outer Ones' outposts to exist secretly on this planet [239]. The Outer Ones apparently inspired humanity to discover Yuggoth (the planet Pluto) [240, 254, 264-265].
According to pseudo-Akeley, there is a secret cult of men who oppose the Outer Ones. Pseudo-Akeley linked them to Hastur and the Yellow Sign, and claimed that the cult works on behalf of monstrous powers from other dimensions [239].
According to the being who possessed Orin Sanderson, there has been interbreeding between humans and the winged beings from the outer rim of the galaxy. Soon, the winged ones from Yuggoth will return. [RB Strange]
Bringers of Strange Gods
Armitage came to believe that the foulest legends of secret myth were first brought to earth by the Outer Ones [Whisperer (online text) 256]. Randolph Carter believed that Winged Ones had came to Earth to teach the Elder Lore to man [HPL Gates (online text) 432].
As noted previously, the Outer Ones brought the demon-god Ghatonothoa to earth [Aeons (online text) 272]. The Outer Ones reverence Cthulhu, Tsathogguah, Shub-Niggurath, the Lord of the Woods, Azathoth, and Nyarlathotep [Whisperer (online text) 226]. They worship Yog-Sothoth as the Beyond-One [Gates (online text) 439].
Earth Creatures
Dogs and other earthly beasts have always hated the Outer Ones. The region around Akeley's house was devoid of animal life [Whisperer (online text) 262-263]. Akeley's dogs apparently kept the Outer Ones at bay [229]
Resemblances
Professor Dyer, when he saw the Antarctic city of the crinoid Old Ones, was reminded of various primal legends, including the Mi-Go or Abominable Snowmen of the Himalayas [HPL Mountains (online text) 45]. The specimens of the crinoid Old Ones reminded Lake of stories of other elder entities, including the Albert Wilmarth's stories of the Outer Ones [25].
In Books
HH Guardian 299: The tiny man said that the Book includes secrets of the Mi-Go.
Aka: Abominable Snow-Men; Mi-Go; Yuggoth, Spawn of;
Compare with: Black Winged Ones; Winged Ones.
Synonym for Evil Ones (2). HH Guardian 294, 296, 299, 302.
HPL Man (online text) 209.
Poem by Justin Geoffrey. A portion describes giant winged creatures with "mastodonic" hoofs. Since mastodons did not have hooves, the description probably simply implies hooves that are very large, possibly as large as an elephant's feet. John Kirowan prefixed a portion of Geoffrey's poem to his account, The Thing on the Roof. Kirowan may have believed that the poem refers to creatures such as the hoofed, toad-like being worshipped at the Temple of the Toad in Honduras. [REH Roof (online text) 3]
HPL Outsider (online text) 46-52; lived in an ancient castle underground, with no memory of birth or upbringing 46-47; on escaping to the surface, discovered himself to be a monstrosity and recovered his memory 49-52; mentions "those who are still men" - perhaps was human once himself 52; thereafter haunts varous Egyptian settings, incl. catacombs of Nephren-Ka, rock tombs of Neb, feasts beneath the Great Pyramid 52.
By H. P. Lovecraft. "The Outsider and Others is a collection of stories by American writer H. P. Lovecraft. It was released in 1939 and was the first book published by Arkham House. 1,268 copies were printed. It went out of print early in 1944 and has never been reprinted." [The Outsider and Others, Wikipedia]
Josiah Alwyn had a copy (with no dustjacket), and Tony Alwyn had also read it. Tony Alwyn found that the mythology so clearly put down in The Outsider and Others was even more horribly narrated in the Pnakotic Manuscripts, the R’lyeh Text, and the terrible Necronomicon. Further, he thought this mythology was related to the disappearance of two residents of Nelson, Manitoba, and a constable of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police. [AWD Beyond2 160, 172; c.f. AWD Wind (online text)]
Upton Gardner ordered a copy of The Outsider and Others, which he believed would complement his study of the Necronomicon, the Pnakotic Manuscripts, and the R’lyeh Text. Sadly, The Outsider and Others arrived after Gardner's disappearance, but Jack found parallels between the book and notes that Gardner had already written. [AWD Dweller 122, 126, 129, 148.]
HH Guardian 296: A transdimensional place, realm of the Evil Ones (2).
England. HPL Descendant (online text) attended by Lord Northam.
AWD OutThere Soames Hemery, Geoffrey Malvern, Duncan Vernon were among a group of five students sent down after a scandal arising from their sorcerous practices.
Incl. Hemery, Soames; Malvern, Geoffrey; Northam, Lord; Vernon, Duncan.
Oxford-Field Museum Expedition
HPL Mountains (online text) 42.
A river? HPL Nameless (online text) 103.
HPL Yig (online text) 84.
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