Cthulhu Universalis: Gods, Demons, and Other Singular Entities

Appendix: Gods, Demons, and Other Singular Entities

The question of what constitutes a "god" in Mythos stories is a curious one. Though writing as a mechanistic materialist, Lovecraft sometimes suspended his belief in the supermatural for the sake of eliciting the dread of the unknown. In the later stories, however, there is an increasing apparatus of science-fiction elements. It seems to be implied that most of the "gods" in Lovecraft's stories are simply alien beings with powers much greater than our own. Still, there is a distinction between beings such as Nyarlathotep and the alien races that worship them, such as the Outer Ones. For the purposes of this appendix, a "god" can be defined to be "a being who is worshipped, or who is referred to as a god by the characters or narrator of a story."

Of the gods, there are those that are unique to the Cthulhu Mythos, and those others that are present in world mythology, but are referred to in Mythos stories. Of these latter, some are identified with Mythos beings who have similar attributes; the implication is that the alien Mythos entities gave rise to varied myths in different cultures.

Demons are beings from Judeo-Christian tradition who are regarded are innately evil, or at best, morally neutral.

Lovecrafts family tree of the gods shows the relationships between some of the gods, and lists a number of descendants who might be considered to be gods or demi-gods.

Appendix: Gods, Demons, and Other Singular Entities

Groups of Gods

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