H.P. Lovecraft's Deities

[Mirabilis]

I've always wondered this, I've never had the privilege to read any of his books, but is H.P. Lovecraft's deities, old gods and so on based off of actual religious, pagan or demonic entities/gods or are they all created from his own imagination? I always thought it was interesting but the sources on his creatures seems limited to describing them within his own universe. I'm not really looking for more info with regards to their existences within his own stories, but anything referring to them outside of them. Like their inspiration or where he got the ideas for them.

 

This may seem like an odd topic to many, but I actually really enjoy studying religions, belief systems and demonology. I have many various religious texts speaking about various entities and demonic beings. I ask this only because one of my books on demons and demonology actually speaks about Cthulu, really the only reason why I'm curious.

Edited June 24, 2015 by Mirabilis

[Shin Mefilas]

Thats actually quite hard to pin down.

The likes of Cthulhu and Yog-Sothoth where as far as I know his own creations while other like Dagon take inspiration from actual deities. This is made even more confusing by the fact that the lovecraft mythos has been added to by some many people (his friends at the time and a lot of other people since).

Dagon - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dagon

I own a lot of lovecraft related stuff (although I have yet to read it all yet).

Edited June 24, 2015 by Demon God Demigra

[Salkafar]

I have read quite a bit of Lovecraft's Mythos stuff (and a lot of Mythos stories by other authors, as well) and I can tell you that he made it up. Except perhaps some of the names, like Dagon. But his cosmology and teratology were entirely him. Maybe he borrowed a little from Lord Dunsany and Robert Chambers.

[Mirabilis]

 Awesome! Thanks guys! I really appreciate it. 

[The Crimson Guyver]

He also borrowed some ideas from Hermeticism and Hermetica (Been looking up Lovecraft's Mythos the past month saw discussions on it and how hermeticism seems to be similar. Here is a little excerpt.
 

 

Then an immense being, of indeterminate form, seemed to call him by name.

 

"Who art thou?" said the terrified Hermes.

 

"I am Osiris, the sovereign Intelligence who is able to unveil all things. What desirest thou?"

 

"To behold the source of beings, O divine Osiris, and to know God."

 

"Thou shalt be satisfied."

 

Immediately Hermes felt himself plunged in a delicious light. In its pellucid billows passed the ravishing forms of all beings. Suddenly, a terrifying encircling darkness descended upon him. Hermes was in a humid chaos, filled with smoke and with a heavy, rumbling sound. Then a voice rose from the abyss, the cry of light. At once a quick-leaping flame darted forth from the humid depths, reaching to the ethereal heights. Hermes ascended with it, and found himself again in the expanse of space. Order began to clear up chaos in the abyss; choruses of constellations spread above his head and the voice of light filled infinity.

 

"Dost thou understand what thou hast seen?" said Osiris to Hermes, bound down in his dream and suspended between earth and sky.

 

"No," said Hermes

 

"Thou wilt now learn. Thou hast just seen what exists from all eternity..."

 

"What marvellous sense has opened out to me?" asked Hermes. "I no longer see with the eyes of the body, but with those of the spirit. How has that come to pass?"

[Salkafar]

That seems about getting to learn about the beauty and wisdom of God.

 

Lovecraft is more about the opposite.

[Mirabilis]

Is there a like a chronological list of books to read within his universe? Or are they just a lot of separate stories? Again my knowledge is really only limited to things like wiki's and such. I guess if I was going to get into his material were would you suggest I start?

[The Crimson Guyver]

I found this list here

[Shin Mefilas]

"That is not dead which can eternal lie, And with strange aeons even death may die." 

 

His stories are all short stories that take place within the world he created.

 

An ongoing theme in Lovecraft's work is the complete irrelevance of mankind in the face of the cosmic horrors that apparently exist in the universe.

 

His pantheon of gods is normal broken into two groups. The Great Old Ones and The Outer God.

 

The Great Old Ones such as Cthulhu,  are ancient powerful deities from space some of which once ruled the Earth and who have since fallen into a deathlike sleep millenia ago. To look app-on them is normally to much for the mind to bare so peoples descriptions of them are often vague. While their forms and powers vary greatly they are normal worshiped by cults both human and none-human.

 

The Outer God are beings of vast and great power. These are the ruling gods of the universe and all that is is subject to their dark uncaring designs. They are multi-dimensional beings that are truly beyond the the humans minds ability to grasp. Their appearance is described as geometric shapes, sphere or bubbling nuclear chaos to human eyes. Only the darkest and most evil of beings knowingly worship them.

Edited June 28, 2015 by Demon God Demigra

[The Crimson Guyver]

I found this bestiary/family tree map I really like how it is laid out.

[Salkafar]

Thing is, Cthulhu isn't even that important in the greater scheme of Great Old Ones and Outer Gods. Earth is choking with beings like that and they are somehow all dormant right now. Imagine what would happen if they all awoke at once rather than every now and then when someone accidentally pokes them in their sleep.

Ubbo-Sathla: he really shouldn't be an Outer God. He's basically the Primordial Soup, a mindless organic goop which constantly produced life forms, way back at the dawn of the Proterozoic. I also think Abhoth is the degenerated remnant of Ubbo-Sathla.

Another bit of headcanon: the two most powerful Outer Gods are Azathoth, who is generally thought of as more powerful than all the rest put together, and responsible for the creation of the entire universe... and is completely insane, pretty much catatonic and just sort of squatting at the heart of existence; and Yog-Sothoth, who is ethereal, intelligent and destructive, known as the Keeper of the Gate. The headcanon part is this: they're not two entities. It's not Azathoth and Yog-Sothoth, it's Azatot and Yogzatot - Body and Mind. When the original, unknown entity created the universe - accidentally or not - he trapped part of himself inside. The mind is still outside, and every 'incursion' of "Yog-Sothoth" is him attempting to fix it.

Nyarlathotep is the nascent consciousness of the universe trying to prevent this, because he likes existing. Compared to Azathot he is practically powerless, but by human standards he is very much a god.

The Outer Gods are like parasites of Azatot, rampant because his mind can't manage 'pest control' now; the fleas, intestinal worms and lice equivalents on a divine scale.

Everything else in the Mythos - including the Great Old Ones - is native to the universe which was created by Azatot/Yogzatot, and they seem monstrous only because they are so different from us. Some of them are offspring or descendants of Outer Gods, though, so I guess that makes them hybrids.

Humanity - and incidentally, also the shoggoth race and the great race of Yith - is descended from Ubbo-Sathla, which was created by Azathoth/Yog-Sothoth. Therefore, humans (and, I guess, shoggoths and Yithans as well) subconsciously strive to re-unite the two. That is why humanity and shoggoths and possibly all other natural alien races are being targeted by Great Old Ones and Outer Gods and their servants such as Deep Ones and the Tcho-Tcho people - they realize that if we succeed, it's the end of the universe and of them.

Some of the more ancient alien races - Elder Things, Mi-Go - might also realize that humanity's propensity for invoking alien entities might lead to disaster one day, so they try to keep us stupid and destroy us if they can; of if we actually succeed, intercept the call and appear themselves instead to destroy the unfortunate conjurer.

Humans also do degenerate things, such as using magic or technology to raise the dead, or create monstrous hybrids. Aliens and other entities are forever trying to lure humanity away from its intended purpose (and the purpose of all natural life in the universe, so perhaps every inhabited planet has its own version of the Mythos).

But humanity is tough, much more so than Lovecraft makes out. For all the myriad attacks on humankind by the seemingly endless array of aliens and gods, we survive... and become more dangerous by the day. Maybe humanity is the really scary entity in the Mythos - the final story will be humanity finally fulfilling its destiny and with some kind of magic or technology or both finally open the Gate, and as all of creation, al the gods and monsters, howl in despair, all the walls everywhere will come down and creation will collapse as God is finally whole again.

Perhaps he will decide we're worth preserving.

Edited June 28, 2015 by Salkafar

[The Crimson Guyver]

So the Elder things utilized Ubbo-Sathla to make the shoggoths? The way the narrator in Mountains of Madness describes the Elder Things (just from his own point of view so it could be entirely wrong.) they were just a people as well just like humans just more advanced. So the Elder Things are related to the the outer gods some how even though it seemed they had free will and even fight Cthulhu and his spawn to a stand still which is damn impressive if all the hype for cthulhu is real.

Humanity being the scary entity of the universe seems a bit reversed on what Lovecraft was focusing on being the fear of the unknown and being just completely nothing in the grand scheme of the cosmos. I wonder if Lovecraft was still alive with the later science fiction bringing in other solar systems, other planets and other galaxies even if he would've done that as well? But in the 1920s I don't think there was a prevalent theory of other planets with scientists so it makes sense all these beings all reside on Earth.

I also find it extremely weird that an advance race (the snake people) were pretty much wiped out by Dinosaurs. How was that possible?

[Salkafar]

The snake people? Like the folks from 'the Lost City'?

 

I don't know if the Elder Things actually used Ubbo-Sathla. I mean they arrived, what, two billion years ago? I think he was pretty much played out by then.

 

And humans being scary, well, we are germs to the Great Old Ones... but germs can be pretty scary. SARS, MERS, MRSA, AIDS...

[The Crimson Guyver]

The Serpent Men who made the city of Valusia and when dinosaurs came into being in the triassic period got eaten I guess but sort of survived till humanity came. But it seems the serpent men were weak for some reason since humanity even wipes them out of Valusia.

[Salkafar]

Maybe.  Before the Dinosaurs they'd still have to contend with our ancestors, the theracephalians.