Lovecraftian inspirations from the real life and beliefs

[Mishuk]

https://adeptus7.itch.io/lovecraftian-in...nd-beliefs

You can use them as You wish, for free, eg. as part of Your game, book, whatever.

This free brochure contains inspiration drawn from the beliefs of peoples who actually inhabit the Earth now or in the past, or from facts taken straight from history or science. Each case includes the suggestion, how given beliefs or facts can be interpreted in the spirit of cosmic horror, emphasizing their appropriate elements or bending them slightly. Sometimes the descriptions are quite brief - a detailed discussion of each topic would take a lot of space and time. These are rather teasers intended to show why a specific thing may be interesting for fans of eldritch vibes and possibly encourage them to take a closer look at the topic.
The article is intended primarily for Game Masters who play games in systems inspired by Lovecraft's works, such as Call of Cthulhu or Delta Green. However, I hope that other fans of cosmic horror will also find something for themselves here. The interesting facts presented here may also be interesting for people who are not familiar with the work of The Loner of Providence, but some of the references may be unclear to them.

Here are contents:
GREEK MYTHOLOGY
Typhon – a classic but forgotten abomination
Zeus – embodied energy
In his house underground, dead Hades waits in sleep
Apollo – beautiful, deadly light
Hermes is the gate, Hermes is the key
NORDIC MYTHOLOGY
A jotun is not the same as a giant, but it can be made into an abomination
Odyn = Nodens, Loki = Nyarlathotep
Or is Odin an abomination?
Einherjers and Odin the human
POLOSH FOLKLORE AND LEGENDS
Jan Twardowski – the first man on the Moon
Silen night, starry night
Church in Trzęsacz – Deep ones do not leave their own, even after death
TRUE (OK, SLIGHTLY FAR-FETCHED) HISTORY
Invasion of the Sea Peoples
Greater Germanic Antarctica
The emperor out of the time
The Indus civilization
TRUE (SERIOUSLY) SCIENCE
Mad mathematicians
Humans like ants, ants like zombies
Halny and other foehn winds - the whisper of the wind brings madness
ABRAHAMIC BELIEFS
Covenant with God and Melchizedek
Succubi/incubi, aliens and a sorcerer-pope
Double faith
Stone from the sky, genies and angels

 

[Mishuk]

We published video fragment.



View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mHnrYCqlv9k

Mathematics is a language that humans use to describe reality and the universe. And since the nature of reality is shocking in cosmic horror, the logical conclusion is that studying it can lead to madness. The motif „magic, if it works, is really mathematics and physics, the understanding of which exceeds the human mind” appears in Lovecraft, for example in „Dreams in the Witch House”. This usually works on the principle that the Necromicon and other „books of magic” contain scraps of advanced knowledge obtained from inhuman beings, which superstitious sorcerers then treat as magic. Therefore, it should also work the other way round – a professional scientist should be able to discover dirty and blasphemous secrets through scientific research. Here are some viable candidates for „scholars who looked into the abyss, and the abyss looked into them.”

Kurt Gödel (1906-1978) – Austrian-American mathematician, physicist and philosopher. He dealt with, among others, theory of relativity (which in itself negates the image of the world that „common sense” dictates to us), deriving from it equations intended to prove the possibility of time travel. Towards the end of his life he went crazy, among other things. believing someone was trying to poison him. When his wife was hospitalized for a long time and was unable to taste his meals to prove the lack of poison, Gödel starved himself to death.

Georg Cantor (1845-1918) – German mathematician, creator of set theory. Over time, he delved deeper into mysticism and claimed that mathematics could be used to reach conclusions about metaphysics. Some Christian (Cantor himself considered himself a devout Christian) philosophers of his time claimed that Cantor’s mathematical theories were contrary to religious dogmas (it was something about proving the existence of an infinite being, other than God – I am not a mathematician, I don’t really understand what is going on). Cantor was tormented by bouts of depression, sometimes so severe that they led to hospitalization.

Ludwig Boltzmann (1844-1906) – Austrian physicist, pioneer of the kinetic theory of gases. He theorized the “Boltzmann brain” – a hypothetical self-aware entity that emerges from chaos through random fluctuations. Boltzmann proposed that we and our observed low-entropy world arose from a random fluctuation in a higher-entropy universe. He committed suicide by hanging. „If our current level of organization, having many self-aware entities, is the result of random fluctuation, and it is much less likely to be so than a level of organization that produces only self-aware self-aware entities, then in any universe with the level of organization we see, there should be a huge number of solitary Boltzmann brains floating in unrecognized environments. In an infinite universe, the number of self-aware brains spontaneously, randomly emerging from chaos, along with false memories of life like ours, should far outweigh the number of real brains evolved in the observable universe, arising from unimaginably rare fluctuations”. Did I understand it? Not really, but it sounds quite Lovecraftian – self-aware beings emerging from chaos, our world as a result of random processes taking place in the „higher” universe… it’s easy to spin a cosmic horror out of it. And let's theorize that Boltzmann’s suicide was due to the terrifying conclusions he had reached…

Paul Ehrenfest (1880-1930) – Austrian-Dutch physicist. He researched the theory of relativity (which, as I mentioned, very often leads to „crazy” conclusions about the nature of reality) and laid the foundations for quantum physics (which is even crazier). Towards the end of his life, he fell into severe depression and shot first his son and then himself.

Grigory Perelman (1966) – the only still living member of this group, a Russian mathematician. He had a brilliant career in Russia and the USA. His greatest achievement was presenting evidence for the so-called Poincaré’s hypothesis regarding the shape of the universe. Unexpectedly, in 2005 he left his job and broke off all contacts with the scientific community… And not only that – he stopped leaving his apartment, communicating only by phone or through the door. He consistently rejects all job offers and awards (including the Millennium Award worth one million dollars!).

Each of these gentlemen (except Perelman) lived at the turn of the 20th and 19th centuries. Each of them can be used in the scenario – either as a living and active NPC, as a dead source of knowledge (in the form of unpublished notes containing mythical secrets), or as a background reference („Don’t think about it, Professor X conducted research in this direction… and how did he end up?).

 

[Mishuk]

And now, time for the next video fragment, inspired by the Greek mythology.


View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FB-NO9snkrQ


It would seem that the Greek gods, so human in their forms and characters, are as far removed from incomprehensible eldritch abominations as possible. It's important to remember, however, that the image presented to us by contemporary pop culture—and even by many works of ancient poets—does not fully capture ancient beliefs. And every deity can be interpreted through Lovecraftian lenses.

We will start with the king of Olympus himself, Zeus.

In the current pop culture, Zeus is associated primarily as a mega-fucker, who will miss no woman. I propose to combine this aspect with his main role - the ruler of lightning - and create something more eldritch.

I propose Zeus as the embodiment of energy - all energy, and therefore not only electricity (lightning), but also life energy. Plato, in his Cratylus work, gives a folk etymology of Zeus meaning "cause of life always to all things", because of puns between alternate titles of Zeus (Zen and Dia) with the Greek words for life and "because of" .

Zeus influence is so strong that its mere presence causes women to become pregnant, giving birth to "heroes" characterized by great strength, aggression and psychopathic tendencies. It has been noticed that these heroes very often get into fights with the offspring of the greatest Zeus' enemy, Typhon (we will talk him in the next episode) - perhaps this means that Zeus does not impregnate women by accident, it is part of his plan to cleanse the Earth of the offspring of his archenemy... Or maybe it is a coincidence.

I propose that Hera, so called "jealous wife" of Zeus, who is known for persecuting his "mistresses" and offspring, is a being sent (by who or what?) to limit the Thunderer's breeding influence. However, while in his presence, she succumbed to his influence and gave birth to Zeus' spawn.

It happened once that Zeus' excess energy caused him to produce a new creature - Athena - without impregnating a mortal woman. She is the goddess of wisdom, and in the computer age we know that information is organized energy. Moreover, some myths hold that Athena did have a mother... in a sense. Metis was a shapeshifting Titan, Zeus's first wife, even before Hera. One day, Zeus devoured her whole. Athena was supposedly the result of this union. And again, gods devouring each other are more akin to eldritch. horror beings.

The myth of Semele is important here. Well, Semele, a demigoddess (daughter of Harmonia) became one of Zeus' lovers. Hera took the form of a mortal woman and persuaded Semele to test Zeus - if he really was a god, let him appear to her in his divine form. Zeus reluctantly granted Semele's wish, revealing himself as a thunderstorm. It turned out that even the demigoddess could not stand the true form of Zeus and she was burned to ashes, but her fetus - Dionysus - survived. Zeus placed the baby in his own body, where it matured. This story shows that Zeus isn't actually a muscular, bearded guy - he's just one of many forms he takes when dealing with mortals, like a bull or a golden shower.

A little-known aspect of Zeus is his strange connection to... werewolves. According to Plato a particular clan would gather on the mountain to make a sacrifice every nine years to Zeus Lykaios, and a single morsel of human entrails would be intermingled with the animal's. Whoever ate the human flesh was said to turn into a wolf, and could only regain human form if he did not eat again of human flesh until the next nine-year cycle had ended. There were games associated with the Lykaia, removed in the fourth century to the first urbanization of Arcadia, Megalopolis; there the major temple was dedicated to Zeus Lykaios.

And here, too, we can find Zeus not only as the master of lightning, but as the source of all energy—including life energy. Just as his influence causes women to become pregnant and give birth to extraordinary heroes, so his influence on men, combined with bizarre, cannibalistic rituals, mutates men into powerful, savage beasts.

This is just small part of the full free brochure full of Lovecraftian concepts from the real life, culture, history and science: adeptus7.itch.io/lovecraftian-inspirations-from-real-life-and-beliefs

 

[Caichan]

Hello

 

[Mishuk]

Hello

Helo, what's up?

 

[Mishuk]

(Here is an audio version:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WIWrJ-j-QjQ
. It was written as scenario seed for a Lovecraftian RPG).

Modern works drawing on Greek mythology usually make Hades (completely wrong) or Kronos (a little more) the Big Bad, but they forget about Zeus’s greatest enemy – Typhon. After defeating the titans and then the gigants, the Olympian gods had to face the main boss on the way to dominating the world – Typhon. Here is an example of its description: It was larger than the largest mountains, its head touched the stars. When he stretched out his hands, one reached the eastern ends of the world and the other reached the western ends. Instead of fingers, he had a hundred dragon heads. From the waist down he had a tangle of vipers (yay, tentacles!) and wings at his shoulders. His eyes were shooting out flames. In other versions of the myth, Typhon was a flying, hundred-headed dragon. In any case – appearance and stature worthy of the Great Old One. Typhon attacked Olympus, and all the gods except Zeus fled in panic. The supreme god took up the fight… and lost it. Only in the second duel did he manage to defeat Typhon, but not kill him – he only imprisoned him, hitting him with a mountain which is known as Etna. And volcanic activity is the result of Typhon’s anger, trying to break free.

Typhon equaled the lord of heaven not only in strength, but in fertility. His wife was Echidna, about whom Hesiod wrote: „She also gave birth to another creature, invincible, huge, unlike neither men nor immortal gods, in a hollow cave – the divine violent Echidna, half a sharp-eyed young girl, with beautiful cheeks, half a huge snake, a great and powerful, spotted, cruel – in the depths of the holy land. This pair spawned many, if not most, of the monsters found in Greek mythology. Their offspring were very diverse and strange, as befits the spawn of enemies of the divine order, including:
– Ladon, the hundred-headed dragon who never slept and guarded the apples that gave immortality,

– Cerberus – we all know the dog guarding the gates of hell… but not all of us know that, according to some accounts, it had not three heads, but as many as 50, it was also covered with scales, and it had a snake for a tail… so what does this have to do with a dog?

– Scylla – this lady inherited the most from the human, beautiful part of Echidna… at least initially, but eventually, as a result of various perturbations, she turned from a beautiful nymph to something like her siblings, becoming a six-headed sea beast, so hideous, according to Homer, that even the gods could not stand sight of her – she dwelt in a cave, from where she opened her mouth to devour the crews of ships,

– Gorgons – I mean, those ladies with snake hair, not monstrous bulls. Medusa was one of them – the story that Athena turned her priestess into a monster as punishment for being raped by Poseidon is an invention of later poets,

– Lernaean Hydra – a multi-headed monster with many reptilian or human heads. In place of each severed head, two others grew, and in addition, the main head was completely immortal – therefore, after chopping off the mortal heads, Heracles had to burn the stumps and bury the immortal, still hissing head underground. Hydra’s breath was poisonous,

– various other creatures, such as the Sphinx, the dog Ortus, the Nemean Lion or the Chimera.
Each of these descendants has the potential to be portrayed as an Eldritch abomination in its own right. To be precise – according to some accounts, the father of these creatures (and Echidna herself) wasn’t Typhon, but a monstrous, ancient (older than Poseidon) sea god, Phorcys.

How to use Typhon? Well, Typhon clearly has the potential to be a Great Old One, imprisoned by… Nodens? Some other Elder God? Weak gods of humanity? Maybe his cult is trying to free him from Etna? What if he succeeds? What might distinguish Typhon from many other Great Old Ones? I would recommend focusing on his monster progenitor aspect – if he manages to reunite with Echidna, they will immediately start spawning various blasphemous beasts in series.

More Lovecraftian inspirations You will find in the free brochure: https://adeptus7.itch.io/lovecraftian-inspirations-from-real-life-and-beliefs

 

[PhineasSpear]

Well then

 

[St3v3Cel]

Did you make all this?