Nyarlathotep

Artist's rendition of Nyarlathotep.

Nyarlathotep (a.k.a. the Crawling Chaos) is a malign deity in the Cthulhu Mythos fictional universe created by H.P. Lovecraft. The character first appeared in Lovecraft's 1920 prose poem of the same name. He was later mentioned in other works by Lovecraft and by other writers and in the tabletop roleplaying games making use of the Cthulhu Mythos. Later writers describe him as one of the Outer Gods.

Nyarlathotep in the work of H. P. Lovecraft

In his first appearance in "Nyarlathotep", he is described as a "tall, swarthy man" who resembles an ancient Egyptian pharaoh. In this story he wanders the earth, seemingly gathering legions of followers, the narrator of the story among them, through his demonstrations of strange and seemingly magical instruments. These followers lose awareness of the world around them, and through the narrator's increasingly unreliable accounts the reader gets an impression of the world's collapse. The story ends with the narrator as part of an army of servants for Nyarlathotep.

Nyarlathotep subsequently appears as a major character in "The Dream Quest of Unknown Kadath" (1926/27), in which he again manifests in the form of an Egyptian Pharaoh when he confronts protagonist Randolph Carter.

The twenty-first sonnet of Lovecraft's poem-cycle "Fungi from Yuggoth" (1929/30) is essentially a retelling of the original prose poem.

In "The Dreams in the Witch House" (1933), Nyarlathotep appears to Walter Gilman and witch Keziah Mason (who has made a pact with the entity) in the form of "the 'Black Man' of the witch-cult," a black-skinned avatar of the Devil described by witch hunters.

Nyarlathotep is also mentioned in "The Rats in the Walls" as a faceless god in the caverns of earth's center.

Finally, in "The Haunter of the Dark" (1936), the nocturnal tentacled, bat-winged monster dwelling in the steeple of the Starry Wisdom sect's church is identified as another form, or manifestation of, Nyarlathotep.

Though Nyarlathotep appears as a character in only four stories and two sonnets (which is more than any other of Lovecraft's gods), his name is mentioned frequently in other works. In"The Whisperer in Darkness" Nyarlathotep's name is spoken frequently by the Mi-Go in a reverential or ritual sense, indicating that they worship or honor the entity, and in "The Shadow Out of Time" (1936), Nyarlathotep is briefly mentioned to have spoken with the protagonist during his period spent in pre-cambrian earth..

Despite similarities in theme and name, Nyarlathotep does not feature at all in Lovecraft's story "The Crawling Chaos," (1920/21) an apocalyptic narrative written in collaboration with Elizabeth Berkeley.

Inspiration

In a 1921 letter to Reinhardt Kleiner, Lovecraft related the dream he had had — described as "the most realistic and horrible [nightmare] I have experienced since the age of ten" — that served as the basis for his prose poem "Nyarlathotep". In the dream, he received a letter from his friend Samuel Loveman that read:

Don't fail to see Nyarlathotep if he comes to Providence. He is horrible — horrible beyond anything you can imagine — but wonderful. He haunts one for hours afterward. I am still shuddering at what he showed.

Lovecraft commented:

I had never heard the name NYARLATHOTEP before, but seemed to understand the allusion. Nyarlathotep was a kind of itinerant showman or lecturer who held forth in public halls and aroused widespread fear and discussion with his exhibitions. These exhibitions consisted of two parts — first, a horrible — possibly prophetic — cinema reel; and later some extraordinary experiments with scientific and electrical apparatus. As I received the letter, I seemed to recall that Nyarlathotep was already in Providence.... I seemed to remember that persons had whispered to me in awe of his horrors, and warned me not to go near him. But Loveman's dream letter decided me.... As I left the house I saw throngs of men plodding through the night, all whispering affrightedly and bound in one direction. I fell in with them, afraid yet eager to see and hear the great, the obscure, the unutterable Nyarlathotep.

Will Murray has speculated that this dream image of Nyarlathotep may have been inspired by the inventor Nikola Tesla, whose well-attended lectures did involve extraordinary experiments with electrical apparatus and whom some saw as a sinister figure.

Robert M. Price proposes that the name Nyarlathotep may have been subconsciously suggested to Lovecraft by two names from Lord Dunsany, an author he much admired. Alhireth-Hotep, a false prophet, appears in Dunsany's The Gods of Pegana and Mynarthitep, a god described as "angry" in his "The Sorrow of Search".

Summary

Nyarlathotep differs from the other beings in a number of ways. Most of them are exiled to stars, like Yog-Sothoth and Hastur, or sleeping and dreaming like Cthulhu; Nyarlathotep, however, is active and frequently walks the Earth in the guise of a human being, usually a tall, slim, joyous man. He has "a thousand" other forms, most of these reputed to be maddeningly horrific. Most of the Outer Gods have their own cults serving them; Nyarlathotep seems to serve these cults and take care of their affairs in their absence. Most of them use strange alien languages, while Nyarlathotep uses human languages and can be mistaken for a human being. Most importantly, while the other Outer Gods and Great Old Ones are often described as mindless or unfathomable, rather than truly malevolent, Nyarlathotep delights in cruelty, is deceptive and manipulative, and even cultivates followers and uses propaganda to achieve his goals. In this regard, he is probably the most human-like among them.

Nyarlathotep enacts the will of the Outer Gods, and is their messenger, heart and soul; he is also a servant of Azathoth, whose wishes he immediately fulfills. Unlike the other Outer Gods, causing madness is more important and enjoyable than death and destruction to Nyarlathotep. It is suggested by some that he will destroy the human race and possibly the earth as well.

Quotations

And it was then that Nyarlathotep came out of Egypt. Who he was, none could tell, but he was of the old native blood and looked like a Pharaoh. The fellahin knelt when they saw him, yet could not say why. He said he had risen up out of the blackness of twenty-seven centuries, and that he had heard messages from places not on this planet. Into the lands of civilisation came Nyarlathotep, swarthy, slender, and sinister, always buying strange instruments of glass and metal and combining them into instruments yet stranger. He spoke much of the sciences - of electricity and psychology - and gave exhibitions of power which sent his spectators away speechless, yet which swelled his fame to exceeding magnitude. Men advised one another to see Nyarlathotep, and shuddered. And where Nyarlathotep went, rest vanished; for the small hours were rent with the screams of a nightmare.
—H. P. Lovecraft, Nyarlathotep

And through this revolting graveyard of the universe the muffled, maddening beating of drums, and thin, monotonous whine of blasphemous flutes from inconceivable, unlighted chambers beyond Time; the detestable pounding and piping whereunto dance slowly, awkwardly, and absurdly the gigantic, tenebrous ultimate gods — the blind, voiceless, mindless gargoyles whose soul is Nyarlathotep.
—H. P. Lovecraft, Nyarlathotep

It was the eldritch scurrying of those fiend-born rats, always questing for new horrors, and determined to lead me on even unto those grinning caverns of earth's centre where Nyarlathotep, the mad faceless god, howls blindly to the piping of two amorphous idiot flute-players.

—H. P. Lovecraft, The Rats in the Walls

What his fate would be, he did not know; but he felt that he was held for the coming of that frightful soul and messenger of infinity's Other Gods, the crawling chaos Nyarlathotep.

—H. P. Lovecraft, The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath

There was the immemorial figure of the deputy or messenger of hidden and terrible powers - the "Black Man" of the witch cult, and the "Nyarlathotep" of the Necronomicon.

—H. P. Lovecraft, The Dreams in the Witch House

The Nyarlathotep Cycle

In 1996, Chaosium published The Nyarlathotep Cycle, a Cthulhu Mythos anthology focusing on works referring to or inspired by the entity Nyarlathotep. Edited by Lovecraft scholar Robert M. Price, the book includes an introduction by Price tracing the roots and development of the God of a Thousand Forms. The contents include:

• "Alhireth-Hotep the Prophet" by Lord Dunsany
• "The Sorrow of Search" by Lord Dunsany
• "Nyarlathotep" by H. P. Lovecraft
• "The Second Coming" (poem) by William Butler Yeats
• "Silence Falls on Mecca’s Walls" (poem) by Robert E. Howard
• "Nyarlathotep" (poem) by H. P. Lovecraft
• "The Dreams in the Witch House" by H. P. Lovecraft
• "The Haunter of the Dark" by H. P. Lovecraft
• "The Dweller in Darkness" by August Derleth
• "The Titan in the Crypt" by J. G. Warner
• "Fane of the Black Pharaoh" by Robert Bloch
• "Curse of the Black Pharaoh" by Lin Carter
• "The Curse of Nephren-Ka" by John Cockroft
• "The Temple of Nephren-Ka" by Philip J. Rahman & Glenn A. Rahman
• "The Papyrus of Nephren-Ka" by Robert C. Culp
• "The Snout in the Alcove" by Gary Myers
• "The Contemplative Sphinx" (poem) by Richard Tierney
• "Ech-Pi-El’s Ægypt" (poems) by Ann K. Schwader

Popular culture

Literature

Nyarlathotep sometimes appears or is referred to in literature outside the Cthulhu Mythos genre of horror:

• In Stephen King's The Stand and his Dark Tower series of books, the character Randall Flagg was known (among many other names) as Nyarlathotep. His short story "Crouch End" features the name spelled "Nyarlahotep". In The Dark Tower VII: The Dark Tower, a fictional version of King himself mentions Nyarlathotep.
• The children's horror writer Brad Strickland used Nyarlathotep as the main antagonist in his book The Wrath of the Grinning Ghost.
• Nyarlathotep is a student in Harry Turtledove's short story "The Genetics Lecture."
• The Book of the SubGenius briefly mentions an entity called "Nyardim Thothep."
• Pulp novelist Barry Reese uses Nyarlathotep in several of his Rook Universe stories. Nyarlathotep appears in "Kingdom of Blood" and "The Gasping Death". Nyarlathotep also appears under the guise Mr. Blackman in the short story "The Great Work" which was printed in both Thrilling Adventures and the fifth edition of Startling Stories
• In the novel The Arcanum, a case involving Nyarlathotep is said to have been solved by Lovecraft himself.
• In Kim Newman's Richard Jeperson short story "Soho Golem", an occultist (holding the noble title "Lord Leaves of Leng") is a priest of Nyarlathotep. Nyarlathotep is said to be summoned by dancing.

Comics

• Nyarlathotep is a French comic book by Rotomago and J. Noirel, literal adaptation of the homonymous Lovecrafts' short story.
• Magic spells in the comic book Conan the Barbarian feature invocations to "Nyarla Thotep".
• In Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Loki summons Nyarlathotep, "tearer of souls, ripper of flesh".
• In Unspeakable Vault (of Doom), Nyarlathotep regularly appears as what looks like a living tentacle with arms and legs.
• Nyarlathotep appears at the end of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier as an emissary sent from Yuggoth to negotiate a truce with Prospero of the Blazing World.

Music

• German heavy metal band Rage has a song titled "The Crawling Chaos", a song seemingly about the destruction of the earth by Nyarlathotep, on their 1995 album Black in Mind.
• The band Nox Arcana has a song titled "Nyarlathotep".
• The band Darkest of the Hillside Thickets has a song titled "Nyarlathotep" on their album The Shadow Out of Tim. The song's lyrics are written entirely in Middle Egyptian.
• Metallica's song "The Thing That Should Not Be" refers to the "Crawling Chaos underground" in one verse, but is mostly a song about Lovecraft's story "The Shadow Over Innsmouth".
• The band Dream Theater has a song titled "The Dark Eternal Night" which is adapted from Lovecraft's writing.
• Experimental electronic project Flint Glass has an album titled "Nyarlathotep", all music on this album was inspired by the Cthulhu Mythos.
• Australian death metal band Portal has a song titled "Omnipotent Crawling Chaos" in which the name Nyarlathotep is clearly mentioned. Portal's lyrics tend to reference Cthulhu Mythos.

Games

• Nyarlathotep appears in the Persona series of PlayStation games as a god symbolic of the destructive potential of Carl Jung's collective unconscious, although, he only plays a significant role in the first title, and both parts of the second title.
• Nyarlathotep is the main antagonist of the Demonbane series which spans games, comics, novels, and a TV series, in which it is trying to free its father Azathoth from the Shining Trapezohedron. It has taken on four named forms so far: Nya, an owner of a mysterious bookstore filled with dangerous grimoires, Nyarla, a maid to Augusta Derleth, Father Ny, the leader of the Church of Starry Wisdom, and the Tick-Tock Man, technology incarnate. It has also taken on the forms of an unnamed black man "from Egypt", and a talking black rat, among others. Its "true" form is depicted as a great shadow filled with fangs and claws and tentacles with three flaming eyes.

Film

• A 13-minute short film version of Nyarlathotep was released in 2001, directed by Christian Matzke. It was re-released on DVD in 2004 as part of the H. P. Lovecraft Collection Volume 1: Cool Air.

References

• Harms, Daniel. "Nyarlathotep" in The Encyclopedia Cthulhiana (2nd ed.), pp. 218–222. Oakland, CA: Chaosium, 1998. ISBN 1-56882-119-0.