There is information about the myth of Cthulhu.

Cthulhu myth is an overhead myth system adapted from howard phillips lovecraft's novel The World, which was perfected by august wilhelm Drees and created by many authors. Cthulhu is not the God of this overhead world, although it is a universal belief on the earth, and the theme of these myths may come from a reinterpretation of myths and legends around the world (such as Wendigo, the legendary snow monster in North America). As long as they accept the concept of Lovecraft's novels and extend them, they can be included in this myth, so this myth system is still expanding and there are many new creations.

The Myth of Lovecraft and Cthulhu

"I think people's thinking lacks the ability to connect with known things, which is the kindest thing in the world. Man lives on an island called ignorance in a dark ocean. This ocean is vast and contains infinite secrets, but we should not sail too far and explore too deep. "

-Lovecraft, the call of Cthulhu

The same theme of Lovecraft's novels is: the value of human beings in the universe is meaningless, and all exploration of the mysterious unknown will lead to a disastrous outcome. Humans often rely on the power of other powerful beings in the universe, but these beings have no interest in humans, if not malice.

The core of the myth is the so-called "great old generation". They are terrible and ancient creatures with great power. They used to rule the earth in ancient times, but now they are asleep. One of the most famous is Cthulhu, which sleeps in the underwater city of Roo-Lee-ah in the South Pacific. When "the positions of many stars are correct", Roo-Lee-ah will float from the bottom of the sea, and Cthulhu will wake up and bring disaster to the earth.

Although Cthulhu is famous and the whole myth system is named after it, it is not the most powerful of the old rulers, nor is it the center of the story. Azathoth, the leader of the fiend, occupies the central position of this system, while Nyarlathotep has more frequent contact with the human world. Compared with other former dominators, Nyarlathotep prefers to deceive and seduce human beings.

Lovecraft himself does not want to systematically sort out the myths he created before his death. In a letter to J.F. Morton on April 27th, 1933,/kloc-0, he expounded some basic viewpoints of the myth system of Cthulhu:

At the beginning of the universe, only Azathoth existed. Three pillars of primitive gods appeared in Azathoth: darkness, nameless fog and chaos.

Blind and stupid, Azathoth originally gave birth to "darkness" for her supreme mother, Shub-Gu Late. She gave birth to almost all her former dominators, including Cthulhu, and even all her life. The nameless fog is Yog-Sothoth, who knows all the time and space and is the key to the silver door. And "chaos" is Naira Totip, the messenger and representative of all gods, and the symbol of ridicule and contradiction. The commonly used human figure is a tall and thin man with dark skin and pleasant expression, who was once worshipped in Egypt. It is said that he taught Einstein to invent the atomic bomb, with the aim of making mankind self-exterminate faster and completing the task of "cleaning up".

The source of terror

"The oldest and strongest emotion of human beings is fear; The oldest and strongest fear is the fear of the unknown. "

-Lovecraft, supernatural terror in literature

The transformation of August Dresden

After Lovecraft's death, august wilhelm Drees, as the heir to the copyright of his works, further improved the system of Cthulhu myth and constructed a general framework. However, Dresden inevitably integrated his Christian values and dualism of good and evil into this construction process; Instead of lovecraft's meaningless chaotic universe, he gave it the theme of the struggle between good and evil.

As Lovecraft imagined in his myth theory, those "ancient gods" first appeared ... these ancient gods were benevolent beings and represented good power. They live quietly near Betelgeuse, Orion, and rarely interfere in the struggle between the earth's races and evil forces. These evil forces are sometimes called "old dominators" and sometimes "ancient dominators" (.

The Myth of August Dresden Cthulhu

In fact, Lovecraft himself is an atheist, and once declared that Kant's moral principles were "a joke". In essence, the myth system created by Dreyfus is not consistent with Lovecraft's idea. Moreover, based on the collective creative characteristics of Cthulhu myth, it can not be regarded as a complete and inseparable whole, but as a collection of many stories and settings based on the same world view.

One problem with the Dresden system is that, except for a few vague examples, Lovecraft never directly mentioned the old gods or ancient gods in his works. In addition, he never thought of building a comprehensive and unified setting for those old dominators (or ancient dominators).

What caused more controversy was that Drees introduced the so-called "element" system into Cthulhu mythology. He divided the former rulers into four camps according to symbolic natural elements: water, fire, wind and earth. In order to fill the blank of this system, Dreyfus even created the images of two former rulers, Cthugha (symbolizing fire) and Ithaqua (symbolizing wind). However, there are still many problems in this classification: for example, Drees classified Cthulhu as a symbol of the existence of "water", but if so, why is it trapped on the seabed and blocked by water? Moreover, in Dresden's system, "fire" and "earth" are enemies, and "water" and "wind" are enemies; This is very different from the traditional element camp (water against fire, wind against the ground).

Different views on Dresden system

"Dreyfus often uses the word' Cthulhu myth' to describe Lovecraft's worldview. Unfortunately, even his own writing distorts the meaning of the word, which may be directly related to his being an apostate and a loose Catholic. In any case, he divided Lovecraft's "old dominator" into good and bad camps, fighting for land and farms. Later, some imitators continued to use this statement, which is far from Lovecraft's trajectory. "

-Robert A. Brock "The Legacy of Terror"

There are many Lovecraft fans who hold a strong contempt for Dreyfus' worldview, thinking that it violates Lovecraft's original intention (which is indeed the case) and turns a bold and imaginative horror world into a vulgar stage of modern fantasy adventure stories with only mythological terms listed; In extreme cases, this controversy even led to factional opposition among fans, and some fans did not include the creation of non-Lovecraft in the category of Cthulhu mythology at all.

For some time after Lovecraft's death, Dreyfus banned other writers from writing stories based on the Cthulhu myth on the grounds of the copyright he inherited. But in 1960, he gave up this request; Since then, the myth of Cthulhu has truly become a world created collectively. Dresden made great contributions to the popularization and perfection of Cthulhu myth, although many boring things were stuffed into the system he created; But without Dreyfus' efforts, Lovecraft and his works would have been forgotten long ago, and the Cthulhu myth would not have such a wide influence today.

Gods and creatures in Cthulhu mythology

Old gods (old gods)

Old gods is the most powerful being in the whole Cthulhu myth system, far beyond the so-called distinction between good and evil, and it is impossible for human beings to understand its will. In ancient times, it fought against the old master and imprisoned and exiled; But its purpose, even itself, is a mystery to human beings, and even its real name is unknown.

Like the ancient gods, the ancient gods were introduced into the Cthulhu myth system by Drees.

The great old generation.

The old dominator is a powerful and ancient creature in the universe. They were imprisoned in ancient times for resisting old gods. Except Nyarlathotep, they can't move freely, but they can be summoned to this world by spells. Most of the old dominators are far beyond the ordinary world, and their power is far beyond human imagination. Ordinary humans will go crazy as soon as they see them. But there are still some alien races, ancient civilizations or crazy mysterious religions who worship them and hope to gain their power.

According to the classification of august wilhelm Dresden, all the former dominators were divided into four camps according to the four elements of water, fire, wind and earth. Among them, the old dominator symbolizing water and wind is opposed to the old dominator symbolizing fire and earth, and both regard each other as sworn enemies.

Old gods (old gods)

The ancient gods were "native" and were introduced into the Cthulhu myth by Drees. They are generally friendly to human beings and help them to oppose the old dominator; Some fans think that the existence of ancient gods is contrary to Lovecraft's idea, so they refuse to recognize its legitimacy; However, some fans retort that the behavior of the ancient gods is purely due to hostility to the old Lord, which does not involve moral factors and has no interest in mankind and the human world itself.

Other supernatural beings.

A powerful existence that does not belong to any of the above categories. Most of the information is unknown.

Overhead place names supplement:

Dream (dreamland)

Celefil Fils (Celefil)

Enchanted forest

Cadas

Cold plateau

Punas valley.

Jin's vault.

Beyond the earth

Aldebaran

betelgeuse

Carl Karkosa

Sixteen Pleiades (Serrano)

Sekera's Cykranosh (Saturn)

Beiluoshimen (the first bright star of Nanyu, the sealed place of Cthulhu's cousin Cthulhu, who is the nemesis of Nyala Totip)

Comet Ketinga (Ketinga)

Lake Harry (Lake Harry)

Sand cover (sand cover)

Todd's star

Yadea thought (Yadea thought)

Jakes (Neptune)

Ilidio Philippine star (Ylidiomph) (Jupiter)

Yuggoth (probably Pluto)

Magic items

Shining trapezoid polyhedron (summon the props of Nyala Totip, stare at it to establish contact with Nyala Totip, and then put it in the dark to summon Nyala Totip)

Huang

Silver key (silver key)

Brew sauce-mead (let people breathe in a vacuum environment so that they can fly between stars on alien creatures)

Mirror of Nitocris (Mirror of Nitokris)