Lovecraftian inspirations from the real life, science, history and culture - You can use them for free

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Download: Lovecraftian inspirations from real life and beliefs by Adeptus7

The free brochure is intended primarily for Game Masters who play games in RPG 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 entertaining for people who do not know the work of The Loner of Providence, but some of the references may be unclear to them.
The article contains several anecdotes – either from real history or from beliefs that exist in the real world, and suggestions on how they can be related to the Cthulhu mythology.

You have my permit to use all those ideas as You wish, in Your scenario, game, book, podcast, video, without the need to reward or mention me in any way.

Below is the table of 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

Erysichton – slayer of living trees, eater of self

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

POLISH FOLKLORE AND LEGENDS

Jan Twardowski – the first man on the Moon

Silent night, starry night

Church in Trzęsacz – Deep ones do not leave their own, even after death

WESTERN EUROPEAN FOLKLORE

The Monstrous German Pied Piper

Ys – Deep Ones princess vs clan of eldritch saints

Jentilak and a Christmas cutthroat

Dragons come in every shape and size

TRUE (OK, SLIGHTLY FAR-FETCHED) HISTORY

Invasion of the Sea Peoples

Greater Germanic Antarctica

The emperor out of the time

The Indus civilization

Order of the Nine Angles – sometimes reality is just as bad and mad as a horror

TRUE (SERIOUSLY) SCIENCE

Mad mathematicians

Humans like ants, ants like zombies

Halny and other foehn winds – the whisper of the wind brings madness

There is more to dimensions than dimensional shamblers

ABRAHAMIC BELIEFS

Covenant with God and Melchizedek

Succubi/incubi, aliens and a sorcerer-pope

Double faith - eldritch cult masquearading as mainstream religions

Stone from the sky, genies and angels

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Cool stuff! For those duckduckgoing “Jan Twardowski” and wondering what a Polish writer and Catholic priest has to do with Lovecraft: they probably meant “Pan Twardowski”, a Polish mythological figure. (“Pan” means simply “Mister”, it’s not a given name.)

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Well, he was actually pan Jan Twardowski (mister John Twardowski) - Jan was his first name, so this was not mistake :slight_smile: Also, as I wrote in the brochure, he was probably historical figure (although of course most of tales about his shenanigans are mythological).

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

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