R'lyehian

ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn
In his house at R'lyeh dead Cthulhu lies dreaming.

— H.P. Lovecraft, The Cult of Cthulhu, "The Call of Cthulhu"

R'lyehian was brought to prehistoric Earth by the spawn of Cthulhu. R'lyehian is also known on the planet Thanagar, where Cthulhu, known as Ichtultu there, was worshipped as a major deity. This is the language of the Old Ones. The Elder Gods and their kin were colossal beings who walked the Earth in the age of gods. Their language, R'lyehian, originated before the universe's birth and hailed from realms unfathomable to the human mind. Scholars argued that the alien, unearthly language with its coughing, guttural, and confused sounds defied the human tongue. That hasn't stopped cults of the Old Ones from attempting to do so in their work to summon these entities from places beyond mortal comprehension and demanding they use their power for their selfish ends.

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History

R'lyehian was brought to the Earth realm by the Old Ones who settled in R'lyeh on the land mass of Mu. Their spawn seeped out from the ancient city with cyclopean buildings constructed in the unnatural shapes of non-Euclidean geometry. Gaea cursed them and the Elder Gods for infecting her home and her body and summoned Atum to cleanse them from the Earth realm. The Elder god Chthon and the Old Ones transcribed their dark rituals and forbidden knowledge onto scrolls scattered throughout the lands before being banished to other planes. The Elder Gods were sent to planes of darkness outside of this reality and contained there while the Greater Old Ones were sent deep into intergalactic space or into the lands of the dead where they became known as Deadites. The Lesser Old Ones fell into slumber in the ruins of R'lyeh, and their alien language survived through those writings that were scattered before Homo sapiens inherited the Earth.

The Thurian Age

When humans began to cover the major continents of the Thurian age, they eventually found their way onto the island continent of Mu where they encountered the ruins of R'lyeh and the forbidden knowledge that the Old Ones had left behind. While Gaea and Oranous had laid together in the Earth realm and populated it with their Primordial offspring and then the Hecatoncheries, the Cyclopes, and the Titans, the Chthonian gods did the same with the underworld. Hecate, also known as Hequat, was also drawn to Mu because of the Eldritch energies left behind. She gifted the people of Mu with sorcery and a fundamental understanding of R'lyehian. The Mu mystics took to worshiping the Lesser Old One Ghatanothoa trapped under Mouth Yaddith-Gho, though some resisted the prevailing religion. A contending religion for the Greater Old One Shub-Niggurath was led by the high priest Tyrog, and the cult of Zanthu the Hierophant also formed that worshipped Ythogtha, the second son of Cthulhu who slumbered in R'lyeah. All of these cults were formed around the Mu's limited understanding of the Scrolls of Dead Names, and there were still those who would not bow to any of these powers.

Hecate cast out those who didn’t pledge to the Old Ones, forcing them across the Eastern Sea to an unknown landmass. They traveled until they hit another great sea where they found the ancient mystic city of Orenbega. And there they came to rest. The Mu mystics back in their homeland were rewarded for loyalty when Ghatanothoa awoke and enslaved all his worshippers. His very presence drove all of the survivors mad because his form was not meant to be seen by human eyes. Those who followed the smaller cults were killed. The survivors then began to infiltrate the Lemurian cities in the scattered islands between Mu and the continent of Thuria, spreading their knowledge from the Old Ones and Hecate. With the teachings of mysticism, they also brainwashed Deviant and human Lemurians alike into the worship of Ghatanothoa. This expansion was stopped when Arishem came with the other Celestials and decided that human society was moving in the wrong direction. They brought about the Great Cataclysm and the first landmass to sink was Mu and the Lemurian civilization, taking the direct knowledge of R'leyhian with them.

The Hyborian Age

As the land masses settled into the new Hyborian continent, the Lemurian survivors moved in first establishing several ancient empires as they moved West. Among these survivors was a sorcerer named Skelos who passed forward the knowledge he or she could through Darkhold Scrolls and Scrolls of Dead Names. Skelos' teaching spread West to Acheron and Old Stygia, where it was picked up and embraced by the Giant Kings of Ancient Stygia. The Lemurian descendants in Eastern Hyboria survived, but records regarding the fall of Acheron and Old Stygia have never been found. R'lyehian survived with some sorcerers in Stygia as the Hyborian people migrated South after the sinking of Atlantis and their escape. Stygian sorcerers and Cultists of Skelos became feared individuals who invoked many powerful entities including Set, Cthulhu, and Dagon. They were feared not just for their power over magic but also because of the mishaps that could result from their magic. It seemed that the Great Cataclysm had made magic very unstable.

Antiquity

The Kandarian Demon and the creature Belestri came to the Sumerian high priest Urigan. The demons presented themselves as messengers from the goddess Ereshkigal to convince him to gather the scrolls of the Old Ones and bind them into one text. Part of this process was to educate Urigan on how to read and understand R'lyehian, which was maddening in and of itself. The high priest went out into the ancient world and suffered starvation, thirst, and plague to gather the pages before binding them in a tome made from the flesh of a non-believer. When it came time to turn the Book of Dead Names over to the Kandarian Demon, however, Urigan realized he had been betrayed and denied it to him. The demon retaliated by unleashing Deadites throughout the city, but the book was lost. Another Sumerian priest found it sometime later in the city of Akhsa and learned R'lyehian to summon Dagon from the depths of the sea. Through limited knowledge of the ancient tongue, the two agreed that Akhsa would provide sacrifices for Dagon's children and Dagon would provide them prosperity in return.

Medieval Times

At the turn of the 8^th Century C.E. the "Mad Poet" Abdullah al-Hazrad left his birthplace in Yemen and traveled the Middle East where he discovered tomb scrawlings and old writings in the unknown language of R'lyehian. al-Hazrad became the first human being to teach himself the language, driving himself mad even as he demonstrated his amazing force of will. He went on to reconstruct the scrolls of the Old Ones and assembled them into a text he called the Kitab al-Azif, which translates roughly to mean "the book of sounds that demons make and insects echo." The Kitab al-Azif maintained the contents of the scrolls in R'lyehian. Constantinople resident and Greek translator Theodorus Philetas would translate the alien tongue to Greek by 950 C.E. under a new title, The Necronomicon. Latin translations were made available in the 13th century. The Church would ban The Necronomicon at least twice.

The original skin-bound Necronomicon turned up in the lands of Lord Arthur near Castle Kandar where it was put in the hands of Arthur's Wise Man. The Wise Man learned R'lyehian again, driving himself a little madder in the process, and deciphered the book. The book was stolen from him by the Deadites, however, and found its way to an unholy alter in an accursed graveyard somewhere between the lands of Arthur and Henry the Red. It would not be claimed again until the chosen one came from the sky. Unfortunately, the chosen one wasn't fluent in R'lyehian and failed to recite the incantation correctly. In failing to undo the wards around the book, he opened the floodgates to the Deadites and summoned the Army of Darkness. The chosen one did help defeat the Army of Darkness and another incantation was read in the ancient language of the Old Ones to send him back to his time somewhere in the future.

Cold War Era

R'lyehian seemed lost to the ears of the mortal realm for more than 6 centuries until Professors Raymond and Henrietta Knowby found the skin-bound Necronomicon. They brought the book back to the Tennessee Hills to interpret and translate the texts inside while recording the incantations to tape. In this process, they summoned the Kandarian Demon and several Deadites. This caused the possession and deaths of both professors, and the recordings of Raymond Knowby reading the incantations in R'lyehian caused the subsequent deaths of 4 college students, Ash Williams' girlfriend, 2 Appalachian residents, another scholar, and the Knowby's daughter. Before her death, she read a passage from the book that forced the Kandarian Demon into its physical form with a head so large it couldn't fit through the cabin door. Then she began to recite the R'lyehian incantation to send the Deadites back to their forgotten realm before she was stabbed and killed by Ash's possessed and severed hand. That portal sent Ash Williams, the Kandarian Demon, the Necronomicon, and everything around them back to the 14th Century where Ash was taken to Castle Kandar by Lord Arthur's men.

Superhuman Registration Era

The Mu Mystics survived on Sharkhead Isle off the East Coast of the United States and joined with the military junta of Arachnos shortly after their coup of the Rogue Isles. A fundamentalist faction still exists among the Mu Mystics, who worship the Old Ones, teach R'lyehian, and revere Hecate. Many have turned their allegiances toward Lord Recluse and his lieutenant, Scirocco. It should be noted that Hecate taught the Mu magic in exchange for their servitude to the Chthonic gods and the Old Ones and that she led the Mu to their ill-fated war against Orenbega and the Circle of Thorns because they refused to bow down to their betters. No one is quite sure what would happen if Hecate returned to Earth in the present day for a reckoning upon the Mu. Still, many fundamentalists assume it would be catastrophic for the descendants of those who first found R'lyeh and learned the alien tongue from its source.

Over 2 decades after Ash Williams, also known as the chosen one, returned to the modern world the alien language of R'lyehian was spoken again. This time, he read aloud random incantations to impress a poet he was hooking up with in his trailer. Through this moment of poor judgment, Ash released an unknown number of Deadites into the world including the Kandarian Demon. This wasn't the last time the language of the Old Ones echoed from the book. Ash and his companions and adversaries recited many passages from the Necronomicon to advance their agendas, though known quite as short-sighted as a trailer park fling. R'lyehian passages were read aloud to release more Deadites, to incarnate the son of 2 lesser Old Ones, send Ash and others back to 1981 C.E. to rewrite history, to summon Deadites to impersonate dead family members, and to possess anyone that might catch the chosen one off guard. R'lyehian passages also appeared on Ash's sidekick, Pablo as the ancient text merged with him and then started converting his flesh into a new incarnation of the Book of Dead Names.

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References

1. Cthulhu on Wikipedia
2. Necronomicon on Wikipedia
3. Hecate on Wikipedia
4. Cthulhu (Earth-616) on Marvel Database
5. Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn on Marvel Database
6. Hecate (Earth-616) on Marvel Database
7. Icthultu (DCAU) on DC Database
8. Hecate (New Earth) on DC Database
9. Icthultu on DCAU Wiki
10. R'lyehian on The H.P. Lovecraft Wiki
11. Necronomicon on The H.P. Lovecraft Wiki
12. Necronomicon Ex-Mortis on Evil Dead Wiki
13. Conan of the Isles (novel) on Conan Wiki
14. Mu on Conan Wiki
15. Stygia on Conan Wiki
16. Mu on City of Heroes Wiki
17. Mu Mystics on City of Heroes Wiki
18. Mu on Paragonwiki
19. Mu Mystics on Paragonwiki
20. Mu on Unofficial Homecoming Wiki
21. Mu Mystics on Homecoming Wiki

Aliases:

• Cthuvian