H.P. Lovecraft - A History Of The Necronomicon

H.P. LOVECRAFT

A HISTORY OF THE NECRONOMICON

Written in 1927
First published by The Rebel Press, Oakman, AL, 1938
Reprinted in Beyond The Wall Of Sleep, 1943

A HISTORY OF THE NECRONOMICON

Original title Al Azif —azif being the word used by Arabs to designate that
nocturnal sound (made by insects) suppos'd to be the howling of daemons.

Composed by Abdul Alhazred, a mad poet of Sanaa, in Yemen, who is said to have
flourished during the period of the Ommiade caliphs, circa 700 A.D. He visited
the ruins of Babylon and the subterranean secrets of Memphis and spent ten
years alone in the great southern desert of Arabia—the Roba el Khaliyeh or
"Empty Space" of the ancients—and "Dahna" or "Crimson" desert of the modern
Arabs, which is held to be inhabited by protective evil spirits and monsters of
death. Of this desert many strange and unbelievable marvels are told by those
who pretend to have penetrated it. In his last years Alhazred dwelt in
Damascus, where the Necronomicon (Al Azif) was written, and of his final death
or disappearance (738 A.D.) many terrible and conflicting things are told. He
is said by Ebn Khallikan (12th cent. biographer) to have been seized by an
invisible monster in broad daylight and devoured horribly before a large number
of fright-frozen witnesses. Of his madness many things are told. He claimed to
have seen fabulous Irem, or City of Pillars, and to have found beneath the
ruins of a certain nameless desert town the shocking annals and secrets of a
race older than mankind. He was only an indifferent Moslem, worshipping unknown
entities whom he called Yog-Sothoth and Cthulhu.

In A.D. 950 the Al Azif, which had gained a considerable tho' surreptitious
circulation amongst the philosophers of the age, was secretly translated into
Greek by Theodorus Philetas of Constantinople under the title Necronomicon. For
a century it impelled certain experimenters to terrible attempts, when it was
suppressed and burnt by the patriarch Michael. After this it is only heard of
furtively, but (1228) Olaus Wormius made a Latin translation later in the
Middle Ages, and the Latin text was printed twice —once in the fifteenth
century in black-letter (evidently in Germany) and once in the seventeenth
(prob. Spanish)—both editions being without identifying marks, and located as
to time and place by internal typographical evidence only. The work both Latin
and Greek was banned by Pope Gregory IX in 1232, shortly after its Latin
translation, which called attention to it. The Arabic original was lost as
early as Wormius' time, as indicated by his prefatory note; and no sight of the
Greek copy—which was printed in Italy between 1500 and 1550—has been reported
since the burning of a certain Salem man's library in 1692. An English
translation made by Dr. Dee was never printed, and exists only in fragments
recovered from the original manuscript. Of the Latin texts now existing one
(15th cent.) is known to be in the British Museum under lock and key, while
another (17th cent.) is in the Bibliothèque Nationale at Paris. A seventeenth-
century edition is in the Widener Library at Harvard, and in the library of
Miskatonic University at Arkham. Also in the library of the University of
Buenos Aires. Numerous other copies probably exist in secret, and a fifteenth-
century one is persistently rumoured to form part of the collection of a
celebrated American millionaire. A still vaguer rumour credits the preservation
of a sixteenth-century Greek text in the Salem family of Pickman; but if it was
so preserved, it vanished with the artist R. U. Pickman, who disappeared early
in 1926. The book is rigidly suppressed by the authorities of most countries,
and by all branches of organised ecclesiasticism. Reading leads to terrible
consequences. It was from rumours of this book (of which relatively few of the
general public know) that R. W. Chambers is said to have derived the idea of
his early novel The King in Yellow.

* * * * *


Chronology

* * Al Azif written circa 730 A.D. at Damascus by Abdul Alhazred
* * Tr. to Greek 950 A.D. as Necronomicon by Theodorus Philetas
* * Burnt by Patriarch Michael 1050 (i.e., Greek text). Arabic text now lost.
* * Olaus translates Gr. to Latin 1228
* * 1232 Latin ed. (and Gr.) suppr. by Pope Gregory IX
* * 14-- Black-letter printed edition (Germany)
* * 15-- Gr. text printed in Italy
* * 16-- Spanish reprint of Latin text
* * * * *

This should be supplemented with a letter written to Clark Ashton Smith on
November 27, 1927:

I have had no chance to produce new material this autumn, but have been
classifying notes & synopses in preparation for some monstrous tales later on.
In particular I have drawn up some data on the celebrated & unmentionable
Necronomicon of the mad Arab Abdul Alhazred! It seems that this shocking
blasphemy was produced by a native of Sanaa, in Yemen, who flourished about 700
A.D. & made many mysterious pilgrimages to Babylon's ruins, Memphis's
catacombs, & the devil-haunted & untrodden wastes of the great southern deserts
of Arabia—the Roba el Khaliyeh, where he claimed to have found records of
things older than mankind, & to have learnt the worship of Yog-Sothoth &
Cthulhu. The book was a product of Abdul's old age, which was spent in
Damascus, & the original title was "Al Azif"—"azif" (cf. Henley's notes to
Vathek) being the name applied to those strange night noises (of insects) which
the Arabs attribute to the howling of daemons. Alhazred died—or disappeared
—under terrible circumstances in the year 738. In 950 Al Azif was translated
into Greek by the Byzantine Theodorus Philetas under the title <"Necronomicon,"
& a century later it was burnt at the order of Michael, Patriarch of
Constantinople. It was translated into Latin by Olaus in 1228, but placed on
the "Index Expurgatorius" by Pope Gregory IX in 1232. The original Arabic was
lost before Olaus' time, & the last known Greek copy perished in Salem in 1692.
The work was printed in the 15th, 16th, & 17th centuries, but few copies are
extant. Wherever existing, it is carefully guarded for the sake of the world's
welfare & sanity. Once a man read through the copy in the library of Miskatonic
University at Arkham—read it through & fled wild-eyed into the hills... but
that is another story!

* * * * *

In yet another letter (to James Blish and William Miller, 1936), Lovecraft says:

You are fortunate in securing copies of the hellish and abhorred
"Necronomicon." Are they the Latin texts printed in Germany in the fifteenth
century, or the Greek version printed in Italy in 1567, or the Spanish
translation of 1623? Or do these copies represent different texts?

THE END