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Lovecraftian

Cosmic horror is not about being eaten — it is about being understood. The monsters of H.P. Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos are vast, ancient, and indifferent. They predate humanity, outrank it, and regard it the way we regard insects. The horror is the realization: you are not the protagonist of the universe. The Mythos is a shared universe — Lovecraft's own stories plus those of his correspondents (Clark Ashton Smith, Robert E. Howard, August Derleth) — and it is public domain, so it keeps growing.

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Begin with Lovecraft's own reading order: The Call of Cthulhu (1928) for the structure, At the Mountains of Madness (1936) for the Shoggoths and Elder Things, The Shadow over Innsmouth (1936) for the Deep Ones, and The Dunwich Horror (1929) for the most visceral cosmic terror. All public domain at hplovecraft.com.

The Great Old Ones

Cthulhu

Origin: H.P. Lovecraft, 1928 · Type: Great Old One · Source: The Call of Cthulhu

A vast being — dragon-like, octopus-headed, with wings and a vaguely anthropoid shape — lying in a sunken city called R'lyeh, dreaming. Cthulhu is not dead; the dead city merely waits, and when the stars align it will rise. Its existence is felt by sensitive minds as a terrible psychic pressure. The famous story: a cult worships it, artists dream of it, and a sailor's encounter drives him mad. Cthulhu is the monster as geology — too large, too old, too indifferent to be fought.

Where to learn more: The Call of Cthulhu · Wikipedia · Cthulhu Mythos overview

Azathoth

Origin: H.P. Lovecraft, 1922 · Type: Outer God · Source: The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath

The blind idiot god at the center of the universe, surrounded by amorphous dancers and the mad piping of a flute. Azathoth is ultimate chaos — mindless, purposeless, and infinite. All of reality, in Lovecraft's cosmology, is its dream, which is why "the Azathoth at the center of the universe" is the punchline to every cosmic-horror setup: the supreme being is not a mind but a void with a rhythm section.

Where to learn more: The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath · Wikipedia · The Fungi from Yuggoth

Yog-Sothoth

Origin: H.P. Lovecraft, 1928 · Type: Outer God · Source: The Case of Charles Dexter Ward

"The All-in-One and One-in-All" — a being of spheres and gates that is coterminous with all of space and time. Yog-Sothoth is the key and the gate: it knows all of time, can be summoned, and is the only entity Lovecraft's wizards reliably bargain with. Its presence is often described as a cluster of iridescent globes — which is why a single eye icon suits it: it sees everything, everywhere, at once.

Where to learn more: The Case of Charles Dexter Ward · Wikipedia · The Dunwich Horror (its son)

Nyarlathotep

Origin: H.P. Lovecraft, 1920 · Type: Outer God · Source: Nyarlathotep (poem/prose)

The Crawling Chaos — the only Outer God with a face, and it changes. Nyarlathotep walks the earth in human form as a messenger, a tempter, a showman who lures people toward ruin. It is the monster that wants to be understood, that speaks, that deceives. Unlike the indifferent entities, Nyarlathotep is actively malevolent and delights in the game. It is the horror of the charming stranger.

Where to learn more: Nyarlathotep · Wikipedia · The Dreams in the Witch House

The Servitor Races

Shoggoths

Origin: H.P. Lovecraft, 1936 · Type: Protoplasmic servant · Source: At the Mountains of Madness

Shoggoths are amorphous blobs of protoplasm created by the Elder Things as a servant race — engineered to build, shape-shift, and absorb functions. Over millennia they grew minds and rebelled. In At the Mountains of Madness, they are glimpsed as glistening black shapes with multiple eyes that form and dissolve. They are the monster as unregulated AI: the tool that was never given a conscience.

Where to learn more: At the Mountains of Madness · Wikipedia: Shoggoth · Shoggoth in popular culture

The Deep Ones

Origin: H.P. Lovecraft, 1936 · Type: Amphibious race · Source: The Shadow over Innsmouth

The Deep Ones are fish-frog hybrids who live in undersea cities, breed with humans, and are served by the hybrid inhabitants of decaying coastal towns like Innsmouth. They worship Dagon and Cthulhu, and their gift is immortality — at the price of slowly transforming into them. The horror of the Deep Ones is not attack but absorption: the community that welcomes you in and changes you.

Where to learn more: The Shadow over Innsmouth · Wikipedia: Deep Ones · The Innsmouth Look

Dagon

Origin: H.P. Lovecraft, 1917 · Type: Sea deity · Source: Dagon (short story)

An ancient fish-god, half-fish half-man, worshipped by sailors in a degenerate coastal town. Lovecraft's first Mythos story, Dagon (1917), has a narrator who finds a colossal creature in a mire after a volcanic event and is never the same. Dagon is the template for the Deep Ones' religion: the old god of the deep that never stopped existing, just waiting.

Where to learn more: Dagon · Wikipedia: Dagon · Middle Eastern Dagon

The Mi-Go

Origin: H.P. Lovecraft, 1930 · Type: Fungal crustacean · Source: The Whisperer in Darkness

The Mi-Go are crab-like fungi from Yuggoth (Pluto), able to fly through space on membraneous wings, and their brains can be removed and kept alive in cylinders — the classic "brain in a jar" horror. They are curious, scientific, and utterly unconcerned with human morality. The Mi-Go are the monster as laboratory: they collect specimens, and you might be one.

Where to learn more: The Whisperer in Darkness · Wikipedia: Mi-Go · The Fungi from Yuggoth

The Elder Things

The Elder Things

Origin: H.P. Lovecraft, 1936 · Type: Star-spawn race · Source: At the Mountains of Madness

The Elder Things (or Old Ones) are the star-faring race that created the Shoggoths and built the Antarctic city at the Mountains of Madness, millions of years ago. They are described as barrel-shaped, with five-fold radial symmetry, wings, and starfish-like heads. They are the oldest civilization in the Mythos — science-minded, spacefaring, and long since collapsed. They are the monster as archaeology: the discovery that something far older and stranger than humanity built this world first.

Where to learn more: At the Mountains of Madness · Wikipedia: Elder Things · The Antarctic expedition

Reference

Documentation:

Related:

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  • Sci-Fi & Modern Bestiary

Last Updated: 2026-08-20 | Vibe Check: Insignificant - The Mythos is not about monsters; it is about how small you are.

Tags: bestiary, lovecraft, cthulhu, cosmic-horror, monsters