Yuggoth
| Yuggoth | |
|---|---|
| Universe | Cthulhu Mythos |
| Notable races | Mi-go |
| Notable people | Tsathoggua, Cxaxukluth |
| Created by | H. P. Lovecraft |
| Genre | Science fiction horror |
Yuggoth (or Iukkoth) is a fictional planet in the Cthulhu Mythos of H. P. Lovecraft. It is deemed to be located at the very edge of the Solar System.
Links with Pluto
At the time of the discovery of the then-planet Pluto in 1930 Lovecraft himself very casually suggested, in a letter to a friend, that Yuggoth might "probably" be the same as Pluto . Other writers have since claimed that it is actually an enormous trans-Neptunian world that orbits perpendicular to the ecliptic of the solar system. The Italian astronomer Albino Carbognani has suggested that any planet discovered beyond Pluto might be named Yuggoth.[1]
In the Cthulhu Mythos
Yuggoth... is a strange dark orb at the very rim of our solar system... There are mighty cities on Yuggoth—great tiers of terraced towers built of black stone... The sun shines there no brighter than a star, but the beings need no light. They have other subtler senses, and put no windows in their great houses and temples... The black rivers of pitch that flow under those mysterious cyclopean bridges—things built by some elder race extinct and forgotten before the beings came to Yuggoth from the ultimate voids—ought to be enough to make any man a Dante or Poe if he can keep sane long enough to tell what he has seen...
—H. P. Lovecraft, "The Whisperer in Darkness"
Yuggoth is the planet where the extraterrestrial Mi-go have established a colony. The Mi-go's city sits at the edge of a pit wherein dwells an ancient and horrifying entity feared by the Mi-Go. They periodically abandon the city on those occasions when it rises from the pit and can be seen directly.
The being Cxaxukluth, along with Tsathoggua and his parents, migrated to Yuggoth from Xoth. A dysfunctional family in their own right, Cxaxukluth's progeny abandoned their patriarch and sought refuge deep in the bowels of Yuggoth, owing to Cxaxukluth's cannibalistic tendencies. Soon thereafter they fled Yuggoth, though Cxaxukluth still dwells there to this day.
It (Rhan-Tegoth) came to the earth from lead-grey Yuggoth, where the cities are under the warm, deep sea.
—H. P. Lovecraft, "The Horror in the Museum"
tok'l-metal
On Yuggoth, the Mi-go mine a strange metal known as tok'l. Tok'l-metal is used in the manufacture of the Mi-go's notorious "brain cylinders", but it also has other ritual uses as well.
In other fiction
Yuggoth itself hung directly overhead, obscenely bloated and oblate, its surface filling the heavens... and all the time pulsing, pulsing, pulsing like an atrocious heart, throbbing, throbbing.
—Richard A. Lupoff, "The Discovery of the Ghooric Zone—March 15, 2337"
In Richard A. Lupoff's short story "The Discovery of the Ghooric Zone—March 15, 2337", Yuggoth is hinted to be the hypothetical Planet X. Lupoff's Yuggoth is a colossal, crimson planet, twice as massive as Jupiter. It is flattened at the poles and pulses eerily, no doubt because of its tremendous rotational speed—perhaps as fast as 80,000 kilometers per hour. It has numerous moons, including Nithon and Zaman, and the twin-moons Thog and Thok.
Other references
- Yuggoth is briefly mentioned in John Bellairs's The Face in the Frost as part of a wizard's model of the cosmos. It is described as "the terrible black planet...which rolls aimlessly in the stupefying darkness."
- A being or "living concept" which is dubbed a Yuggoth by the narrator possesses Allan Quatermain's abandoned mortal shell in the illustrated story Allan and the Sundered Veil in the first graphic novel volume of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen. The Yuggoth is described as being known as "a creature, a planet, and an idea" and is an abstract alter-dimensional entity which is entering through the hole in the fabric of time that the story revolves around.
- An entity referred to as both Nyarlathotep and "Yuggoth's emissary" appears towards the end of The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier. The being is involved in diplomacy in the Blazing World.
- Yuggoth is also a theme which is discussed in detail in Kenneth Grant's Typhonian Trilogy.
- The H. P. Lovecraft story "The Whisperer in Darkness" is the main focal point in the Electric Wizard song "Weird Tales: Electric Frost/Golgatha/Altar of Melektaus." This can be seen in lyrics such as "From ancient Yuggoth, black rays emit, Evils narcotic cyclopean pits."
- Jack Chalker's novel Horrors of the Dancing Gods references "Far Yuggoth" as the continent of the sub-Earth world of Husaquahr from which all evil things come. Far Yuggoth can only be reached by taking a ship called the Hovecraft.
- In Brian Keene's novel A Gathering of Crows, Levi traps the minions of Meeble by tricking them into the Labyrinth, a corridor between planes of reality. When his adversaries close in to seemingly finish him, he informs that they are powerless. As they are now on Yuggoth, which is the planet ruled by Behemoth, a more powerful member of the Thirteen...
Moons
Nithon
Nithon is a cloud-laden moon of Yuggoth. It is covered by fungi and has luminescent clouds that block all sunlight.[2]
Thog and Thok
Thog and Thok are twin moons of Yuggoth. Very little is known about these moons, though Thog is said to be a pitch-black world. On the surface of Thog is the fabled Ghooric Zone—a green-litten subterranean cavern containing a putrid lake where "puffed shoggoths splash".[3]
References
Notes
Bibliography
- Campbell, Ramsey. "The Mine on Yuggoth" (1964) [tok'l, Yuggoth].
- Fantina, Michael. "Nithon" (1974) in Night Terrors. Poem. [Nithon].
- Lovecraft, Howard P. "The Whisperer in Darkness" (1931) [Yuggoth].
- Lupoff, Richard A. "The Discovery of the Ghooric Zone—March 15, 2337" (1977) [Planet X, Nithon, Thog and Thok, Yuggoth, Zaman].
- Smith, Clark Ashton. "The Family Tree of the Gods" (1944) [Yuggoth].
Other references
- Harms, Daniel. The Encyclopedia Cthulhiana (2nd ed.), 1998. Chaosium, Inc. ISBN 1-56882-119-0.
- Detwiller, Dennis. "Delta Green Eyes Only Volume One: Machinations of the Mi-Go," 1998. Pagan Publishing.
External links
- "The Family Tree of the Gods" by Clark Ashton Smith
- Night Terrors by Michael Fantina, a poem containing references to Yuggoth
- "The Discovery of the Ghooric Zone—March 15, 2337" by Richard Lupoff