by Daniel Harms
SPACE-MEAD
Golden liquid used by those who travel between the stars. The mead insulates the drinker from the detrimental effects of space travel, leaving them in a dream-like state for the entire journey. It remains up to the person who drinks the mead to provide a means of interstellar transportation; byakhee are a particularly favored method. If not used for this purpose, the mead often provides the drinker with visions of events happening far away which have an impact on them.
According to some, those who drink space-mead do not actually leave this world. Rather, their physical bodies are left in some place on this planet, while their astral selves make the journey to the stars. This makes these expeditions no less dangerous, however.
See byakhee. (“The House on Curwen Street” (O), Derleth; “The Keeper of the Key”, Derleth.)
SPECTRAL HUNTER
Magical creature created through a sorcerous rite. A magician transforms a willing victim into a human-shaped monster with shark-like teeth, a thin, rubbery body, and pincers for hands. The spell also binds the hunter’s soul to a particular item. Once created, the hunter can never travel more than a mile from that focus. The Hotethk tribe of California once knew this spell, but that group is now extinct.
(“Devil’s Canyon”, Carnahan (O); Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying Game, Cook and Tynes.)
SPELLMAN, MARTIN. (c. 1912–?)
Would-be writer who became a nurse at Oakdeene Sanitarium in 1935. The events of the night of January 1, 1936 drove him insane, causing him to be incarcerated in the same institution. In 1974, an overdose of medication left him with brain damage, and later a sniper killed him as he exercised in the sanitarium’s yard. Spellman’s notes on the Cthaat Aquadingen are now on file at Miskatonic University.
See Oakdeene Sanitarium. (“Not to Force the Rhymes”, Adams; “The Horror at Oakdeene”, Lumley (O); Ex Libris Miskatonici, Stanley.)
SPHERES OF NATH
Device of the Elder Things mentioned in the notes of Professor Gordon Walmsley. According to this noted cryptographer, the Elder Things, knowing that their days of empire would soon come to an end, installed one of these devices in each of their cities and outposts. When turned on, the device would destroy all traces of that particular location, including any artifacts borne away by outsiders, and transport the entire complex to a site beneath the ocean. The Nazis are rumored to have found such a device during their Antarctic expeditions, but it is believed to have been destroyed with their base.
Whether there is any connection between this device and the land of Nath is unknown.
See Elder Things; Nath. (“An Item of Mutual Interest”, Glancy; “In the Vaults Beneath”, Lumley (O).)
SSATHAAT SCRIPTURES
Contains rites to Yig. (“The Snakefarm,” Ambuehl; Mackey, “Caller from Oklahoma”, Worlds of H. P. Lovecraft.)
SSS’HAA (also SSSAAA)
Leader of the Valusian serpent people and high priest of Yig. He led the faithful of Yig from their former home in Yoth to the caverns beneath Mount Voormithadreth.
(Thongor and the Wizard of Lemuria, Carter (O); “The Vengeance of Yig”, Carter; “Zoth-Ommog”, Carter.)
STANFORD, CARL
One of the most important sorcerers in the Masters of the Silver Twilight. He may have gained some fame as an occultist at one point, though the details of this have been lost.
[Carl Stanford Petersen was the author of the Call of Cthulhu role-playing game.]
(“Worms”, Harrigan; “The Hermetic Order of the Silver Twilight”, Hutchinson (O).)
STANZAS OF DZYAN
See Book of Dzyan.
STAR-SPAWN OF CTHULHU (also CTHULHI)
Beings that came to earth with Cthulhu and dream with their master in the corpse-city of R’lyeh. Despite their ability to mold their form at will, they always resemble their master to some degree; indeed, they may all be descended from him.
The Cthulhu-spawn arrived on earth many eons ago, building a great city on the newly-risen continent of R’lyeh. The Elder Things of the Antarctic resisted this incursion, but the star-spawn beat them back into the ocean. Peace was finally declared, and both races settled back into their cities. In the end, however, R’lyeh sank beneath the waves, trapping Cthulhu and all of his spawn. Presumably the Cthulhi will awaken with their master when R’lyeh rises above the ocean. A few of these beings may still be free.
See Cthulhu. (“At the Mountains of Madness”, Lovecraft (O); The Transition of Titus Crow, Lumley; Call of Cthulhu Rulebook, Petersen and Willis.)
STAR-STONES OF MNAR
Grey-green rocks from the land of Mnar with the Elder Sign carved into them. (Their power comes not so much from the Sign, however, as from the power inherent in each stone.) Holding a star-stone may protect a person from the minions of the Great Old Ones, but not the Great Old Ones themselves. The Elder Gods themselves may have created these stones, as they are often found near the tombs of some of the Great Old Ones.
Star-stones are usually where they are for a good reason, and should not be disturbed if found. Each year, dozens of paranormal investigators are injured or killed because they ignore this simple rule. Not only might the stones’ removal allow an evil force to break free, the Elder Gods have been known on occasion to punish those who move large numbers of star-stones from their proper places. Acquisition of star-stones should be left to seasoned veterans of preternatural struggle who (it is hoped) know what they are doing. Miskatonic University has been conducting experiments in mass-producing star-stones with some success.
The Sussex Manuscript maintains that there are three different kinds of star-stones: the regular kind, a polished oval stone useful against “kings” (lesser Great Old Ones?), and a jewel with fire in its heart which guard the tombs of the Great Old Ones themselves. No one has observed the latter two varieties, so they may not exist.
[Stones very much like these first appear in “At the Mountains of Madness”, but there they serve as decorations and currency for the Elder Things and are not associated with protection or Mnar.]
See Circles of Thaol; Elder Sign; Kish; Mnar. (The Burrowers Beneath, Lumley; “The Doom of Enos Harker”, Carter and Cornford; “The Lurker at the Threshold”, Derleth and Lovecraft; “At the Mountains of Madness”, Lovecraft (O); The Sussex Manuscript, Pelton.)
STAR VAMPIRES
Species of interstellar beings who most commonly appear when summoned. Star vampires are completely transparent, save for a brief time after they drink the blood of a victim. Then they appear as masses of sharp talons and waving suckers.
A star vampire may be summoned by reading a book with the spell (such as De Vermis Mysteriis) at night under a cloudless sky. Rumor has it that star vampires are now colonizing this planet, and are responsible for many mysterious livestock deaths.
(“The Shambler from the Stars”, Bloch (O), Call of Cthulhu Roleplaying Game, Cook and Tynes; Call of Cthulhu Rulebook, Petersen and Willis; S. Petersen’s Guide to Cthulhu Monsters, Petersen et. al.)
STARKWEATHER-MOORE EXPEDITION
Expedition to Antarctica undertaken as a follow-up to Miskatonic’s Pabodie Expedition. Professor William Dyer of Miskatonic University strongly protested against it, but his tales of a stone city built by an alien race only served to encourage these new explorers.
The Starkweather-Moore Expedition, led by adventurer James Starkweather and Professor William Moore of Miskatonic University, departed New York on September 6, 1933. Their expedition was plagued by sabotage and malfunctions, but they eventually returned to the site of the Pabodie expedition. When the team arrived, they reported that any alien ruins that might have existed had collapsed into an underground network of caverns. The expedition had to return with no evidence of prehuman intelligences.
[An earlier Call of Cthulhu supplement states that the Starkweather-Moore Expedition, led by Professor Eustace Blake, left Bremen on December 20, 1931. I have no solution to this conundrum.]
See Elder Things; Pabodie expedition. (
Alone Against the Dark, Costello; Beyond the Mountains of Madness, Charles and Janyce Engan; “At the Mountains of Madness”, Lovecraft (O); “In the Vaults Beneath”, Lumley.)
STARRY WISDOM CULT
Group of devotees of Nyarlathotep who met in Providence, Rhode Island between 1844 and 1877. Professor Enoch Bowen, a well-known expert on the occult and archaeology, founded the cult after his return from an expedition in Egypt. The congregation, which met in the old Free-Will church, swelled as time went on. In 1863, the Starry Wisdom Church had over two hundred members. A branch church opened for a brief while in Townshend, Vermont, and missionary efforts to Arkham began. Even after the death of Bowen in the 1860s, the church continued under the leadership of a Dr. Raymond Flagg.
The nature of the cult’s worship was kept a secret, but several rumors began to be circulated. According to some sources, the cult owned a sacred artifact known only as the Shining Trapezohedron, which Professor Bowen had brought with him from Egypt. By gazing upon this sacred object, the members could call up a being known as the Haunter of the Dark, who shared dread secrets with the faithful. This being could only be summoned in absolute darkness; if it were exposed to light for any period of time, it would be banished. The cult’s rituals consisted of obeisances to this object, sprinkled with pseudo-Egyptian mysticism.
In 1877, the town leaders finally took action against the cult, due to evidence of its involvement in the kidnappings of several individuals. After a campaign of harassment and threats, 181 of the former cultists left the city before the end of the year. The Starry Wisdom cult had been disbanded, and its sacred books and relics remained within their crumbling old church until the town demolished the structure in the mid-1930s. It is rumored that the sect continued its meetings in Providence in secret, under the leadership of Asenath Bowen, a relative of Enoch.
Various cults giving themselves the Starry Wisdom name have come and gone over the years. One church in Yorkshire, England, which flourished between 1880 and 1890, may have been under the leadership of Raymond Flagg. Some have also linked this religion to the Celestial Providence sect in Chicago that was destroyed in the fire of 1871. One branch set up in Arkham during the Twenties, but it was disbanded in 1927 after its leader’s death. A more recent Starry Wisdom Church appeared in San Francisco, but was destroyed by arson. A Chicago area congregation known as the Church of Seven Stars is believed to have connections to the Starry Wisdom dating back over a century.
More recently, rumors have linked certain disappearances, mostly in Canada, to cells of the Starry Wisdom cult. The group is very secretive, however, so is impossible to be sure if these organizations are connected with each other through affiliation or doctrine.
[I have heard rumors of real-life contemporary “Starry Wisdom” churches in both Florida and California.]
See Akeley, Henry Wentworth; Book of Dzyan; Book of Eibon; Bowen, Enoch; Brotherhood of the Black Pharaoh; Cultes des Goules; De Vermis Mysteriis; Dexter, Ambrose; Lillibridge, Edwin; Necronomicon (appendices); Nyarlathotep (Haunter of the Dark); Shining Trapezohedron; Unaussprechlichen Kulten. (“The Yorkshire Horror”, Barton; “Mysterious Dan’s Legacy”, Baugh; “The Shadow from the Steeple”, Bloch; Strange Eons, Bloch; “The Horror from the Middle Span”, Derleth and Lovecraft; “Cults Exposed!: The Starry Wisdom Church”, Harms; Keeper’s Compendium, Herber; “Strange Aeons”, Flansburg; “The Haunter of the Dark”, Lovecraft (O); “Documents in the Case of Elizabeth Akeley”, Lupoff; Balak, Rainey; “King of Chicago”, Sumpter; Sherlock Holmes in the Adventure of the Ancient Gods, Vaughan.)
STARS ARE RIGHT, THE
Time at which the Old Ones will return and the reign of humanity over Earth will end. Though cultists often believe that this time will come soon, the exact time and stellar positions that will bring this about are uncertain and possibly unknowable to humans.
See Angles of Tagh Clatur; Cthulhu; Elder Gods; Ghroth; M’nagalah; Nug and Yeb. (“The Call of Cthulhu”, Lovecraft (O).)
STILLWATER
Town in Manitoba. All of Stillwater’s inhabitants disappeared on February 25, 1930, and only one body from the town was ever found. There have been unsubstantiated rumors of cult activity among the town’s former inhabitants.
(“The Thing that Walked on the Wind”, Derleth (O).)
STREGOICAVAR (also CREGOIVACAR?)
Village located in Hungary, west of the city of Budapest. Stregiocavar may be translated as “Witch-town” due to a cult whose members once lived on the site when the town was still known as Xuthltan. Although Muslim forces slew its members in 1526, the town’s name has remained as a reminder of its past. Stregoicavar’s most famous landmark is the Black Stone, a monument where the disbanded cult worshiped hundreds of years ago. Its most famous visitor was Justin Geoffrey.
See Black Stone. (“The Gorge beyond Salanpunco”, Derleth; “The Black Stone”, Howard (O).)
STRONTI
See Shonhi.
A STUDY OF THE BOOK OF DZYAN
Book published around 1930 by Joachim Feery that deals with Madame Blavatsky’s famous text. His use of Deeley’s “translation” makes his conclusions even more dubious than usual.
See Book of Dzyan; Feery, Joachim. (The Fate, Detwiller with Ivey; Keeper’s Compendium, Herber (O).)
STYGIA
Land of the Hyborian Age in the area of present-day Egypt and Libya. The founders of Stygia were refugees from the destruction of Lemuria who came to this land and destroyed a pre-human civilization (of which nothing is known) that thrived there. The Stygians took their own customs, along with some aspects of the former inhabitants’ culture and religion, and created a new country.
During the life of the adventurer Conan, Stygia was one of the world’s most powerful countries, though its influence was already waning. Its capital was the inland city of Luxur, but outsiders were more familiar with the port of Khemi, on the banks of the river Styx, which is known today as the Nile. The people worshiped such beings as Nyarlat (Nyarlathotep), Shuddam-El (Shudde-M’ell), Gol-Goroth, and Azathoth, though they reserved their highest respect for the god Set and his priests.
Near the end of the Hyborian Age, the Vanir from the north conquered Stygia, setting themselves up as rulers and mingling their lines with those of the previous inhabitants. These people gave rise to those of Egypt, though some state that the Hyksos were closer in blood and tradition.
See Acheron; black lotus; Cthugha; Gol-Goroth; Nyarlathotep; Serpent Ring of Set; Set; Shudde-M’ell; Thoth-Amon. (“Black Colossus”, Howard (O); “The Hyborian Age”, Howard; “Black Eons”, Howard and Price; “The Worm of Urakhu”, Tierney; “The Throne of Achamoth”, Tierney and Price.)
SUMMANUS
Great Old One that manifests itself as a mouthless man with pale tentacles beneath his garb.
The cult of Summanus was most popular in Roman times; he was the lord of the night sky and thieves. Hardly any details of the god’s rites were revealed to outsiders, but the learned men of the time believed Summanus to be the lord of Hell. Summanus may still be worshiped today, but if this is true, his cult is even more secretive than before.
The proper ceremonies used in the propitiation of Summanus are found in the Tuscan Rituals.
[Summanus was the Roman deity of the night sky and the lightning that appeared at night. Jupiter, the Roman sky-god better known to students of myth, controlled only the daytime sky, and Summanus was considered to be equal or even superior in rank to him. Summanus had a temple in Rome near the Circus Maximus where sacrifices were made to him on June 20, his feast day. Lumley’s depiction of him as an underworld god is not without precedent, though most scholars reject this interpretation.]
See Tuscan Rituals. (“The Fairground Horror”, Lumley; “What Dark God?”, Lumley (O).)
SUNG, PLATEAU OF
Land in Burma often considered an extension of Leng. Within Sung lies the city of Alaozar, beneath which Lloigor and Zhar are imprisoned.
See Alaozar; black lotus; E-po
h; Lloigor; Tcho-Tchos; Twin Obscenities; Zhar. (“The Lair of the Star-Spawn”, Derleth and Schorer (O).)
SURTHAGGITH VTHAEGGAISH EAERTH
See Black Book of the Skull.
SUSSEX FRAGMENTS
Tablets found in northern Europe and England that date to the Pleistocene era. They bear a striking resemblance in content to the G’harne Fragments. Most of them are kept at the Wharby Museum in Yorkshire.
[Derleth probably meant to write “Sussex Manuscript”, but changed it to “Fragments” (perhaps thinking of the Pnakotic Manuscript/fragments). Stanley might not have been aware of this when she described the Fragments’ history.]
See Book of Dzyan; G’harne Fragments. (“The Seal of R’lyeh”, Derleth (O); Ex Libris Miskatonici, Stanley.)