by Daniel Harms
1670 — Around this date, Johann Lindenmuth of Nuremburg translates the Necronomicon into German under the title Die Totenrufen. It is never printed, and the manuscript is later lost. (“The Long-Lost Friend”, Lobdell.)
1722 — Breakup of the infamous cult of Kingsport, Massachusetts. The Necronomicon played an important role in the rituals of this group, though whether the raiders found a copy is unknown. (“The Festival,” Lovecraft; Kingsport: City in the Mists, Ross.)
1771 — A raid is made upon a farm outside Providence, Rhode Island owned by Joseph Curwen. Curwen was a reputed sorcerer who owned a Latin copy of the Necronomicon. He is supposedly killed, but little is damaged during the raid. [16] (“The Case of Charles Dexter Ward,” Lovecraft.)
1811 — A mysterious foreigner leaves a Latin copy of the Necronomicon at the Bibliotheque Nationale. He is found the next day poisoned in his squalid apartment. (“The Necronomicon,” Herber.)
1848 — Von Junzt’s German translation of the Necronomicon, Das Verichteraraberbuch, published at Ingolstadt, Bavaria, eight years after the translator’s death. [17] (Schrodinger’s Cat Trilogy, R. Wilson.)
1895–1900 — Henry Armitage, recently appointed to the post of head librarian at Miskatonic University, purchases a copy of the Necronomicon from Providence businessman Whipple Phillips, the grandfather of H. P. Lovecraft. [18] (“The Necronomicon,” Herber.)
1901 — Publication of Joachim Feery’s Original Notes on the Necronomicon, in both complete and expurgated editions. The authenticity of this volume is highly suspect, especially since Feery claimed to have inserted his own dreams into the passages from the dreaded book. (“Aunt Hester,” Lumley; “Name and Number,” Lumley; Ex Libris Miskatonici, Stanley.)
1912 — Wilfred Voynich, an American bookseller, discovers an enciphered medieval manuscript in an Italian castle. Along with this document, which comes to be known as the Voynich Manuscript, Voynich finds a letter that asserts that the book is the work of the famous scientist Roger Bacon. [19] (“The Return of the Lloigor,” C. Wilson.)
1912 — American millionaire Harry Widener adds a copy of the Necronomicon to his collection shortly before his fatal trip aboard the Titanic. After his death, his books are donated to Harvard University. (“The Necronomicon,” Herber.)
1916 — Noted occultist Aleister Crowley publishes a limited edition English translation of the Necronomicon. [20] (Trail of the Loathsome Slime, Rowland.)
1921 — Professor W. Romaine Newbold declares that he has deciphered the Voynich Manuscript. In his account, Newbold claimed the document was a scientific treatise proving that Roger Bacon had developed the microscope centuries before Leeuwenhoek. Unfortunately, Newbold dies in 1926 before he can finish deciphering the manuscript. (“The Return of the Lloigor,” C. Wilson.)
1922 — H. P. Lovecraft makes the first mention of the Necronomicon in his story “The Hound.” (“The Hound,” Lovecraft.) [21]
1928 — A Greek copy is found in the library of Ivan the Terrible, and walled up beneath the Kremlin. Stalin later finds the book, and has it translated into Russian for himself. (“Secrets of the Kremlin”, Erkes.)
1929 — Benjamino Evangelista is found murdered, along with the rest of his family, in his home in Detroit. The investigation into his death finds that Evangelista was a faith healer and cult leader, and had written a divinely-inspired book called The Oldest History of the World. This book is notable because it contains references to a volume of magic called “Necremicon,” “Necromicon,” and “Necronemicon”, which is also titled “Al Azif”. These passages were supposedly written before Lovecraft ever used the Necronomicon in his stories. [22] (The Philosopher’s Stone, C. Wilson.)
1931 — A Professor Manly, looking over Newbold’s notes on the decipherment of the Voynich Manuscript, deduces that Newbold’s supposed “cipher” is in fact the result of fading of the manuscript’s ink. Newbold’s results are discredited by the scientific community. (“The Return of the Lloigor,” C. Wilson.)
1932 — Lovecraft infiltrates an order of Ommiade monks in Boston, bearing away their copy of the Necronomicon. (Necronomicon, Yuzna.)
1938 — The house of Doctor Laban Shrewsbury of Arkham, Massachusetts, is burned to the ground shortly after he sent the first volume of his work Cthulhu in the Necronomicon to the printers. Although no trace of Shrewsbury was found in the ruins, it is believed that he perished in the fire. (“The House on Curwen Street”, Derleth.)
1939 — Cthulhu in the Necronomicon by Doctor Laban Shrewsbury published (?). (“Books of the Cthulhu Mythos,” Herber and Ross.)
1944 — In the spring of this year, Nazi occultists supposedly uncover a copy of the Gothic Necronomicon. A translation is made, but the Germans are unable to make proper use of it before the Third Reich falls. (Delta Green, Detwiller, Glancy, and Tynes.)
1946 — The New York bookseller Philip C. Duschnes advertises a Latin copy in his spring catalog. (“The Necronomicon”, Duschnes.)
1956 — Henrietta Montague completes her task of translating the British Museum’s Necronomicon into English at the request of that institution’s directors. This expurgated translation is later published in an edition intended for scholarly use only. Sadly, Montague succumbed to a wasting disease shortly after the project’s completion. (The Burrowers Beneath, Lumley; Ex Libris Miskatonici, Stanley.)
1965 — Miskatonic University Press issues The Annotated Necronomicon, a combined Latin/English text translated by A. Philip Highgas. (Ex Libris Miskatonici, Stanley.)
1967 — Professor Lang of the University of Virginia takes up his study of the Voynich Manuscript, discovering that it is written in Greek and Latin using Arabic letters. His work, which is taken up after his disappearance in 1969 by other scholars, proves that the Voynich Manuscript is actually a commentary on certain passages of the Necronomicon written by a monk named Martin Gardener. (The Philosopher’s Stone, C. Wilson; “The Return of the Lloigor,” C. Wilson.)
1967 — The noted author L. Sprague de Camp, while sightseeing in Baghdad, purchases a manuscript in the Duriac language from a government official in the Directorate General of Antiquities. Later, he finds that looters found the document in ruins near Duria; three different Iraqi scholars had attempted to translate it, but all had vanished shortly after they had begun. [23] (“Foreword” to Al Azif, de Camp.)
1972 — In the spring of this year, two monks from an Eastern Orthodox denomination are found to have stolen valuable books from libraries and private collections across the country. One of these, a ninth-century Greek manuscript purporting to be the Necronomicon, comes into the hands of a New York priest named “Simon”, who begins its translation. (The Necronomicon Spellbook, Levenda.)
1973 — Owlswick Press of Philadelphia publishes the edition of Al Azif discovered by de Camp. A copy may be found in the Brown University library.
1977 — “Simon” publishes his own version of the Necronomicon, which soon thereafter is released as a paperback. The “translator” claimed to have derived the volume from a Greek manuscript, of which only parts were included in his book. (Necronomicon, Levenda.)
1978 — The Necronomicon: The Book of Dead Names published by Neville Spearman. According to Colin Wilson, the original manuscript existed in cipher among John Dee’s papers at the British Museum, and constitutes part of the Arabic scholar Alkindi’s Book of the Essence of the Soul. By use of computer analysis, the authors were able to decode the volume and present it to the public. [24] (The Necronomicon, Hay, ed.)
1979 — During a visit to a Cairo bookseller, Professor Phileus Sadowsky of the University of Sofia discovers a page bearing Alhazred’s famous couplet in Arabic. Unfortunately, this page disappears on its way through Customs. (“Notes on a Fragment of the Necronomicon,” Hamblin.)
1988 — Death of noted fantasy/science fiction author Lin Carter. One of his unfinished works was a partial manuscript of the Necronomicon, including a number of cautionary tales and descriptions of magical rites. [25]
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1994 — A copy of the Gothic Necronomicon is discovered beneath the former KGB headquarters and is stolen by a neo-Nazi group. (Delta Green, Detwiller, Glancy and Tynes.)
NOTES ON THE CHRONOLOGY
[1] Evil Dead II and Army of Darkness included the Necronomicon Ex Mortis, but threw out the more familiar timeline entirely. They also state that all copies of the book had vanished by 1300, a fact not borne out by the fiction.
[2] I have found no biography of Abdul Alhazred, or any of the commonly accepted variants on that name, in Ibn Khallikan’s biography. It is possible that Alhazred is still included under another name, or that later scribes expunged this particular entry from the work. Stanley suggests that he is included under the name “ar-Rahib,” but I have had no luck in finding this entry either. Alhazred’s date of death is given as 731 in Derleth’s “The Keeper of the Key.”
[3] For the more commonly accepted version of the Necronomicon’s origin, see the entry for 730. These two possibilities may be reconcilable, however, if Alkindi had access to Alhazred’s book and compiled material from it for use in his own work.
[4] This “Patriarch Michael” is probably Michael Cerularius, Patriarch of Constantinople from 1043 to 1058. Because of his actions against Rome, Patriarch Michael was largely responsible for the eventual break between the Roman Catholic and Greek Orthodox churches. After Michael made inflammatory remarks against the emperor in 1058, that man removed him from his post, and the former patriarch died shortly thereafter.
[5] The matter of Olaus Wormius is one of the most troubling affairs in Mythos scholarship, as the famous Danish physician of the same name lived almost four hundred years after the translation was supposedly made. Olaus Wormius the Elder, as we may call him, was born in Jutland, and went on to make many other Greek and Latin translations of ancient books. Some scholars remained unconvinced by this, however. Stanley states that this copy, titled De Nomine Necium, was actually made by students of the famous jurists in Bologna and later corrected by the 17th century Wormius. Others give its authorship an even later date. See especially the entries for 1487 and 1623.
Wormius indicates in his prefatory note to his translation that the Arabic edition of the Necronomicon no longer existed. Possibly the ecclesiastics destroyed only the copy which Wormius had seen, and the translator believed that this had been the last copy of that book in Arabic. Most of the rumors of the Arabic Necronomicon since have been unsubstantiated, however.
Stanley asserts that one version believed to have been translated in 1228, subtitled De Nomine Necorum, is probably a fake written in the nineteenth century and attributed to Wormius. No other authority has backed her opinion, however.
(“The Keeper of the Key”, Derleth; “History of the Necronomicon,” Lovecraft; Ex Libris Miskatonici, Stanley.)
[6] A year before his decision to censor the Necronomicon on the Index Expurgatorius, Pope Gregory IX had instituted the papal Inquisition to combat the rise of heresy within the church. Thus, it seems certain that he would have had the Necronomicon banned.
A mistake has been made by previous scholars, however. At this time, the Index Expurgatorius did not exist, so Pope Gregory could not have placed the Necronomicon on it. Other such lists did exist at this time, and it is likely the authorities included the Necronomicon in one of these.
[7] Stanley speculates that the date of the first printing was around 1490; the Miskatonic University Library copy was printed in Wurttemberg in 1500. Other scholars have said that the German printing occurred during the first half of the fifteenth century, but few non-religious books came off the presses during that time. See entry for 1472 for an alternate explanation. (Ex Libris Miskatonici, Stanley.)
[8] This may indeed be the edition commonly considered to be German, not only because both versions are said to have been printed at much the same time, but also since these two editions are considered to be muddled and confusing in comparison to the seventeenth century printing. (“Out of the Ages,” Carter.)
[9] This particular version of events is original to this source. For two different explanations, see the entries for 1228 and 1623.
[10] Lovecraft initially wrote that this edition appeared in the first half of the sixteenth century. He assigned the date 1567 to the Italian printing in a letter written in 1936. Since the letter did not appear until recently, later authors have given different dates. Herber states that this edition appeared in 1501, and was likely the work of Aldus Manutius, founder of the Aldine Press. According to Stanley, several editions were put out by printers in Mannheim, Germany, Italy, most likely in Urbino. (Keeper’s Compendium, Herber; “History of the Necronomicon,” Lovecraft; Ex Libris Miskatonici, Stanley.)
[11] Noted occult scholar Anton Zarnak asserted that the Necronomicon was actually the work of John Dee, who transcribed it from what he saw during his crystal-gazing sessions. When it was completed, he was shocked but feared to destroy it. Zarnak also claimed that Alhazred (or al-Hazrat) was a devout Muslim and that his Al Azif, a collection of demonological lore, influenced Dee’s Necronomicon slightly. Most Mythos scholars do not concur with him, but it bears mention if only because of Zarnak’s reputation. (“Soul of the Devil-Bought”, Price.)
[12] There are two versions of the legend regarding Dee’s discovery of the Necronomicon in Prague. One states that Dee found a copy of Alkindi’s Book of the Essence of the Soul in the library of King Rudolph II and made a copy of it. The Liber Logaeath, a manuscript kept at the British Museum, may possibly be this copy. The other account is that Edward Kelley, Dee’s roguish companion, purchased the book from the notorious Kabbalist Jacob Eliezer. Dee presumably kept the manuscript when he and Kelley parted ways in 1589, and translated the manuscript while he was warden of Christ’s College at Manchester. [It should be noted that Dee was actually in Prague at this time.] (The Necronomicon, Hay, ed.; “The Necronomicon FAQ,” Low.)
[13] No mention is made in Dee’s diaries of a trip to present-day Romania to see the noble’s copy of the Necronomicon. He lived in a castle in southern Bohemia at the time, however; would he have had time to make an unrecorded trip to the Baron’s home? Or did the Baron come to him?
Two dates for the alleged “publication” of the Dee manuscript should be noted here, but I have little reason to consider them correct. One holds that it was published in 1585 in the Dutch town of Haarlem, while another states that it was made in Antwerp in 1571. Most scholars would agree, however, that Dee did not begin his translation until 1586, and that this manuscript was never published in any form. (The Necronomicon, Hay, ed.; Ex Libris Miskatonici, Stanley.)
[14] It is likely that this is not truly a translation of the Necronomicon at all. Carter and Berglund have disclosed that the Sussex Manuscript was probably written by Fred L. Pelton, a longtime Lovecraft fan. For a brief while, August Derleth considered publishing this book, and mentioned it in his short story “The Gorge above Salanpunco,” but in the end rejected it.
[15] This same date comes from the letter mentioned under “1567”. Once again, many people have made up their own dates due to the letter’s unavailability. Bloch was very close at 1622, as was Stanley at 1624. (According to her timeline, this was a publication of a translation made by the historical Olaus Wormius (see 1228).) Duschnes included the Madrid printing of 1647 in his own work. (“The Shadow from the Steeple,” Bloch; “The History of the Necronomicon,” Lovecraft.)
[16] It is likely that one of the raiders kept Curwen’s copy of the Necronomicon, or possibly that a thief bore it away from the abandoned farm. In any event, this particular copy, distinguished by its cover bearing the false title, “Qanoon-e-Islam,” disappears for almost a century.
[17] One other edition of the Necronomicon mostly in an ancient form of German has been discovered. This one, however, was handwritten, and probably is not identical with the von Junzt edition. (“The Fairground Horror,” Lumley.)
[18] The span of five years that I have used here is merely speculative.
It is noteworthy that the copy owned by Phillips was that taken from Joseph Curwen’s farm after the raid of 1771. It may have been passed down in the family by one of the raiders, or other circumstances may have been at work.
