Out of the Aeons

Hazel Heald c.1932

"Out of the Aeons" is a short story by H. P. Lovecraft and Hazel Heald, a writer from Somerville, Massachusetts. It is one of five stories Lovecraft revised for Heald. It focuses on a Boston museum that displays an ancient mummy recovered from a sunken island.

Plot summary

The story is told from the point of view of the curator of the Cabot Museum in Boston. In 1879, a freighter captain discovered an uncharted island, presumably risen from its sunken state due to volcanic activity. From it, he recovered a strange mummy and a metal cylinder containing a scroll. A year later, the mummy is put on display in the museum, and the island mysteriously vanishes without a trace.

Over the years, the mummy gains a reputation as a possible link to an ancient tale from the Black Book by Friedrich von Juntz of a man named T'yog, who challenged Ghatanothoa, one of the gods of Yuggoth, using the power of a magical scroll, the work of the Great Old Ones opposed to Ghatanothoa. In his sleep, however, one of the cultists stole the true magical scroll and replaced it with a fake one, and T'yog was never seen again. When the possible link to the Black Book and T'yog reaches the general public, the narrator begins to notice more and more suspicious foreigners coming to the museum.

Soon, several attempts are made to steal the mummy. During one attempt, two men, armed with the true scroll, die as the mummy seemingly springs to life, opening its eyes and revealing an image of the approaching form of Ghatanothoa. The image had the power of Ghatanothoa to mummify any who view it, turning one of the thieves into a mummy, but the image had faded by the time the curator examines it, and it only frightens the curator. Though he never understands what he has seen, the curator is horribly shaken. He orders an autopsy of the mummy's braincase. The curator and all present are shocked that the mummy's brain is still alive. The mummy is the living remains of T'yog, and is fully aware of its surroundings.

Adaptations

Robert Bloch wrote a screen adaptation of the story for the 1971 TV series Night Gallery, however it was not produced. It was rewritten by Alvin T. Sapinsley, filmed, and broadcast as "Last Rites of a Dead Druid". Sapinsley's screenplay bore no relation to the original Lovecraft tale that Bloch had adapted.

Connections

Several members of Lovecraft's Cthulhu Mythos are mentioned in this story, including Shub-Niggurath and Yig, who inspire T'Yog with the scroll to ward off Ghatanothoa's power.
The first curator of the Cabot Museum was named "Pickman", sharing a name with the eponymous character of Lovecraft's "Pickman's Model".
One of the visitors to the museum is a strange man who calls himself "Swami Chandraputra." This is actually Randolph Carter, who, as described in "Through the Gates of the Silver Key," uses that alias after his mind is trapped in an alien body.
The story helped inspire the Xothic legend cycle of Lin Carter.

External links

Works related to Out of the Aeons at Wikisource

Works by H. P. Lovecraft

Cthulhu Mythos Dream Cycle

Novellas	The Dream-Quest of Unknown Kadath The Case of Charles Dexter Ward The Whisperer in Darkness At the Mountains of Madness The Shadow over Innsmouth The Shadow Out of Time

Short stories	"The Tomb" "Dagon" "A Reminiscence of Dr. Samuel Johnson" "Polaris" "Beyond the Wall of Sleep" "Memory" "Old Bugs" "The Transition of Juan Romero" "The White Ship" "The Street" "The Doom that Came to Sarnath" "The Statement of Randolph Carter" "The Terrible Old Man" "The Tree" "The Cats of Ulthar" "The Temple" "Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family" "Celephaïs" "From Beyond" "Nyarlathotep" "The Picture in the House" "Ex Oblivione" "Sweet Ermengarde" "The Nameless City" "The Quest of Iranon" "The Moon-Bog" "The Outsider" "The Other Gods" "The Music of Erich Zann" "Herbert West–Reanimator" "Hypnos" "What the Moon Brings" "Azathoth" "The Hound" "The Lurking Fear" "The Rats in the Walls" "The Unnamable" "The Festival" "The Shunned House" "The Horror at Red Hook" "He" "In the Vault" "Cool Air" "The Call of Cthulhu" "Pickman's Model" "The Silver Key" "The Strange High House in the Mist" "The Colour Out of Space" "The Descendant" "History of the Necronomicon" "The Very Old Folk" "Ibid" "The Dunwich Horror" "The Dreams in the Witch House" "The Thing on the Doorstep" "The Evil Clergyman" "The Book" "The Haunter of the Dark"

Collaborations	"The Green Meadow" "The Crawling Chaos" "The Horror at Martin's Beach" "Imprisoned with the Pharaohs" "The Curse of Yig" "The Mound" "Medusa's Coil" "The Horror in the Museum" "Through the Gates of the Silver Key" "Out of the Aeons" "The Tree on the Hill" "Till A’the Seas" "In the Walls of Eryx" "The Thing in the Moonlight"

Juvenilia	"The Mystery of the Grave-Yard" "The Beast in the Cave" "The Alchemist"

Poetry	Fungi from Yuggoth

Essays	"Supernatural Horror in Literature" To Quebec and the Stars The Cancer of Superstition Autobiography: Some Notes on a Nonentity

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