The Mystery of Cthulhu: The Sea Monster of R’lyeh and Sounds from the Ocean Depths

Deep beneath R’lyeh, a city of stone buried beneath the Pacific Ocean, lies a being of unimaginable power. Even looking at the creature’s appearance is enough to make you lose your mind. Legend has it that he lies dormant beneath the waves, waiting for the stars in the sky to align and rise to reclaim his place on the surface.

That is Cthulhu – the monster in the imagination of HP Lovecraft – one of the most famous authors of the science fiction literature. However, after much evidence found by researchers, Cthulhu is a real monster and is believed to be part of a mysterious chain related to extraterrestrial creatures whose powers and abilities are beyond human understanding. Although Cthulhu is just one of the creatures born from the imagination and drawn by Lovecraft’s pen, this author also maintained a relative level of belief in the existence of Cthulhu as well as the secret of his uncle’s death . In fact, many people believe that Cthulhu is the monster that appeared in the very famous movie Cloverfield.

In this article, readers will be provided with a lot of interesting information about Cthulhu, his origins, mysteries, learn about Cthulhu worship and Cthulhu’s place in popular culture.

Before learning about the origins, legends and how Cthulhu can communicate with humans, let’s learn how to read this monster’s name.

Lovecraft explains that the language of the ancients is not similar to human speech, so any attempt to pronounce Cthulhu’s name correctly is likely only an approximation. One suggested reading is ” khûl-lhoo” , however, the most common reading remains “kuh-THOO-loo”.

The name Cthulhu first appeared in the short story The Call of Cthulhu written by HP Lovecraft in 1926, although none of the characters in the story have been confirmed to exist in reality. The Cthulhu in this book is a product of the author’s imagination or only appeared in the author’s dreams. The narrator says that the statue of Cthulhu, in some ways, resembles an octopus, a dragon, and a human or a creature with a humanoid form. From this description, artists and sculptors have created many works depicting the monster with an octopus-like head (with tentacles) and a pair of giant wings attached to its back to depict Cthulhu.

The Call of Cthulhu

Lovecraft does not describe much about the monster Cthulhu. The author mentioned that Cthulhu once controlled the Earth and one day, this monster will return to the blue planet to continue this mission. As the story progresses, the narrator discovered that Cthulhu was imprisoned in a stone city deep under the ocean, but a sudden earthquake caused part of the city to float above the water. Although Cthulhu was not awakened, it could transmit signals to the brains of some creatures and special people (those whose brains were “immune” to Cthulhu’s influence). The end of the story also revealed that after a terrible storm, the city was once again pushed to the bottom of the sea and Cthulhu returned to where it belonged.

This story also introduces the practice of Cthulhu worship by a group of people who believe that Cthulhu will inevitably return and that his mission is to inspire it. They have prophesied that when Cthulhu rises and takes control of the Earth, humanity will have to put aside its ideas of civilization and subjugation. Chaos will begin and men will return to their natural instincts.

According to Lovecraft, humans have never fully understood Cthulhu because the existence of this monster is often synonymous with death. Lovecraft’s world contains many creatures that no one can fully understand. Some of them are known as The Great Old Ones or The Old Ones , fierce, strong, hideous and extremely long-lived, second only to the stars. Although Lovecraft used the phrase “The Great Old Ones” in a rather contradictory way, most believers in Lovecraft’s views accept that Cthulhu is one of the extraterrestrial monsters that only exists in our limited world.

Because Lovecraft’s stories are almost always told in the first person with limited knowledge, what we know stops there. Other authors have expanded on Lovecraft’s worldview, and the world’s interested community has engaged in long-running debates with views that go beyond the canon of mythology and should never be repeated. What we do know is that the Great Old Ones come from a planet many light years away from Earth, and that they may actually exist, at least in some form—in dimensions that humans have yet to grasp.

Many of the Great Old Ones were present on Earth, although our planet was still young and lifeless at the time. The Elder Things , another race of monsters that Lovecraft sometimes called Old Ones, took over the Earth, built giant cities, and may have contributed to the creation of life on the planet. When the Great Old Ones confronted the Elder Things , a truce was reached. The Great Old Ones founded the stone city of R’lyeh , ruling the Earth for millions of years until the appearance of humanity.

In prehistoric times, Cthulhu connected with humans telepathically , leading them to ancient temples and areas where humans discovered statues and works of art from other worlds. The Great Old Ones created these statues from materials that did not exist on Earth, and from there, the worship of Cthulhu began to form.

Not long after the arrival of humanity, R’lyeh was buried under the ocean, trapping the Great Old Ones. A small portion of humanity still remembers how to communicate with Cthulhu telepathically and continues to worship the monster. Lovecraft notes that this practice spread across the globe, from China to Greenland to the swamps of Louisiana, with the incantation “ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wgah’nagl fhtagn!”, repeated three times as fast as possible.

Lovecraft explained that brain signals cannot penetrate the thick layer of water, so the Great Old Ones are isolated from the human world and cannot have any direct impact. They lie dormant under the stone city, waiting for the day when the stars in the sky will connect and R’lyeh will rise to the surface once more. Lovecraft even specified the coordinates of the ancient city in his work “The Call of Cthulhu”: South 47° 9′ and North 126° 43′ 47″. At the same time, he also described the architecture of this city as not following the laws of Euclidean (non-Euclidean), full of strange angles and curved surfaces that seem to have concave and convex over time.

Lovecraft created many strange and ferocious creatures in his works and throughout his life he encouraged his friends to write new stories from their own fantasy worlds. He was a prolific writer and historians have preserved many letters that he sent to other authors, including long discussions about the content of his works and how others might use them.

Lovecraft’s fans regard his story as a Cthulhu mythos, despite the fact that this monster is not the most powerful of Lovecraft’s imagined “monstrous” creatures. However, we must also point out that Lovecraft wrote many stories and poems that have no connection to the Cthulhu mythos. What is really interesting is that Cthulhu is no longer limited to his imagination, but on the contrary, the stories about this monster have flourished.

Deep beneath the Pacific lies Cthulhu, an ancient being of unimaginable power, first introduced in HP Lovecraft’s The Call of Cthulhu. This monstrous entity, described as part octopus, part dragon, and part humanoid, rules over a buried city, R’lyeh, and communicates telepathically with select humans. Though not Lovecraft’s most powerful creation, Cthulhu has transcended its fictional origins, becoming a cultural phenomenon. From mysterious legends to global worship practices, Cthulhu’s influence continues to grow, blurring the line between myth and reality, and captivating fans with its enigmatic presence in the expansive Cthulhu Mythos.