Abdul Alhazred

Abdul Alhazred, or the Mad Arab, is a recurring character in the works of H. P. Lovecraft. He is frequently cited as the author of the fabled Necronomicon, an occult text containing knowledge from beyond the Earth.
===Quotations===
==Name==
Abdul Alhazred is not an Arabic name. The more proper Arabic form might be Abd al-Hazred or simply Abdul Hazred, although these are still anomalous, as Hazred is not one of the 99 Names of God. In Arabic texts, his name has appeared as Abdullah al-Ḥaẓrad (عبدالله الحظرد). 
Al-Hazrad roughly translates as "The Banned" or "The Ban", although whether this is intentional is up for speculation. 
The term "Mad Arab" in reference to Alhazred is always capitalised and used as a title, and the term can actually be used in lieu of Alhazred's name.
==Lovecraft's Biography==
Most of what Lovecraft conveys about Alhazred's biography comes from his pseudo-historical sketch, "The History of the Necronomicon." In 730, while still living in Damascus, Alhazred supposedly authored in Arabic a book of ultimate evil, al Azif, which would later become known as the Necronomicon.
Those who have any dealings with the Necronomicon usually come to an unpleasant end, and Alhazred was no exception. According to the account:
== August Derleth ==
August Derleth, in "The Keeper of the Key," presents a slightly different account of Alhazred's death, moving the date to 731 C.E. In that story, Dr. Laban Shrewsbury and his assistant Naylan Colum discovered Alhazred's burial site while heading a caravan from Salalah, Oman, into Yemen, where they discovered the Nameless City, a domain of Hastur. 
Shrewsbury, as an old agent of Hastur and devoted enemy of his half-brother Cthulhu, crossed its gates in search of Alhazred's burial site. Alhazred, he learned, was kidnapped in Damascus and brought to the Nameless City, where he had earlier studied and learned some of the Necronomicon's secrets. As punishment for his betrayal of their secrets, Alhazred was tortured. Then they blinded him and severed his tongue, and finally executed him.
Though only rugs, bones and dust remained of Alhazred, the sarcophagus also contained an incomplete personal copy of the Necronomicon, written in the Arabic alphabet. Shrewsbury used necromancy to recall Alhazred's spirit and ordered it to draw a map of the world as he knew it. After obtaining the map, which revealed the location of R'lyeh and other secret places, Shrewsbury finally let Alhazred return to his eternal rest.
== Expanded Mythos ==
In Alan Moore's Providence, Abdul Alhazred is Howard Phillips Lovecraft's literary equivalent of Khalid ibn Yazhid, a real-world alchemist also known as Hali, using a made-up name from his youth. Hali, is the author of the Kitab Al-Hikmah Al-Najmiyya, later translated as Liber Stella Sapiente or Hali's Booke of the Wisdom of the Stars. Hali was killed by invisible djinns and eventually became a lake.
The character Alan Hasrad from the works of Franklyn Searight is a modern day descendant of Alhazred.
== Behind the Mythos ==
"Abdul Alhazred" was a pseudonym used by Lovecraft from when he was a child. (: Selected Letters 1.160) He may have come up with it when he had read 1001 Nights at five (: Selected Letters 3.421), or got it from a lawyer friend of his family (: Selected Letters 4.521).
Alhazred was the first creation of Lovecraft to be used by another author in a published story, as he was mentioned in "The Were-Snake", by Frank Belknap Long, in 1925.
==In Other Media==
===Marvel Comics===
In the Marvel Universe, Abdul Alhazred was born in the 8th century in the Umayyad Caliphate. He created the legendary and powerful black magic tome known as the Necronomicon, patterned after the Darkhold, or inspired by it, though both occult books, as well as the Oracles of Zoroaster and other mystic scrolls and tomes were hypothesized to be in fact imperfect copies of the ancient writings etched on the walls of R'llyeh, the city of the Aqueos, produced by ancient beings in elder times.
Alhazred's spirit became trapped in the realm Pellucidar, a pocket dimension accessed within subterranean Earth. It has been hypothesized that he died there, or that his spirit was transported there by the Great Race of Yith. Alhazred's spirit was stored within the crystal of the reptilian Mahars of Pellucidar.
Around 1920, the portal to Pellucidar was found, and Alhazred's mind took control of a man, reshaping his form into a more powerful version of Alhazred's own body. Alhazred took command of a band of slavers and used them in his plans of regaining his full power via sacrifices to the crystal. Tarzan became involved and foiled his plans, and the crystal began feeding off Alhazred's own energies and leaving him vulnerable to other assaults. He was driven into the crystal, which drained him into ashes.
Alhazred later returned in modern days and tried to take over Madripoor's syndicate. He confronted Wolverine, his plan backfired, and he was banished to a demonic realm.
===South Park===
South Park's iteration of The Mad Arab is mostly faithful to the source material, though his appearances/relevance to the universe is only tangential. In the episode "Coon vs Coon and Friends", the character Kenny McCormick, under the alias "Mysterion", seeks out a group of goths in possession of the Necronomicon, which he must use to stop an awakened Cthulhu that has joined forces with his equally ungodly playmate Eric Cartman, and find the cause of his own immortality. As Kenny reads the book and the goths elaborate, the viewer is shown several of its pages, one of which illustrates Abdul Alhazred himself. He is portrayed as a bearded Middle-Eastern man in flowing robes, standing amongst ruins in the desert with hands gesturing. Below his image reads "700 A.D.," the date of his birth, and above reads his name; he is given the title of "Prince," despite never having been characterized as royalty in the source material.
==Homages and Parodies==
*The creator of the Evil Dead's universe version of the Necronomicon from the video game Hail to the King is very similar to Abdul Alhazred, his name being Abdul Alzeez.
*In Arthur C. Clarke's comedic pastiche "At the Mountains of Murkiness", Alhazred is parodied as Abdul Hashish. While Alhazred wrote about the plateau of Leng in the Necronomicon, Hashish wrote about the valley of Oopadoop in a book called the Pentechnicon.
==Gallery==
Abdul Alhazred (South Park).webp|As depicted in South Park
Alhazred-RobertBloch1933.jpg|"Abdul Alhazred writing the Necronomicon", by Robert Bloch (1933)
==Links==
*Abdul Alhazred at the Marvel Database
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Category:Humans
Category:Characters Originating From Lovecraft Circle Works
Category:Deceased (In Mythos)