The Novel of the Black Seal

"The Novel of the Black Seal" is a horror story by Arthur Machen, part of his 1895 novel The Three Imposters. In its account of a hidden society of malevolent "Little People", the survivors of ancient days, the story influenced Lovecraft stories like "The Call of Cthulhu", "The Dunwich Horror", "The Whisperer in Darkness", and "The Lurking Fear". Lovecraft wrote in "Supernatural Horror in Literature" that "Black Seal", along with "The Novel of the White Powder" (also part of the same book), "perhaps represent the high-water mark of Machen’s skill as a terror-weaver".
== Characters ==
*William Gregg, an authority on ethnology who lives in England near the Welsh border. He disappears after investigating the Little People.
*Jervase Cradock, a simple-minded boy who works for Gregg; his father was one of the Little People.
*Miss Lally, who works for Gregg as a governess; she is the narrator of much of the story.
== Behind the Mythos ==
Although "The Novel of the Black Seal" has often been published as a short story, it actually originates as a chapter of Machen's novel The Three Impostors. Within the context of the novel, the story's protagonist and narrator, Miss Lally, is merely one of the personas assumed by one of the titular tricksters. While this might lead the reader to question the veracity of the events narrated, it should be noted that the character William Gregg is indisputably real in-universe, as is his mysterious disappearance.
Central elements from "The Novel of the Black Seal" are echoed in H. P. Lovecraft's The Whisperer in Darkness and Robert E. Howard's "Worms of the Earth". All three stories concern a species that inspired the folkloric Little People, and associated with a mysterious black stone inscribed with unknown symbols. Lovecraft's story mentions Machen by name, as does Howard's "The Children of the Night", which deals with the same species. The Little People and their black stone return in Howard's "People of the Dark" as well.
In Machen's story, the black stone is known as Ixaxar, a.k.a. Ishakshar or the Sixtystone. Henry Kuttner referenced it by these names in his Cthulhu Mythos stories "The Hunt" and "Hydra", respectively.
The character Jervase Cradock is similar to Wilbur Whateley from Lovecraft's "The Dunwich Horror" as well as Helen Vaughan from Machen's own The Great God Pan: all three were born from human mothers who were impregnated by non-human creatures, and as a result are only superficially human.
==External Links==
*"The Novel of the Black Seal" at Project Gutenberg.
Category:Arthur Machen works
Category:Mythos-Adjacent Works