Mystical systems
Necronomicon
Direct answer
Necronomicon: The Necronomicon is a fictional book of forbidden lore invented by the American writer H. P. Lovecraft, said in his stories to drive its readers to madness.
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At a glance
- Also called
- al azif
- Found in
- Mystical Systems
- Related
- Grimoire, Necromancy, Index Librorum Prohibitorum, Faust
The Necronomicon is a fictional book of forbidden lore invented by the American writer H. P. Lovecraft, said in his stories to drive its readers to madness.
A lineage map for books and systems; it avoids presenting symbolic traditions as literal fact.
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Is the Necronomicon a real book?
In Lovecraft's tales the Necronomicon is a rare volume kept under lock in a few libraries, holding the history of elder beings and the rites to call them. Characters who consult it tend to end badly. He credited it to a mad Arab, Abdul Alhazred, and scattered references to it through his stories, as did friends who shared his invented mythology, so that it seemed to exist in a web of independent mentions.
Necronomicon does not exist. Lovecraft said so plainly in his letters, and wrote a mock history of the book to keep his own references consistent. Readers nevertheless wrote to booksellers and libraries asking for it, pranksters slipped cards for it into catalogues, and from the 1970s several books were published under the title. These are modern compositions. The Necronomicon is thus the purest forbidden book there is: one whose power lies wholly in being described and never read.
On the tree of the hidden arts: Forbidden knowledge.
What sets Necronomicon apart
Lovecraft's method was bibliographic. He gave his invention what real rare books have: a translator and year for each version, a papal ban, a note of which libraries hold copies and in what condition. He also shelved it beside genuine titles, so that readers who checked found half the list authentic. The mock history even borrows a real scholar, the Danish physician Ole Worm, and misplaces him by four centuries. Detail of that kind, and not any quoted spell, is what persuaded people the book could be requested at a library desk.
- Invented by: H. P. Lovecraft (1890 to 1937)
- First named: The Hound, written 1922, printed in Weird Tales, 1924
- Fictional author: Abdul Alhazred, the mad Arab, first named in 1921
- Fictional original: Al Azif, said to be written at Damascus about 730
- Mock history: History of the Necronomicon, written 1927
- Best known pastiche: the Simon Necronomicon, New York, 1977
Often mistaken for something else: A grimoire such as the Key of Solomon is a real historical manuscript of magic; the Necronomicon was a title without a text until modern authors wrote books to fit it.
The story behind Necronomicon
The supposed author is named in The Nameless City, written in 1921, and the book itself in The Hound, written in 1922 and printed in Weird Tales in 1924. Lovecraft's short History of the Necronomicon, written in 1927 and printed as a pamphlet in 1938, the year after his death, gives it an Arabic original called Al Azif of about 730 CE and Greek, Latin and English translations, the last attributed to John Dee. The best known of the later volumes, issued in New York in 1977 under the name Simon, draws on Mesopotamian myth and is a work of that decade.
Why Necronomicon matters
Necronomicon shows that the idea of a forbidden book can be more potent than any contents, since an invented title has sent real readers searching.
How to read Necronomicon
The name stands for Lovecraft's device, for the published pastiches, and as a general byword for a dangerous grimoire.
Necronomicon in practice: an example
A browser who finds a paperback Necronomicon in a shop's occult section is holding a book of the 1970s, not the volume of Lovecraft's stories.
Where readings of Necronomicon go wrong
Any edition on sale is a modern creation; the ancient text exists only inside the fiction.
Sources and editorial method
This entry summarizes the tradition in the Almanac's own words; where no source is listed, it is an editorial summary rather than a primary text, and symbolic readings are named as the tradition's, not as fact.
- Source
- The Great Almanac Dictionary
- Category
- Mystical Systems
- Aliases
- necronomicon meaning, is the necronomicon real, lovecraft necronomicon, book of the dead necronomicon, al azif
- Last updated
- 2026-09-26
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Common questions
Is the Necronomicon a real book?
No. It was invented by H. P. Lovecraft for his horror stories in the early 1920s, and he stated in letters that it was pure fiction. Books sold under the name were written decades after his death.
Who wrote the Necronomicon in the stories?
A fictional eighth century poet of Yemen called Abdul Alhazred, described as mad. Lovecraft's mock history says he wrote it at Damascus around 730 under the title Al Azif and died soon after in strange circumstances.
What does the word Necronomicon mean?
Lovecraft explained it as an image of the law of the dead, from Greek roots. Scholars of Greek have offered other renderings, such as a book concerning the dead. The title was his coinage, modelled on ancient book names.
