English, Unknown Author, 15th Century. Manuscript, embossed red leather cover seemingly of a later make than the interior. The embossed design is a sharply angled shape, loosely evocative of a pentagram. Archaic language, but of neat print. Periodically, plates appear to have been cut from the book. Pencil annotations in modern English appear frequently in the first third of the work, but decrease afterwards. The book has the faintest scent of ozone about it.
Research
Initial Reading
This work claims to be a translation of an otherwise unknown series of documents (The Pnakotic Manuscripts) brought to the West after the fall of Constantinople in 1453. These are said to be Greek translations of an even older set of documents chronicling an otherwise unknown epoch of the pre-human history of Earth.
The unidentified translator claims to have obtained this work, also called The Pnakotik Scrolls and The Scrolls of Pnakotus, from an unnamed refugee from the Byzantine Empire. This translation was made in conjunction with the help of another (also unnamed) Greek scholar.
The body of the text is a haphazard jumble of myths outlining the history of various fabulous kingdoms and civilizations of Earth before the rise of Man (as well as other places specifically said not to be of this world). Discussions include a catalog of various races in residence on the Earth during the ages before man, the actions of various legendary figures, and the myriad inhuman deities worshiped by both. A final section traces the mythic history of the book itself, from fragments uncovered in some vast, non-human library (the so-called City of Pnakotus, in the Great Western Desert of Terra Australis), to the scribes of vast pre-historic human empires who consulted with improbable “others” (some sort of flying, barrel-shaped beings) in their efforts to understand the work. It seems likely that this work is a compilation of a host of mystical texts, many of which are preserved only in fragmentary form.
Full Reading
Quotes
“And from Sykranoetia reysed Xatogia, taking the forme of a grete furred tode, he dwelled in the cavernes of Ienkae and much to the grete anger of Yigge, the God of those beasts…”
Spells
Contact Winged One, Contact Mind of the Observer
Masks of Nyarlathotep 