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The History of Cosmic Horror

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Featured Horror Mystery and Lore

Don’t explain, because the unexplainable is the most frightening thing there is.

H.P. Lovecraft

What Exactly is Cosmic Horror?

Cosmic Horror movies and books are on the rise in the horror community lately—a refreshing turn away from the slashers and gore of the late seventies, early eighties, most of the nineties, and the last two decades. The Cosmic Horror genre is about more than just the copious amounts of senseless violence—it’s beyond its own monsters and dangers—it’s about testing the limits of your own humanity. How connected are you to the world around you? How frightened are you about the dangers of the unknown? When your perception of reality is suddenly pulled out from under you, you begin to experience overwhelming trepidation, anxiety, and an unanticipated creeping loss of sanity.

In stories with a central theme of Cosmic Horror, more often than not, have protagonists that are forced to face things that go well beyond the normal realm of comprehension, which leads to the idea that authors of the genre try to stand behind, “don’t try and over-explain what’s happening, rather let them stew in existential dread.” While this genre of horror contains plenty of gore and violence, it angles more on the supernatural, paranormal, and psychological sides of fear—so there is no reaction of disgust, but rather pure, unadulterated terror.

So, in the simplest terms possible, cosmic horror is a sub-genre of science fiction where horror is derived from the insignificance of our own existence within an often dispassionate universe … easy peasy, right? While Lovecraft is credited as the creator of cosmic (or Lovecraftian) horror, that doesn’t mean that he was necessarily the first person to write within this genre—he was simply the first person to dedicate his fictional writing solely to the genre which now bears his name. To this day Lovecraft remains the most famous writer of the cosmic horror genre, although the genre continues to expand with the works of writers around the world.

Where Did Cosmic Horror Come From Anyway?

A View Of the Cosmos
A View of the Cosmos
Photography by NASA

Now that we know what the genre of cosmic horror is all about, where exactly did this genre come from? As far as literary history has shown, cosmic horror began with one man—Howard Phillips Lovecraft. He is officially credited with being the father of the cosmic horror genre—but was he the first author to write in the genre, or was he simply the first author to be credited for it? Truth be told, Algernon Blackwood, an author out of England was officially the first one to write within the cosmic horror genre, but this subgenre of horror had not technically been established yet. His stories The Willows and The Man Who Found Out have historically been classified as general horror, gothic fiction, and fantasy fiction.

To understand certain types of horror, one must first understand where horror and the subsequent emotion of fear comes from. As has been mentioned many-a-times before, as said by Lovecraft himself, “the oldest and strongest emotion of mankind is fear, and the oldest and strongest kind of fear is the fear of the unknown.” This means that this particular subgenre capitalizes on this reaction to uncertainty (in its simplest form), the bread and butter of cosmic horror, and the inability to tell what is coming and when. This quote represents the spectrum of Lovecraft’s range of fiction—it’s elegant, yet somehow a pathetic representation of what can truly represent the genre as a whole. In no uncertain terms, Lovecraft and other authors of the genre make it increasingly clear that there are multiple ways in which the futility and insignificance of human beings can be frightening. If there is nothing meaningful connection to the purpose of human beings, then are we truly anything more than a plaything for celestial beings?

It’s truly an unsettling thought to acknowledge this nihilistic idea of the modern age—that we base our relevance on the time in which we live, but discount the ancient wisdom and forces that came before us. During the earliest days of cosmic horror, Lovecraft took exceptional influences from the plethora of pagan religions all throughout the world. He took particular influence from the most ancient of these pagan religions and cultures—this is in no small part, due to the fact that Lovecraft was quite reverent to paganism and quite openly rejected mainstream Christianity. Keep in mind, Lovecraft lived in a time and place where having beliefs, or favorable leanings towards paganism was highly taboo—where today it is quite a bit more commonplace. Cosmic horror, however, despite being more widespread isn’t an easy genre to write—not to mention capture on film—well at all.

When Lovecraft first began to write stories that exhibited his creations, he displayed a truth that is often disregarded in the course of our daily lives—that we don’t consider the idea that there is something unknown and completely unrelatable to anything we have ever experienced before in our years of life on this earth. We don’t consider that we might be in a world where we don’t recognize the god(s) that deserve idolization, that there may be a natural way of being that we are unaware of, that there may be some type of fate of the world that we haven’t considered as a possibility. This was something that Lovecraft and his predecessors might not have considered, but it is definitely a possibility that should be considered, even if it is completely alien to what we’re used to.

Dig into more cosmic horror by reading and watching our best of cosmic horror books, comics, and movies lists.

Puzzle Box’s Best of Cosmic Horror Comics
The Best Cosmic Horror Books
Cosmic Horror Movies that Perfectly Capture Existential Dread
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The History of Halloween

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Featured Horror Mystery and Lore Lifestyle

September is coming to a close and the heat, brief as it was, is beginning to wane. For some this is a dark time, one foretelling many months of bitter cold, long stretches of darkness and bouts of seasonal affective disorder. Though for others an excitement builds through these darkening months that leads to the spookiest and one of the most beloved traditions in recent history; Halloween. Explore the history of Halloween from ancient Celtic traditions to trick or treating today in the U.S.

History of Halloween Celtic Roots

For many Americans, Halloween will feel as culturally homely as eagles and apple pies, although, (hold awed gasps) the tradition didn’t actually start stateside. The origins of this delectably macabre holiday date back to the ancient Celtic festival of Samhain (pronounced sow-in). The Celts, who occupied the area that is now Ireland, the United Kingdom and northern France over 2,000 years ago, celebrated their new year on November 1.

The date was considered the end of the autumn period and symbolizes the emergence of winter, when herds were returned from pasture and land tenures renewed. Legend told that during the Samhain festival, the souls of the departed would once more return to their homes and those who had died since the last festival would have their souls pass over to the afterlife. Bonfires were lit atop hills to ward off evil spirits, and to give the folk a place to relight their hearth fires over winter. They would wear animal heads and skin masks to the ceremonies to avoid being recognized by those spirits, while sacrificing animals to appease the gods. It was believed that on the night before the new year, the boundary between our world and that of the dead became thin, allowing them to communicate with spirits. On the night of October 31 they celebrated Samhain, when it was believed that the ghosts of the dead returned to earth.

According to historical records,the Celts believed that the spiritual communication on Samhain enhanced the premonitory powers of the Celtic druids, allowing them to predict the future in a far more accurate way. 

Bats and Halloween

Bats Flying by a full moon on Halloween

The widespread modern association of bats with Halloween actually has its historical origins too. The Samhain bonfires lit by the Celtic Druids attracted swarms of bugs from the surrounding wilderness which, in turn, drew flocks of bats to enjoy a rather fruitful supper. In later years, various folklore emerged citing bats as harbingers of death or doom. In Nova Scotian mythology, a bat settling in your home foretells that a man in your family will die. If it flaps around the place trying to escape, a woman in the family will pass on instead.

History of Halloween Roman Influence

According to other records, some Halloween traditions are actually rooted in ancient Roman history. By 43 A.D. The Romans had conquered and occupied most of the Celtic’s territory, bringing with them festivals such as Feralia, which took place in October and also commemorated the passing over of the dead to the afterlife. Another holiday, Pomona, was held in honour of the Roman Goddess of fruit and trees, which developed to this day as the reason why we bob for apples on Halloween.

A few Centuries later saw the further development of the festivals that would eventually become Halloween, as several Christian figures attempted to replace the pagan traditions with ones closer to God. By 1000 A.D., All Souls’ Day was announced on November 2 as a time for the living to pray for the souls of the dead. All Saints’ Day, or All Hallows, honored the saints on November 1. That made October 31 All Hallows Eve, which later became Halloween.

Halloween in The United Kingdom

Of course, old habits die hard, and people in England and Ireland mostly continued on as they had done, using the time of year to focus their attention on the wandering dead. They set out gifts of food to feed the peckish spirits, and as time went on and the tradition continued, folk would dress in creepy masks in exchange for treats themselves. The practice was called “mumming,” and was the beginning of a tradition we now know as trick-or-treating.

Trick or Treating in America

Scary Halloween Mask

In America, the southern colonies were the first to adopt the original festivities resembling Halloween, these early renditions of the festivals being called “play parties”. Towns would gather to celebrate the harvest, swap ghost stories and read each other’s fortunes, with far more events and activities being added over the years.

By the 1950s Trick-or-treating had exploded in popularity around the US, and Halloween had become a true national event. Today the holiday is celebrated by over 179 million Americans who spend around $9.1 billion on it per year, according to the National Retail Federation. 

Halloween obviously remains a popular holiday in America and the UK today, but it actually almost didn’t make it across the Atlantic in the first place. Puritans shunned the tradition, disapproving of its Pagan roots, though once Scottish and Irish immigrants began to arrive in America in greater numbers, Halloween made its way back into the zeitgeist. The very first American colonial Halloween celebrations featured large public parties to commemorate the upcoming harvest, tell ghost stories, sing, and dance.

https://www.history.com/topics/halloween/history-of-halloween

https://www.countryliving.com/entertaining/a40250/heres-why-we-really-celebrate-halloween/

https://www.goodhousekeeping.com/holidays/halloween-ideas/g4607/history-of-halloween/

https://www.businessinsider.com/history-of-halloween-2017-10?r=US&IR=T

https://www.britannica.com/topic/Halloween

https://www.historic-uk.com/CultureUK/Halloween/

https://www.worldhistory.org/article/1456/history-of-halloween/

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The Honey Island Swamp Monster of Louisiana

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Horror Mystery and Lore
Dark and spooky swampland
Photography by Anthony Roberts

Louisiana is rife with local folklore, particularly stemming from the untouched acres of the Honey Island Swamp just a short drive from New Orleans. These legends are of the pirates of the Bayou who were said to have hidden buried treasures, Native American ghosts, and the mysterious green lights that lure unsuspecting night travelers into the depths of the swamp, never to be seen again. These are just a few examples of all of the stories that are hidden in the unfathomable depths of the Louisiana swamps, which is home to the Honey Island Swamp Monster.

In August of 1963, Harlan Ford—a retired air traffic controller—was the first to catch sight of the bigfoot of the Bayou, having recently taken up wildlife photography. He described this seven-foot-tall, bipedal creature as being covered in grey hair, with yellow or red inhuman eyes set deep into its primatial face. The air hangs thick around this swamp monster, with an odor of rotting, decaying flesh—a smell so distinctive and disgusting that it would warn anyone of its presence.

The Honey Island Swamp Monster
Honey Island Swamp Monster

In 1974, the Honey Island Swamp Monster gained fame nationally, after Ford and his associate Billy Mills claimed to have found footprints that weren’t like any other creature in the area—these footprints according to myth, and a chance casting of a footprint found by these two men were at between ten to twelve inches long with three webbed toes, along with an opposable digit that was set much farther back than the others. Along with the luck of finding this footprint and casting it, they found the body of a wild board whose throat had been gashed open just a short way away. For the next six years, until his death in 1980, Ford continued to hunt for the creature—after his passing, a reel of Super 8 film was found among the belongings he had left behind, this film supposedly showed proof of the creature’s existence.

In the early twentieth century, before the first reported sighting of the Honey Island Swamp Monster by Ford, there was a legend of a traveling circus—traveling by train, a catastrophic wreck resulted in the escape of a group of chimpanzees. These chimpanzees were said to have gone deep into the swamps and interbred with the local alligator population. The Native Americans who called the area home, referred to the creature as the Letiche—they knew it as carnivorous, living both on land and in water—they believed this creature had originated as an abandoned child, raised by alligators in the darkest, most untouched regions of the swamp.

The Honey Island Swamp Monster caught on Super 8 Video footage

Researchers who have studied the lore of the Honey Island Swamp Monster, believe that it is related to Bigfoot—one reason that it is often referred to as the Bigfoot of the Bayou. While their description is similar, the tracks do not resemble those collected of Bigfoot from the Pacific North West. Despite the reputable nature of Ford and Mills, there have been a number of shows that have focused on hunting down the Honey Island Swamp Monster in order to prove the existence of this cryptid—all of them have come down on the side of the whole thing being a hoax, which isn’t entirely surprising.

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The Insatiable Hunger of the Wendigo

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Horror Mystery and Lore

Forever Wasting Away

Buck staring menacingly
Photography by Paul Johnston

Once during a brutally cold winter, there was a lost hunter whose intense hunger drove him to the unforgivable act of cannibalism; this taste of human flesh he was transformed into an insane bestial man, doomed to wander the forests awaiting his next meal. This is the story of the wendigo who is derived from the folklore of the Native Algonquian Tribes, but like any good story that came from an oral story tradition, the details vary based on who you ask and where you are—there are even those who say the Wendigo is related to Bigfoot, but most agree that the Wendigo is closer to a Werewolf. The Wendigo is said to be more of a cold-weather creature, having been sighted primarily in Canada and parts of the Northern United States, where many of the unsolved disappearances would be blamed on this beast’s cannibalistic tendencies.

This insatiable predator is certainly a sight to see—although you wouldn’t ever want to see him—despite being nearly fifteen feet tall, he appears as a hybrid between a buck and a human male, who is gaunt, emaciated, and rotting. Don’t let this fool you though, he’s incredibly dangerous with his sharp teeth and claws—nothing will save you from his obsession for finding his next meal. Forever wasting away, it’s an insatiable hunger that drives his need to kill and consume.

“The Wendigo” by Algernon Blackwood (audiobook)

More Than an Urban Legend

https://soundcloud.com/backstory/where-the-windigos-are

During the turn of the twentieth century, the Algonquian people say that numerous members of their tribe simply disappeared—they attributed these disappearances to the Wendigo. Unfortunately, this can also be associated with the legend that the Wendigo has the ability to curse humans as the Wendigo by possessing them, gradually imparting his own lust for human flesh that makes this monster so frighteningly compelling. The most famous case of this happening is that of Swift Runner; during the winter of 1879, this Native American man murdered and consumed his entire family. When questioned for his crimes, Swift Runner told the authorities that he had been possessed by a Wendigo’s spirit during the murder and cannibalism. Regardless of his claims, he was found guilty and he was sentenced to hang. Swift Runner’s case was not an abnormality amongst the tribal communities that inhabited the regions of Northern Quebec all the way to the Rocky Mountains in Colorado—so it makes us wonder whether or not the Wendigo is more than just an urban legend.

Does the Wendigo Still Exist?

There is always the potential for a Wendigo to come into existence—since the plague of this creature is that his form is a form of punishment for dishonorable or taboo activities—like chomping down on your fellow man if you’re starving to death. It makes a person wonder about the tragedy that befell the Donner party, did any Wendigos spawn from that horror story? According to the Author of Dangerous Spirits: The Windigo in Myth and History, “[the Wendigo] was a means of defining moral and social behavior, which could serve as a warning against greed and selfishness.” Other ways a Wendigo could come into being is if a medicine man or shaman cast a curse upon the man, or if the man had dreamt of the Wendigo—it was often an explanation used for mental illnesses and other afflictions before they were fully understood.

Antlers (2020)
Antlers (2020)

The real concern about the Wendigo is whether or not it actually exists in this day and age—since no one in their right mind would ever seek out such an unstoppable creature, it’s fair to say that it would be best to avoid an encounter entirely. Thankfully, a majority of sightings happened between the 1800s and the 1920s, with very few of them having had occurred since—those brave enough to seek this monster out would be more likely to catch a glimpse of the Wendigo if they look through the forests that Wendigos inhabit during the colder months of the year. Then again, tromping through the forest in the middle of winter in the harsh climate that the Wendigo is said to frequent isn’t the sanest thing a person could do.

So what do you think? Would you ever go into the blistering cold forest in search of a monster from whom there is no escape? Or would you leave his existence a mystery?

Movies Referencing the Wendigo

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The Legend of The Boggy Creek Monster

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Featured Horror Mystery and Lore

Fouke is a picturesque little city in central Miller County, Arkansas, about 150 miles outside of Little Rock. Boasting its gorgeous Mountain Lake Park Hotel and a spacious festival plaza, Fouke seems ideal for a relaxing getaway amongst the more attractive facets of nature. However, not all of nature’s creations are necessarily friendly, as warned by a legend which has haunted Fouke since the 1840s; The Boggy Creek Monster.

Boggy Creek Variations

Also referred to as the Fouke Monster, or Swamp Stalker, The Boggy Creek Monster is a hulking ape-like creature standing upright between seven and eight feet tall. Long and dense fur covers its arms and legs and it walks or runs with a hunch, swinging its arms like a primate. It has a similar description as the legendary Bigfoot and a strikingly eerie resemblance to the Momo seen in Louisiana, Missouri. This prompts some to believe that these are part of the same genus of elusive ape-men which still live hidden lives in the denser woodland of the earth. The Boggy Creek Monster has been said to kill livestock, chickens and dogs in the area and while it hasn’t been reported to have killed any people, many have claimed of its vicious nature.

The Legends

Two families in the late 1860s were allegedly terrorised, and one hospitalised, by the beast. Then in May 1971, Bobby and Elizabeth Ford claimed that a great hairy beast with red eyes and rattling breath attacked their home. Bobby claimed that the beast grabbed his shoulder, him only having narrowly escaped its clutches and ploughing himself through his front door. Elizabeth also claimed to see the red eyes and fur-covered arms coming through the window as she slept in the living room one day.


The legend spread like wildfire and made it into a low-budget cult horror film in 1973 entitled The Legend of Boggy Creek. While the film was panned critically, many fans saw it as a chillingly atmospheric dive into their favourite Arkansas urban legend, and the film actually spawned two very odd unofficial sequels, one of which featuring the monster as a disney-esque character who helps a band of lost children. The original was also said to have paved the way for films like The Blair Witch Project, meaning the Boggy Creek Monster could have had more impact on the world of film than once realised.

The people of Fouke used to capitalise on the legend with their Monster Mart featuring a huge screaming Boggy Creek Monster holding up its sign, with the Haunted Texarkana Ghost Walk and with plenty of signs around the town. These are not so much the case any more and it appears the locals have tired of the legend and the outsiders it brings to their quaint place of residence. That being said, 1997 saw over forty sightings of the Swamp Stalker, primarily walking along the dry creek bed just outside of town. While tourism seems to be dying out, the legend of the Boggy Creek Monster is as prevalent as ever.

https://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/entries/fouke-monster-2212/
https://www.tripadvisor.com/Tourism-g31598-Fouke_Arkansas-Vacations.html
https://cryptidz.fandom.com/wiki/Boggy_Creek_Monster
https://encyclopediaofarkansas.net/entries/the-legend-of-boggy-creek-movie-2192/

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