Gug

The gugs, hairy and gigantic, once reared stone circles . . . and made strange sacrifices to the Other Gods and the crawling chaos Nyarlathotep, until one night an abomination of theirs reached the ears of earth’s gods and they were banished to caverns below . . . That a mortal dreamer could traverse their cavern realm and leave by that door is inconceivable; for mortal dreamers were their former food, and they have legends of the toothsomeness of such dreamers.

— H. P. Lovecraft

A Gug is a species of shaggy cannibal giant, restricted to life underground by a curse of the Great Ones. From each of its black-furred arms sprout two forepaws, equipped with dreadful talons. Its legs and feet are bird- or dinosaur-like, and patches of greasy black fur cover its body. The face of a Gug is especially terrible, with bulging pink eyes set on bony swellings and a ghastly fanged mouth splitting the head vertically. Voiceless, the thing communicates by facial expression and gesture.

Habitat : as intelligent beings, almost anywhere. The species quickly adapted to caverns after banishment from the surface world.

Distribution : currently restricted to the Underworld, through fear of the Great One curse. A Gug kingdom exists and individuals wander throughout the Underworld.

Comparative height chart

Life and Habits : These giants superstitiously avoid Ghouls (who regularly visit Gug graveyards), feeding primarily upon Ghasts which they hunt down in the lightless Vaults of Zin. Gugs have peculiar and despicable reproductive practices; see Truer (1984) for particulars.

Most Gugs live in a horrible walled kingdom-city where cyclopean round towers soar endlessly into the black air overhead. Each tower has a single black portal, thirty feet high. Rough stone paves the whole of the city (Carter, 1927). At the city’s center is the sign of Koth, on a great central tower leading to the surface of the Dreamlands. No day or night exists in the twilight realm, and a Gug usually sleeps immediately after gorging on loathsome provender: just after general feast-time may be the best time to penetrate this place. Ghast raiders, occasionally attacking then, may imperil researchers.

Distinguishing Gugs:

• The Beings from Ib are much smaller and more rubbery.

• Men of Leng are much smaller, with only two arms and normally-placed facial features.

• Tsathoggua has a squat, toad-like appearance, and a horizontal mouth.

The Gug Jaw The powerful muscles of the Gug’s jaw are at rest when the vertical hinge is closed, not open (as with primates), supplying a excellent reason why Gugs do not speak. Special supplementary muscles allow the jaw to lock at two stages of openness.

Fig. 35—Gug skull..