The Necronomicon
Is this the lost masterpiece of occult literature?
One of the most talked about occult books of the last century is an ancient text called The Necronomicon. It is purported to have been written by the ‘Mad Arab’ named Abdul Alhazred and was described as being a grimoire or book of magic. The original name in Arabic was Kitab al-Azif. Al Azif is defined as ‘that nocturnal sound (made by insects) supposed to be the howling of demons.’ It was translated into Greek to mean ‘an image of the law of the dead’ before becoming The Necronomicon. Nowadays the title is generally meant to mean Book of the Dead.
Abdul Alhazred lived in the early 700s CE, originally from Sunaa in Yemen. He wandered far during his life visiting the ruins of Babylon, the ‘subterranean secrets’ of Memphis and the Empty Quarter of Arabia (the vast sand desert of the Arabian peninsular). His final years were spent in Damacus where he wrote his iconic grimoire, ‘Al Azif.’ According to the Islamic historian, Ibn Khallikan, he was killed when ‘seized by an invisible monster in broad daylight and devoured horribly before a large number of fright-frozen witnesses.’
Copies of his grimoire were passed secretly amongst philosophers of the age before being given the title of The Necronomicon by a scholar from Constantinople. Yet copies were suppressed and burned after it had…
