Planar Adventures for Dummies: Ecology of the Cyclops

The cyclops in fantasy gaming is fairly boring. It is just another giant monster that is out to kill you. This is in contrast to their place in Greek mythology, in which they were the allies of Zeus who forged his lightning bolt and helped him overthrow Cronus.

Monsters of the Mind: Cyclops

Greek mythology

In Greek mythology there were at least two generations or tribes of cyclopes: the elder cyclopes and the younger cyclopes.

The elder cyclopes were immortal one-eyed giants born from the union of Gaia (Earth) and Uranus (Sky); they were sometimes counted among the titans. They were master craftsmen, giving rise to the adjective "cyclopean" to refers to ancient architecture only they were considered capable of building. Uranus feared them so much that he imprisoned them within Tartarus (Hell). They were later released by Zeus and forged his lightning bolt.

Cyclops blacksmith

The younger cyclopes were a primitive tribe of one-eyed giants who lived in caves and herded sheep on the island of Hypereia (later identified with Sicily). Like other giants they were birthed by Gaia, either asexually or after she was impregnated by Tartarus or the blood of Uranus after he was castrated by their son Cronus (Time).

Polyphemus ("the loquacious one"), who lived among the younger cyclopes, was not born directly of Gaia. He was a son of Poseidon (king of the sea), and the sea-nymph Thoosa ("swift"), daughter of Phorcys (the old man of the sea).

Polyphemus with two blind eyes

Historical artwork of the cyclops alternately depicted them with just one eye, or with two blind eyes and a third eye in their forehead. Elephant skulls are commonly cited as inspiring the cyclops myth, since the ancients are assumed to have mistakenly believed they belonged to giants and misinterpreted the nasal cavity as an eye socket.

Cyclops mask modeled after elephant skull

Popular culture

According to Bernard Evslin's retelling of Greek mythology, Gaia gave birth to two cyclopes. A boy and a girl, they became the mother and father of the cyclops race.

Ray Harryhausen animated the cyclops with stop-motion in The Seventh Voyage of Sinbad. Here it is depicted with a short horn in its forehead like a Japanese ogre and shaggy legs ending in hooves like a satyr.

Some New Age occultists like to tie the cyclops' third eye into the pseudo-science surrounding the pineal gland. From there they like to claim that the cyclops had oracular powers or even sacrificed their normal eyes to gain a third (based on the artwork depicting them with three eyes). Although an oracle told Polyphemus was told he would be blinded by Odysseus, the cyclopes were never ascribed oracular powers in mythology.

Ray Harryhausen's cyclops

Etymology

The word cyclops means "round-eyed" and is believed to have referred to cattle thieves. You can see the resemblance to related words like cycle and optics.

Neologisms were invented through back-formation to refer to cyclopes with variable numbers of eyes: monoclops, biclops, triclops, etc. These are etymologically nonsense of course, as "cy-" is not a prefix denoting number and "-clops" is not a suffix denoting eyes.

It would be accurate to refer to these derivatives as monocyclops, dicyclops, tricyclops, etc. Be careful not to confuse Greek and Latin numerical prefixes, as these are different: mono- versus uni-, di- versus bi-, etc.

Triclops by Nathan Hill

Fantasy gaming

Dungeons & Dragons included the cyclops in its monster manuals and depicted the race as generic uncivilized giant monsters, basically ogres with one eye. 4th edition tied them into the Feywild, gave them magical powers, and made them fanatical servants of the Fomorians.

Pathfinder adopted this depiction wholesale, then tried to tie it into the original mythology by claiming the cyclopes were the degenerate descendants of a fallen empire and gods of lightning and forging (referencing the elder cyclopes from mythology?). Their mythic rules introduce a "great cyclops" which resembles the horned, shaggy-legged cyclops from Harryhausen's films. Seemingly inspired by the New Age idea that the cyclops had a psychic third eye, this depiction gives all cyclopes limited oracular ability and claims that their empire fell because of misuse of divination.

Pathfinder also takes Kabandha from Hindu mythology, multiplies him and makes the resulting "kabandhas" into a type of cyclops; specifically, a headless cyclops with its face in its chest. This was probably influenced by The Travels of Sir John Mandeville, a fake travelogue of Asia that recounts fantastical peoples like headless men and dog-headed men. When I said scrapping the bottom of the barrel, I meant it.

Races described by Mandeville

Likewise, Iron Kingdoms depicts cyclopes as clairvoyant and ascribes them various psychic powers.

I prefer the original mythological version of them as craftsmen. I find the monster manual depiction bland and boring, though I will admit that it generally fits the portrayal of the younger cyclopes in mythology. I think the idea of second sight is a neat addition that gives depth.

Meanwhile, other bestiaries introduce new varieties of cyclopes with varying degrees of creativity.

The greater cyclopes, lesser cyclopes, and Argus Panoptes are given statistics in The New Argonauts by Sean K. Reynolds. Since this was written before mythic was a thing and ignores epic/divine, they are your standard low- and mid-level monsters.

Mazes & Minotaurs introduces both the cyclopes and the argusoïd (a multiplication of Argus Panoptes). It further claims that the two races are natural enemies, ostensibly as a joke.

Bestiary Malfearous goes a step further and expands the cyclopes with multiple sub-races. Naming this super-race "clops" (a mistaken etymology as I explained above), it describes this race as giants with a variable number of eyes at least one of which grants them magical powers. The new cyclopic races introduced are triclops and megaclops. The megaclops closely resembles the argusoïd, so I consider them synonymous.

Two-headed cyclops or "biclops"

Tome of Horrors introduces the biclops, converted from an earlier edition of D&D, which is a cyclops with two heads each with a single eye. Get it? (The biclops was roundly mocked in an article about stupid monsters in D&D.) In a similar vein, Symatt released artwork of a three-headed “triclops.”

Octavirate Presents: Lethal Lexicon Vol 1 parodies the biclops by introducing its own version, which is depicted as a cyclops with two eyes arranged vertically that grant it better depth perception. (A similar biclops appeared in the old children's cartoon ChalkZone.)

Biclops parody

The indie video game Cloud Meadow depicts a stony-skinned cyclops with a giant eye in its chest rather than its eyeless face.

My setting

My setting just tosses the different cyclopes into a blender. I have the elder cyclopes craftsmen, younger cyclopes shepherds, satyresque cyclopes, two-headed cyclopes, binocular cyclopes, three-eyed cyclopes, three-headed cyclopes, headless cyclopes, and argusoïd as different varieties within the greater cyclopes race birthed by Mother Earth. As their power is often indicated by their number of eyes, there is a natural enmity between cyclopes with vastly different numbers of eyes.

Unlike in typical fantasy gaming logic, I do not strictly adhere to the idea that physical or mental traits run in families. In my setting heredity is dependent on the needs of the plot: a tribe might consist entirely of one-eyed cyclopes only for a hundred-eyed cyclops to be born to them one day, while another tribe might have children with randomly determined numbers of eyes. Likewise for their size, number of heads and other limbs, etc.

James Groman's Kaiju Killer

Research Links

Gaming links

Bibliography

Bestiary Malfearous by Worlds of Adventure
Lethal Lexicon by Octavirate Games
Mazes & Minotaurs by Legrand Games Studio
Tome of Horrors by Frog God Games
The Cyclopes by Bernard Evslin

Planar Adventures for Dummies

Pages

Friday, November 16, 2018

Ecology of the Cyclops