Edgar Rice Burroughs was a master storyteller. One of his best tricks was to include monsters, creatures, call them what you will, in the best scenes. He used this well in At the Earth’s Core by Edgar Rice Burroughs (All-Story Weekly, April 4-25, 1914), the first Pellucidar novel. Who can forget how David Innes and Ja met in a boat on the deadly Lural Az, while a plesiosaur tried to eat them? Or the giant sloth that chased the two explorers upon their first steps into the Inner World?
These critters can be placed into distinct groups. Any good scientist could tell you that the mammals of Pellucidar, no matter how big, would not have lasted long against the dinosaura, but ERB never let that get in the way of a fantastic world. Let’s tackle these in order of appearance.
The first monster to stomp onto the scene was the terrible ground sloth, so let’s look at the mammals first.
Dyryth or Megatherium
“Emerging from the forest was a colossal beast which closely resembled a bear. It was fully as large as the largest elephant and with great forepaws armed with huge claws. Its nose, or snout, depended nearly a foot below its lower jaw, much after the manner of a rudimentary trunk. The giant body was covered by a coat of thick, shaggy hair…”
In the 1976 film version, the producers changed the sloth to a rubber monster-thing, which set the tone for all monsters to follow. Plenty of disappointment to come…
Jalok or Hyaenodon
“The thing’s body was as large as that of a full-grown mastiff, its legs were short and powerful, and its jaws broad and strong. Dark, shaggy hair covered its back and sides, while its breast and belly were quite white. As it slunk toward us it presented a most formidable aspect with its upcurled lips baring its mighty fangs…”
Burroughs was such a dog lover that he had to have a dog pet for his heroes. John Carter has Woola. Innes has Raja.
Tarag or Sabertooth Tiger
“And now, as the two stood frozen in terror, I saw the author of that fearsome sound creeping stealthily into view. It was a huge tiger—such as hunted the great Bos through the jungles primeval when the world was young. In contour and markings it was not unlike the noblest of the Bengals of our own world, but as its dimensions were exaggerated to colossal proportions so too were its colorings exaggerated. Its vivid yellows fairly screamed aloud; its whites were as eider down; its blacks glossy as the finest anthracite coal, and its coat long and shaggy as a mountain goat. That it is a beautiful animal there is no gainsaying, but if its size and colors are magnified here within Pellucidar, so is the ferocity of its disposition. It is not the occasional member of its species that is a man hunter—all are man hunters; but they do not confine their foraging to man alone, for there is no flesh or fish within Pellucidar that they will not eat with relish in the constant efforts which they make to furnish their huge carcasses with sufficient sustenance to maintain their mighty thews…”
The tarag is the saber-toothed tiger of ancient days, though larger in the Pellucidarian version. Burroughs always had a version of a lion in each world. This is the scene that George Lucas pays homage to in the arena scene in Attack of the Clones.
Thag or Prehistoric Bull
“Presently a door in one side of the arena wall was opened to admit a huge, shaggy, bull-like creature….As the animal approached the two, bellowing and pawing the ground with the strength of many earthly bulls, another door directly beneath us was opened, and from it issued the most terrific roar that ever had fallen upon my outraged ears…”
The Bos or Thag is a dangerous, short-tempered creature and perhaps the only beast worthy of fighting the tarag in the arena.
Sadok or Brontotherium
“Once he was, but a sadok tossed him, and never again had he the full use of his right arm.”
The two-horned rhino of prehistory is alive and well and living in Pellucidar. This animal doesn’t get much more than a mention in the Pellucidar books.
Tandor or Mammoth
“And into the clearing, along numerous trails that seemed to center at this spot, came as strange a procession as the eyes of these men had ever rested upon. There were great ox-like creatures with shaggy coats and wide-spreading horns. There were red deer and sloths of gigantic size. There were mastodon and mammoth, and a huge, elephantine creature that resembled an elephant and yet did not seem to be an elephant at all. Its great head was four feet long and three feet wide. It had a short, powerful trunk and from its lower jaw mighty tusks curved downward, their points bending inward toward the body. At the shoulder it stood at least ten feet above the ground, and in length it must have been fully twenty feet. But what resemblance it bore to an elephant was lessened by its small, pig-like ears. “
The Tandor is both a wild animal and a draft animal of the mammoth men in Pellucidar. Burroughs does a neat thing, basing the name “tandor” on the Mangani “Tantor” for elephant, so the two words are related.
There are a lot of sea creatures in the waters of Pellucidar. It’s no wonder the locals don’t know how to swim.
Azdyryth (“Sea Sloth”) or Ichthyosaur
“Dian told me they were tandorazes, or tandors of the sea, and that the other, and more fearsome reptiles, which occasionally rose from the deep to do battle with them, were azdyryths, or sea-dyryths–Perry called them Ichthyosaurs. They resembled a whale with the head of an alligator.”
Hydrophidian or Sea Serpent
“His hand was reaching upward for the stern when I saw a sleek, sinuous body shoot from the depths below. The man saw it too, and the look of terror that overspread his face assured me that I need have no further concern as to him, for the fear of certain death was in his look. And then about him coiled the great, slimy folds of a hideous monster of that prehistoric deep—a mighty serpent of the sea, with fanged jaws, and darting forked tongue, with bulging eyes, and bony protuberances upon head and snout that formed short, stout horns…”
The hydrophidians riddle the seas of Pellucidar. One of many dinosaurs found in Pellucidar. Burroughs usually gave them Pellucidarian names but not this one.
Sithic or Labyrthodon
“A huge, slimy amphibian it was, with toad-like body and the mighty jaws of an alligator. Its immense carcass must have weighed tons, and yet it moved swiftly and silently toward me. Upon one hand was the bluff that ran from the canyon to the sea, on the other the fearsome swamp from which the creature had sneaked upon me, behind lay the mighty untracked sea, and before me in the center of the narrow way that led to safety stood this huge mountain of terrible and menacing flesh…”
The prehistoric crocodile is another danger of the waters.
Tandoraz or “Sea Tiger” or Plesiosaur
“Dian told me they were tandorazes, or tandors of the sea, and that the other, and more fearsome reptiles, which occasionally rose from the deep to do battle with them, were azdyryths, or sea-dyryths—Perry called them Ichthyosaurs. They resembled a whale with the head of an alligator. “
The “sea tiger” is the plesiosaur of the seas of Pellucidar.
Other forms of dinosaurs exist in Pellucidar, in fact any prehistoric animal you could imagine.
Lidi or Apatosaurus
“We had barely entered the great plain when we discovered two enormous animals approaching us from a great distance. So far were they that we could not distinguish what manner of beasts they might be, but as they came closer, I saw that they were enormous quadrupeds, eighty or a hundred feet long, with tiny heads perched at the top of very long necks. Their heads must have been quite forty feet from the ground. The beasts moved very slowly—that is their action was slow—but their strides covered such a great distance that in reality they traveled considerably faster than a man walks…”
The Thorians who live in the Land of the Awful Shadow ride the brontosaurian mounts. One has to wonder what Burroughs ever thought of Alley Oop?
Thipdars or Pterodons
“And at the first glance there broke upon my horrified vision the most frightful thing I had seen even within Pellucidar. It was a giant dragon such as is pictured in the legends and fairy tales of earth folk. Its huge body must have measured forty feet in length, while the batlike wings that supported it in midair had a spread of fully thirty. Its gaping jaws were armed with long, sharp teeth, and its claw equipped with horrible talons…”
The thipdars are the pets of the Mahars. These pterodactyls would be better described as pterodons as they are much larger than a human. Lin Carter would borrow these creatures for his Thongor series, calling them Grakks. Rachel Welch would borrow the nest scene from Tarzan at the Earth’s Core for One Million Years B.C. You can’t tell me Harryhausen isn’t an ERB fan!
And now the best of them all, the creatures that Edgar Rice Burroughs made up especially for Pellucidar, each a possible off-shoot of the fauna of the Inner World.
The Monkey Men
“But these were not all that my startled eyes perceived. Chattering and gibbering through the lower branches of the trees came a company of manlike creatures evidently urging on the dog pack. They were to all appearances strikingly similar in aspect to the Negro of Africa. Their skins were very black, and their features much like those of the more pronounced Negroid type except that the head receded more rapidly above the eyes, leaving little or no forehead. Their arms were rather longer and their legs shorter in proportion to the torso than in man, and later I noticed that their great toes protruded at right angles from their feet—because of their arboreal habits, I presume. Behind them trailed long, slender tails which they used in climbing quite as much as they did either their hands or feet…”
The Monkey Men live in tree villages but use ancient ruins for their gladiatorial games. This is one of Burroughs more racist creations. I think he wanted to include “the missing link” of evolution. Fortunately they aren’t in the Pellucidar series for long. There is an interesting similarity with the monkey people in Jules Verne’s The City in the Treetops, a possible inspiration.
Sagoths or Apemen
“Our guards, whom I already have described as gorilla-like men, were rather lighter in build than a gorilla, but even so they were indeed mighty creatures. Their arms and legs were proportioned more in conformity with human standards, but their entire bodies were covered with shaggy, brown hair, and their faces were quite as brutal as those of the few stuffed specimens of the gorilla which I had seen in the museums at home.
Their only redeeming feature lay in the development of the head above and back of the ears. In this respect they were not one whit less human than we. They were clothed in a sort of tunic of light cloth which reached to the knees. Beneath this they wore only a loin cloth of the same material, while their feet were shod with thick hide of some mammoth creature of this inner world.Their arms and necks were encircled by many ornaments of metal—silver predominating—and on their tunics were sewn the heads of tiny reptiles in odd and rather artistic designs. They talked among themselves as they marched along on either side of us, but in a language which I perceived differed from that employed by our fellow prisoners. When they addressed the latter they used what appeared to be a third language, and which I later learned is a mongrel tongue rather analogous to the Pidgin-English of the Chinese coolie…”
The Sagoths are the intermediaries of the Mahars. They can communicate with them by way of a pidgeon tongue. Burroughs has many varieties of apemen in Pellucidar. The Sagoths are his version of the neanderthal. Robert E. Howard used the word “Sagoth” in the name of a city/island “Bal-Sagoth” in 1931.
The awful version of the Sagoth’s from the 1976 film At the Earth’s Core. Perhaps they didn’t want to be too similar to the Planet of the Apes films? Whatever. They still suck.
“Involuntarily I shrank back as one of the creatures approached to inspect us. A more hideous thing it would be impossible to imagine. The all-powerful Mahars of Pellucidar are great reptiles, some six or eight feet in length, with long narrow heads and great round eyes. Their beak-like mouths are lined with sharp, white fangs, and the backs of their huge, lizard bodies are serrated into bony ridges from their necks to the end of their long tails. Their feet are equipped with three webbed toes, while from the fore feet membranous wings, which are attached to their bodies just in front of the hind legs, protrude at an angle of 45 degrees toward the rear, ending in sharp points several feet above their bodies…”
The Mahars are the dominant race of creatures in Pellucidar prior to david Innes arrival. They ruled with the help of the sagoths. Gilaks or humans are mere cattle to them. There are no male Mahars. they breed through a cloning process called The Great Secret. Burroughs uses the Mahars to once again tackle his beliefs on female domination. He will do this again in Pellucidar. Let’s just say he was no feminist.
All these wonderful creatures, I can only wish as all ERB fans do for a big budget CGI version. Aquaman (2019) hinted at what such a film might be like in a scene where the superhero is transported by a wormhole to a prehistoric sea inside the earth. What would you pay to watch that for a whole two hours?
Love the work of these three artists who decorated this piece. For more:
Roy G. Krenkel https://www.erbzine.com/mag33/3330.html
J. Allen St. John https://www.erbzine.com/mag4/0431.html
