I have never heard of this Demon Lord, James Is this one you made up on the fly? Socothbenoth(Demon Lord of Incest), well that's right up Vanthus's alley with the way he's got the hots for his sister! Is there any info on this Demon Lord, seems there Is a lot of chatter going on In the Abyss right now who else Is going to show Up to try to take the Big "D" down?
DAve
Creative Director
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Nope... his name's been around forever. It was on the list of Other Demon Lords back in the 1st edition Monster Manual 2, and I've mentioned him a few times in Demonomicon articles. Green Ronin's Book of Fiends has a lot more info on him for folks who want to punch up his presence in the Savage Tide adventure path.
But while Socothbenoth isn't going to have much more of a presence in the Adventure Path... there's plenty of demon lords who will!
Socoth-Benoth was elaborated on in a 3rd Party product, which is why he's a bit on the obscure side. Green Ronin's 3.0 Armies of the Abyss, which became the first third of the 3.5 Book of Fiends. Written by Erik Mona, no less.
Probably-not-so-coincidentally, Robert Schwalb, the author of the module, wrote Legions of Hell, one of the other thirds of the Book of Fiends.
Edit: Beaten by Jacobs! CURSES!
Nope... his name's been around forever. It was on the list of Other Demon Lords back in the 1st edition Monster Manual 2, and I've mentioned him a few times in Demonomicon articles. Green Ronin's Book of Fiends has a lot more info on him for folks who want to punch up his presence in the Savage Tide adventure path.
But while Socothbenoth isn't going to have much more of a presence in the Adventure Path... there's plenty of demon lords who will!
Thanx James I was going to check out that list In MM2 but was too lazy, thanx and hope your feeling better buddy.
DAve
heheh, I knew it!
Suspecteed it from the moment of that "love potion prank", and "being separated" :D
Just recieved the back Issue of Dragon with Malcanthet In It. Okay so now I know that both Red Shroud and Socothbenoth are siblings off of Malcanthet and Pazuzu...Intresting! I thought Red Shroud was going to be an offspring of Demogorgon and Malcanthet, James you did mention that there would be such an offspring coming up In Savage Tide...any teasers name,appearance,purpose? I"m Intrested to see what The Big "D" and the Succubus Queen would create? He's very scaly,tentacled and Baboon nasty and well she's just slammin'!
DAve
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Chief Creative Officer, Publisher
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I love the description of Lord Socothbenoth's personal layer Goranthis: The Cathedral Thelemic.
The line "Mocking birds trill innocuous love songs as they flutter from tree to tree stretching thier colorful wings in the welcoming light of a warm sun" still brings tears to my eyes. The writing of the layer is very descriptive and beautiful.
Hey, thanks!
--Erik
From bibletools.org:
Succoth-benoth
(From International Standard Bible Encyclopedia)
suk'-oth, suk'-oth-be'-noth, be'-noth (cukkoth benoth; Rhochchothbaineithei, Codex Alexandrinus (better) Sokchothbenithei):
1. The Meaning according to the Hebrew:
The name of an idol made by the Babylonians sent into exile at Samaria by an Assyrian king (Shalmaneser), and mentioned among the deities of the various nationalities there assembled (2 Kings 17:30). In Hebrew, Succoth-benoth means "booths of daughters," and has been explained as the chambers wherein the Babylonians placed women for prostitution; or booths or tabernacles in which images of certain goddesses were worshipped.
2. Sir H. Rawlinson's Identification of the Name:
The parallelism, however, requires a deity, like the Nergal of the Cutheans, the Ashima of the Hamathites, etc., and not a chamber or shrine. This consideration caused Sir H. to suggest an identification of Succoth-benoth with the Babylonian Zer-panitum (= Zer-banitum), whose name was probably pronounced Zer-panith, the spouse of Merodach (the god of Babylon), as the "seed-creatress." The difference in the first component, zer, was regarded as due to its possible Hamitic (= Sumerian) equivalent, or to a Semitic mistranslation, both of which explanations are now known to be untenable.
3. Is Succoth the Babylonian Sakut?:
As the people who made Succoth-benoth were Babylonians, we should expect here either a name of Merodach, the god of Babylon, or one of the deities identified with him. At present the only suggestion which can be made is that Benoth is for ban wath, i.e. ban'(i) mati, "creator of the land." Both the Semitic and the bilingual creation-stories speak of Merodach as the creator of the world, with its products, and the great cities of Babylonia; and "father Enlil," who bore the title "lord of the world," bestowed the same upon Merodach at the creation, thus identifying Merodach with himself. Now there is a group which may be read either Dikut, "the Judge," or Sakut, "the Counselor," and if we can read Succoth-benoth as Sakut(h)ban' wat(h), "the Counselor, creator of the land," a satisfactory explanation of this puzzling name will be furnished. The terminal -i of the Babylonian has been preserved in the ei, of the Greek. The adoption of such a descriptive name of Enlil-Merodach would form a compromise between abandoning their old objects of worship and accepting "the god of the land" (2 Kings 17:26).
T. G. Pinches
Just if people are interested in the sources of these demon lords...
Yes, this is a very typical linguistic phenomenon--speakers of one language taking a respectful name from another language and transliterating it in an insulting manner. An interesting little bit of biblical trivia here.
On another note, how do the Green Ronin books compare to WotC's Fiendish Codex series? Sounds like the two series share many of the same authors.
heheh, I knew it!
Suspecteed it from the moment of that "love potion prank", and "being separated" :D
Wow. I didn't catch that one. I guess my imagination isn't as sick as yours. ;)
How very biblical . . . In my freshman year Old Testament class (Catholic H.S.) we learned about Lot and his daughters from the teacher. Then I learned from my Catholic classmates that "incest is best" (*sound of laughter rippling through the classroom as the poor young closet-lesbian religion teacher struggles to control the class*). Catholic school was a real eye-opener to a sheltered kid with a vaguely protestant upbringing.
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Creative Director
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Yes, this is a very typical linguistic phenomenon--speakers of one language taking a respectful name from another language and transliterating it in an insulting manner. An interesting little bit of biblical trivia here.
On another note, how do the Green Ronin books compare to WotC's Fiendish Codex series? Sounds like the two series share many of the same authors.
They compliment each other more or less perfectly. We were pretty careful to avoid contradicting any of the information in Book of Fiends when Erik and I were working on the FC1. I didn't work on FC2 so I can't say about that one.
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Yes, this is a very typical linguistic phenomenon--speakers of one language taking a respectful name from another language and transliterating it in an insulting manner. An interesting little bit of biblical trivia here.
On another note, how do the Green Ronin books compare to WotC's Fiendish Codex series? Sounds like the two series share many of the same authors.
I just got the Book of Fiends. It's pretty wild.
I guess I didn't notice that... Where was it mentioned?heheh, I knew it!
Suspecteed it from the moment of that "love potion prank", and "being separated" :D
Way, way waaay back in TINH, when the PCs ask Lavinia about Vanthus.
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Creative Director
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There are multiple examples of alliances between demon lords, actually.
Demogorgon has alliances with Ilsidahur and Malcanthet and Dagon.
Baphomet has an alliance with Pale Night.
Obox-ob has an alliance with Lascer (that one's probably way too obscure, though).
Savage Tide effectively sees an alliance build between Orcus and Malcanthet, after a fashion.
There's a lot more. Alliances between demon lords are generally prone to treachery at one point or another, of course, but just because something is chaotic doesn't mean that it can't ally with another creature for whatever reason (generally so they can fight against a tougher common enemy).
So yeah, Nocticula and Socothebenoth have an alliance. How unbreakable it is remains to be seen.
