Original Mythos

The term “Original Mythos” specifically refers to the first images and accounts of the Slender Man from the “Create Paranormal Images” thread on Something Awful forums. The thread ran from June 8, 2009 through February 12, 2010, and the first Slender Man post was made by user Victor Surge on June 10, 2009. Through these case files, demented fairy tales, and anecdotes of ordinary forum users, the Slender Man takes on a life of its own in the internet’s collective consciousness and out your window, right now.

Original Mythos

Pages on this wiki that comprise the Original Mythos are as follows.

  • Stirling City Incidents: “we didn’t want to go, we didn’t want to kill them, but its persistent silence and outstretched arms horrified and comforted us at the same time…”
  • Wilks Estate: “Further inquiry to cease immediately.”
  • Jake Greenwood: “ANTI-S WALKER UNIT to deploy to —Wichita—Kansas—“
  • Found Photographs: “I’ve been seriously debating sharing these, but after Victor Surge’s posts I feel I have to.”
  • Steinmen Woods: “Slender Man safety procedures require this incident’s physical photographic evidence to be disposed of by no later than 10/20.”
  • Conspiracies: “Many remarked that Page’s interest in the occult was abnormal, but some would later argue it had caused the crash of the Led Zeppelin.”
  • Der Großmann: “There is more evidence of the slender man, but this is one of the oldest translatable accounts.”
  • The Tall Man: “If you don’t, it will be worse. So much worse.”
  • Schlankwald: “Tall Forest”
  • Henderson Horse Farm: “W…went out there… dead… all dead… the eyes… no…. no eyes”
  • Radio Newsroom: “Eerie similarities? Or maybe there’s something more going on here?”
  • From the Journal of Dr. Jeffrey Scripter: “I don’t often write of my official duties in this journal, as I feel it would be unprofessional; however, today has been all too peculiar to leave out.”
  • Diamond Lake: “Weird things happen. Weird things.”
  • Hamilton Psychiatric Hospital: “I find this tall man stuff Fascinating and wanted to learn more. So I chcked around and found some really cool stuff.”
  • Grandpa: “My grandpa shook a moment and I asked ‘what’s wrong?’ He turned the TV off and asked me what I knew about his time in WWII.”
  • Optic Nerve: “Sub: Ongoing S. Man Investigation”
  • Patient of Dr. Bronn: “I think she thinks it’ll help me get through the ‘dreams’. I don’t think they ARE dreams, though, even though she and my wife keep insisting they are.”
  • Transcript 21: “No sir, he didn’t kill Ned. We did. But he made us kill Ned. Yes sir. That’s what he did.”
  • Disappearance of Boy: “A new piece of evidence has turned up in the investigation of the boy that disappeared from an elementary school in Tulsa.”
  • Mississippian Mounds: “Photographs of these earthwork monuments routinely develop unusual dark artifacts not visible at the time the photo was taken.”
  • Miscellaneous Journal Entries: “Until the day you die. Until the day you die.”
  • War Accounts: “After that he said he just threw it in reverse and never looked back.”
  • Der Ritter: “The reason for this sudden change of priorities in Freckenberg’s style is still a topic of hot debate.”
  • First Appearance: “hey guys, you reckon this might be the first human record of the slender man?”
  • Missing Family: “Police sources have reported that a camera was found with several pictures taken, and they are being developed.”
  • Fear Dubh: “I can remember my granny telling me stories about a lot of Scottish folk tales; she only ever mentioned the Fear Dubh once, and that was in church.”
  • Inhuman Handprint: “Everything Elizabeth had been talking about was true. It was real.”
  • Carvings: “We can’t specify yet. The police are working on it. In the meantime, we’re issuing a warning: people should avoid activities in the woods until further notice.”
  • The Big Tree: “The following photos were the three shot burst that his Uncle Bubba Ray took the moment they heard the shriek and Eldon vanished before their eyes.”
  • Deadly House Fire: “You can’t stop it, you can never stop it. He finds you, and what he does to you is worse than death.”
  • SomethingAwful: “Goons, what the fuck is that.”
  • Jozef: “Let me preface this by saying that I am an extremely sceptical person.”
  • Fog: “A creep in the fog.”
  • Emergency Call: “He is coming, the slender man is coming”
  • Deep Sea Excursion: “We’re not safe anywhere.”
  • Henry Coe: “I found a man named Henry Coe’s alleged recollection of what seems to be the Slender Man.”
  • Pyotr: “It is a mistake. It must be corrected. It will come. He will come.”
  • Detector Images: “I was presented with this image as part of the collision detection research as they were having trouble with the sensor going off for no reason.”
  • Small Findings: “Finally I found his old mountaineering journals, and sure enough my memory wasn’t just playing tricks on me.”
  • Three Ages of Woman and Death: “The German Renaissance artist Hans Baldung (better known as Hans Baldung Grien) was thought to be a contemporary of the previously mentioned woodcut artist Hans Freckenberg.”
  • Cessna Stationair: “Jesus Christ, I shouldn't have flown back tonight.”
  • Jason E: “The following image is notable as one of the few photographs of the Slender Man in which he is the intended subject of the shot.”
  • Padre Flaco: “Do you think a Mexican legend about a tall man wearing black robes like a priest who lives in the forest is a coincidence or part of a pattern?”
  • Marble Hornets Preamble: “I filed the tapes separately from my others, and was honestly too freaked out to look at them at the time, and eventually forgot about them. But reading about the slender man has peaked my interest again. Maybe it’s what Alex was talking about that day.”
  • Found Footage: “Everything was normal except for about one minute of footage.”
  • British Myths, Legends and Unsolved Tales: “In the winter of 1809, the English industrial town of Blackburn, Lancashire was victim to a spate of child disappearances.”
  • Recorded Witness Hearing: “Your call home was recorded. Now playing Item 3C for the recording…”
  • Séance: “Spirits, hear me… Two of us are looking for answers… looking for hope… looking for a missing child… please spirits… help us fi….”
  • Run: “The way it looked, wrong, a nightmare invading her waking world.”
  • Windsor Pines: “I never meant to lie.”
  • Rodzby Incident: “OK, someone needs to own up to some internet detective shit.”
  • Derek: “It’s not funny, Derek. I’m not laughing, and neither is he.”
  • Tias: “I was always told not to mess with the dead and that they had eerie powers, but we never suspected…”
  • Nathaniel V: “From a grimoire of sorts I picked up at a used book store.”
  • Metaphysical Territoriality: “When you sit and think about him, he is behind you.”
  • Atlantic Historical Review: “One such example of these Gallic ‘monster’ tales can be seen in correspondence dating back to the first century B.C.E.”
  • Swamp Stories: “There’s simple enough explanations without believin’ in magic and monsters.”
  • Ghost Stories of the American South: “It’s the man walking yonder! It’s the man walking yonder!”
  • Dorothy Birch: “Looking back, I should have noticed the signs immediately.”
  • Henry Louis Marshall: “Not you. Never you.”
  • The Case of Shannon DeMarco: “Sh-She came in like this. I’m surprised the deputy managed to get her in here in one piece. God, I’m too scared to do anything else to the poor thing, she’ll just fall apart.”
  • Jessica Samson: “She told me that she was feeling sick lately. She said someone had been bothering her at school and she wanted to get away for a while.”
  • Mr. Sanderson: “Apparently the very thing that saved my life is the same thing that makes it a living hell: my mind.”
  • Of the Slender Man: “We’ve been trying to collect as much literature as possible on this ‘Slender Man’, the ancient god of death and despair. So far all we’ve found are stories throughout the ages of people being put to death while being forced in to the very depths of madness.”
  • Remains of Missing Camper: “I recently found a fragment of an old newspaper in the store rooms of my college.”
  • Little Brother: “It all started with the scraping at our windows.”
  • Comment Chain: “Look what you’ve done, SomethingAwful. Fuck you.”
  • Ceiba Trees: “Oh, Dios Santo y todos sus angeles protegenos…”
  • Withering Walkers: “Yeah. So slender men have existed for a long time.”
  • Stanley Ercavich: “I’m writing this because it might be the last thing I ever write. Or say. Whatever.”
  • Miscellaneous User Sightings: “I was hesitant about posting this but here goes.”
  • Appalachian Trail Incident: “It is my surmise that the students misinterpreted the appearance of the assailant. Through a combination of suddenly being awakened late at night, the rainy conditions and more than a little bit of ‘creative thinking’ brought on by the reported bout of ghost stories told by the students earlier in the evening.”
  • Harris: “Why? Why did it smile?”
  • Superstition: “I think at this point, I’m going to chalk this up with the bloody yolk signs, black bird omens and howling dogs are ill tidings. I don’t think I want to think any further.”
  • Delgado: “That’s what he is. Delgado. Thin. Thin and tall, taller than anyone I’ve ever seen before.”
  • The Orphanage: “I knew one day I would find the orphanage to see it for myself. When I was ready.”
  • Psychologist's Notes: “This is the third child abduction case in the county this year. However, unlike the other two, this one has an eyewitness.”
  • Josef Franz: “Historians are trying to find more works by Franz in the hopes that it will help clear up the mystery of his disappearance and bring new light about the life of this mysterious child prodigy.”
  • Men In Suits: “I saw a man in a suit today.”
  • The Green Man: “There are countless tales of the miraculous deeds of the Green Man. But not one mentions what ultimately became of him.”
  • Abandoned Journal: “As an avid researcher of the occult and paranormal, the reports of a tall, thin man had once intrigued me. Once enthralled me. My lust, my craving for knowledge has now been my undoing.”

Other Content

In addition to witness accounts of the Slender Man, there were several other interesting posts from the original thread.

  • Original Mythos Images: The thread included several standalone images worth note.
  • Original Mythos Meta: Throughout the thread, various users began to question the nature of their forum’s discussion.
  • Connections: The Original Mythos makes the most significant connections between the Slender Man and other folklore and history. The thread has also referenced several non-Slender Man stories, which is why their pages are tagged “originalmythos”
  • Create Paranormal Images: Non-Slender Man images and text from the thread have been archived here as well.
  • Dreams and Pareidolia: Some of this page’s content comes from this thread.
  • Nightmare Retardant: as does this one’s.

Pages by Medium

The Original Mythos can also be organized by putting a given page in any of the following categories (with multi-category pages in italics):

Pages by Content

And as for what each page contains…

Unless otherwise stated, the content of this page is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0 License