Was the Modern Design of Gnolls Based on the " Cynocephaly" of myth

The "Cynocephaly" or "Cynocephalus" were described in various tales as a race of Dog Headed Humanoids that were viscous to outsiders and Notorious Slavers

Also One of them Met Baby Jesus and became a saint

Other urls found in this thread:

doyleandmacdonald.com/d_nuth.htm
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They weren't thick and sticky to insiders?

No.
These guys were something different.
Post Ecology of the Flind Gnolls a shit.

No, those would be kobolds back when they were more rat/dog-like

probably, though the word gnoll has other orgins. a dog headed person was in common usage while gnoll was just made up in the 20th century as a name for some goblin.

1912 to be exact, the Gnole was a creature in Lord Dunsany's "How Nuth Would Have Practiced His Art Upon the Gnoles"
OD&D explicitly mentions Dunsany in its description of its version of gnolls. They were nasty fellows sort of inbetween a gnome and a troll.

doyleandmacdonald.com/d_nuth.htm

>They were nasty fellows sort of inbetween a gnome and a troll.
That detail has nothing to do with Dunsany. It's also the only detail OD&D gave beyond, "go read Dunsany."
The hyena thing got added in AD&D, but considering how limited Gary's interests where and how poor his research tended to be

I seriously doubt it.

>That detail has nothing to do with Dunsany.

Sure, insofar as Dunsany's Gnoles are not given much of anything in the way of a description, as you can see in the link I gave. They do appear to be wicked fairy-like creatures however.

>how limited Gary's interests where

This is the kind of answer I'd expect from a memelord. Gary's interests were pretty far-ranging, far more so than most of the wargamers of his day.

>and how poor his research tended to be

And it's easy to sneer now that we have the internet at our fingertips, but you try doing research in a small town like Lake Geneva, Wisconsin in the early 70s. I was a kid back then, but I know what it was like in the 80s in a much bigger town and it was still no picnic having to make do with your local library's selection. The guy did the best he could.

>Furfags officially have a saint
fuck this gay universe

>And it's easy to sneer now that we have the internet at our fingertips,
and no amount of defending his poor research will allow you to claim he would recognize obscure religious iconography.
Especially considering how surface-level all his actual religious references were.

>obscure religious iconography.

When did I say anything about that? That's OP's business.
The flaws in e.g. chainmail's representation of medieval combat are well known. Hell, people have traced some of them back to the specific history text Gygax must have got them from, which was probably the only such book in his home town's library. That's still no reason to run the man down.

>how surface-level all his actual religious references were.

Gygax was a deeply religious man, and resisted putting anything religious in D&D for years because he felt it would end up disrespectful. You'd know that if you'd read any serious writing about the man. Shitting on Gygax may be a hip thing to do, but you really should at least know a little about him.

St. Christopher isn't really obscure. The name "Christopher" itself kind of comes from the story of him carrying Jesus across a river.

Gygax was an ultra ignorant Amerifat who learnt everything he knew from paperback fantasy novels. He was not a nerd.

high-school dropout too

that sounds like the definition of a nerd

>people who get their ideas about Gygax from internet memes

holy shit, Gygax was Veeky Forums incarnate

Also from his forum posts and from anecdotes by his old players.

You have to be careful with the old players' quotes. The Arneson vs. Gygax lawsuit was pretty nasty and divided the people around early D&D into two opposing camps, and there was a lot of "paint the other guy in the worst possible light" going on.

That's how I prefer my gnolls.

Any idea what he was really like in that case? Was he some super murder hobo that milksnaked the original murder hobos?

It's best to look at sources that predate that nastiness. There's a ton, Gygax was really prolific and active in multiple areas of wargaming in the 60s and 70s.
I'd recommend "Playing at the World," the author does his best to get past all the later stuff and paint a picture of the era from primary sources.
Both Gygax and Arneson were pretty fascinating guys.

Here's the book, up on sendspace:

file/x0nvfn

What's the name of the saint
>Good Boy

All fa/tg/uys hate each other the most.

Not true, you guys are great.

And successful. Unlike, well..