Just what eldritch and unspeakable beast was slaughtered to provide the casing of this unholy tome? What hunter stalked it through the nighted forests of the sunless lands? What weapon laid it low? Does PETA know about this?

The arabic script you would be shooting for wouldn't be 17th century. Lovecraft's Abdul Alhazred authored the Necronomicon in 730 AD. So if you are shooting for arabic text demonstrative of his version, shoot for the earliest Quran you can find, Muhhamed having died in the 600's. I found a Quran a year or two ago that was a scanned text and really old. It was offered 1 image per intricately illumintated page. I can't seem to find it now, though.

I think if you want to look at language that would have been used by a 17th century translator, a good place to start would be the story "The Case of Charles Dexter Ward", and the letters written by Curwen. I think they date to around 1750 and later, but the cool part is the man was supposedly far older and using much more archaic language with his correspondants.

For additional language reference, I would suggest some John Dee, since he wrote in English, and lived in the middle of the 16th century. If you need help on "esoterica" of the time, let me know. The world was abuzz translating this and that, so it should be fairly easy for you to emulate. You could even do it in latin ...

I am trying to recall what translation they would be talking about in the 17th century. I need to go back and look. There were lesser translations that Lovecraft often referred to, but the one that seemed most important was Olaus Wormius' translation in 1228 AD.

Here are is a decent overview of Abdul Alhazred and another concerning many of the ancient texts.

BE WARNED!! Take not this task lightly!! To many this is a deadly serious matter, the abuse of which carries the most grim consequences...

Lovecraft's Abdul Alhazred authored the Necronomicon in 730 AD.

Perhaps this would be a later copy rather than an original. HPLC certainly had enough instances of the book being re-copied by hand.

Truthfully, that was to be my intent. It would only be a certain passage, a page or two, that would have been copied into the manuscript, and then translated. I'd have to do the Arabic by hand and then scan it in, so I feel I'd have to research calligraphy as well. The translation I could provide, and they would provide the appropriate font for it. Have you guys looked at the web-site I linked? These people are pretty into getting it as good as possible (as far as a prop for LARP or plays go, anyway).

P.S. The religion section was a really wacky place to put this, ...

The religion section was a really wacky place to put this, ...

Are you making fun of of Cult of Cthulu? not very sensitive of you....

Ph-nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhy R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn.
"In his house at R'leh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming."

"That is not dead which can eternal lie,
And with strange eons even death may die" -A.A.-

SPC N.S. - IIRC, they specifically forbade that passage from being quoted/translated, even into Arabic (including transliterations). It's too common, and they probably already had something for it. They actually wanted us to stay away from the "known" portions of the text, and come up with some inventive "previously unpublished" stuff.

Well, I "splurged" for a "how to" book on Kufi calligraphy... but I got it off of eBay... and I'm sending a personal check... so it'll be a couple of weeks... and the "how to" part is in Arabic. Yah. Well, we'll see.