Description: Vual, alternately Vaal, Vuall, or Wall, speaks Egyptian, although the records do not specify whether this be Middle Egyptian, Demotic, or Coptic. Whatever its language, this gregarious Duke of Hell can secure friendship for its summoner, and even the love of women, in addition to divining past and present events.
Description: Valac or Volac appears as a cherub riding a two-headed dragon, and can tell its summoner where to find either serpents or hidden treasures. You're not alone if you can see some potential problems there. Recently had a star turn in The Conjuring film franchise, being (as "Valak") the entity possessing The Nun, and, like many of these antique demons, shows up in either the Castlevania or Bloodstained games as a monster.
Description: Ruiner of marriages, demon of lust, rage, and gambling. The infamous nuns of Loudun claimed Asmodeus — alternatively Asmodai, Asmodee, or sometimes Asmoday — was their tormentor in 1634. In the arcane text The Testament of Solomon, King Solomon uses a magic ring to conscript this demonic fellow king to help him build the great Temple.
Description: Biblical Canaanite god associated with fiery child sacrifice, famously depicted in statue form in Fritz Lang's Metropolis, and invoked by Allen Ginsberg in the poem Howl as a metaphor for industrial America. Moloch, here conflated with bull-headed Morax/Marax of the Pseudomonarchie Daemonum and Lesser Key of Solomon, has come to symbolize subservience to greed and wealth, and as such, its name has entered common speech somewhat. Notably, Moloch has become part of recent conspiracy theory, although the owl statue of Bohemian Grove fame probably has little to do with the more culturally rich figure of the bull-headed idol.
Description: Listed in the Pseudomonarchie Daemonum, Legemeton, and Dictionnaire Infernal, this Prince of Hell is supposed to have knowledge of the past, present, and future, and remarkably, the power to reconcile enemies. Appearing variably as a horse or a man, he is also remarkable for his purported refusal to engage in deceit.
Description: Native to the Dictionnaire Infernal, but not the Goetia/Legemeton, Lamia is possibly a demonic interpretation of the mythological Medusa, or Lilith, the "first" version of Eve arisen from the dual creation accounts in Genesis. Medieval Lilith was sometimes fused with or married to Asmodeus. Kabbalic Lilith bred with Samael (sometimes the angel of death, sometimes Belial or Satan) to create monsters, the lilim. Lamia is also a common Latin translation used for the Lilith-like word in Hebrew that could mean "night monster" or "screech owl". Generally, a lamia is a vampire or a succubus, and almost always a murderer of newborn children.
Description: A President of Hell, per the Pseudomonarchie Daemonum of 1577, Buer is said to have knowledge of philosophy, logic, and herbology, although when he appears most frequently in pop culture — typically as an enemy monster in the Castlevania video game franchise — he seems to prefer rolling down stairs at people to dispensing wisdom.
Description: The Black Hand, also known as "Unification or Death" — a secret society of assassins within the Serbian military who sought to liberate the Kingdom of Serbia and other ethnically-Serbian territories from the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Through agents including Gavrilo Princep, Unification or Death murdered Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife, Sofie, beginning the falling domino chain that led to the start of World War I.
Description: Griffin's hapless and sadly visible catspaw in H.G. Wells' classic story ended the novel as a successful entrepreneur, parlaying the fame of his experience (and perhaps some ill-gotten gains) into a new career. Once the original, rather humble exterior sign for his inn had worn out, he commissioned another, more lavish one.
