Evil Book Name Generator

Forbidden tomes, cursed grimoires and blasphemous scriptures

Magic & Supernatural500 names

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Generate evil book names for horror, dark fantasy and tabletop games: forbidden grimoires, cursed codices, blasphemous gospels and flesh-bound ledgers, from Latin-titled tomes to titles that describe exactly what the book does to its reader.

About evil book names

An evil book earns its reputation before anyone opens it, so the title has to do the threatening. The names that have lasted, from Lovecraft's Necronomicon and Robert Bloch's De Vermis Mysteriis to the Darkhold and the Book of Vile Darkness, follow a few quiet rules: they borrow the vocabulary of real liturgy and scholarship (codex, psalter, breviary, treatise, apocrypha), they favour Latin or a made-up dead language, and they promise knowledge that should have stayed buried rather than simply sounding scary.

The most useful pattern for original titles is a respectable form word attached to an unsettling subject. A Bestiary of What Waits Beneath or a Treatise on the Husbandry of Ghouls reads like a real book that a real, deeply wrong scholar sat down to write, which is more frightening than a title made of pure menace. Physical detail (flesh-bound, wax-sealed, moth-eaten) tells the reader what the object feels like in the hand. Named authors (Aldric's Catechism of Rot, the Last Book of Sister Agathe) suggest a history and a chain of owners who came to bad ends.

This list blends canon tomes, Latin titles, church-register forms and plain-spoken horror titles, so you can match the tone of a gothic novel, a Call of Cthulhu campaign or a D&D warlock's patron gift.

How to choose evil book names

  • Pick a form word that matches who wrote it: a psalter or breviary for a corrupted church, a treatise or lexicon for a mad scholar, a ledger or register for something bureaucratic and cold.
  • Use real Latin sparingly and correctly (Liber Tenebrarum, Codex Serpentis); a single wrong ending breaks the spell for any reader who took a year of Latin.
  • Let the title hint at the book's effect or price (The Ledger of Debts Unpaid, The Book That Weeps) so it doubles as a plot hook when players or readers find it.
  • Describe the binding or material once, if at all; 'flesh-bound' is effective in one title and comic by the third.
  • For a campaign, give the book a short name the table will actually say (the Darkhold, the Red Vellum) and a longer formal title for the lore entry.

Frequently asked questions

What makes a book title sound evil or forbidden?

Scholarly or liturgical form words (codex, psalter, treatise, apocrypha) combined with a subject that should not have a book written about it, plus a physical detail like flesh-bound or wax-sealed. Latin titles and named authors who met bad ends add weight; plain menace words like 'death' and 'evil' stacked together usually sound cheaper.

Are the famous tomes like the Necronomicon included?

Yes, a handful of canon titles from the Cthulhu Mythos, Marvel and Dungeons & Dragons appear for reference, but the large majority of the 500 names are original and free to use in your own fiction and games.

Can I use these names for a D&D or Call of Cthulhu campaign?

That is exactly what they are written for. Use the Latin and codex-style titles for arcane tomes and warlock patron gifts, the church-register titles (breviary, psalter, missal) for corrupted temples, and the plain horror titles for Mythos investigations.

Can I use an evil book name as the title of my novel?

Yes. The original titles here are free to use commercially. Titles are not copyrightable, but check that a name is not already a well-known published work before committing to it.

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All 500 evil book names

This is the complete list the generator above draws its random batches from, sorted A to Z and grouped by first letter.

Plain text, one name per line.

A: 10 names

  • A Grammar of Screams
  • A Ledger of Stolen Breath
  • Account Book of the Child-Tithe
  • Aldric's Catechism of Rot
  • Almanac for the Year of No Sun
  • Anatomy of the Devil's Lantern
  • Annals of the Mourning Court
  • Annals of the Slaughtered Saints
  • Antiphons of the Gagged Choir
  • Apocrypha of the Black Sun

B: 53 names

  • Bestiary of the Unmade
  • Bestiary of the Wet Cellar
  • Bestiary of What Waits Beneath
  • Book of Broken Psalms
  • Book of Burnt Milk
  • Book of Counted Sins
  • Book of Dripping Candles
  • Book of Grave-Loam
  • Book of Hinges and Hooks
  • Book of Lost Midnights
  • Book of Nettle and Knife
  • Book of Nine Rivers of Bile
  • Book of Orm the Hollow

B, continued

  • Book of Sour Milk and Ash
  • Book of the Black Candle
  • Book of the Blackened Pulpit
  • Book of the Blind Cartographer
  • Book of the Blind Watchman
  • Book of the Bone Orchard
  • Book of the Candle-Eaters
  • Book of the Closed Sky
  • Book of the Crawling Hour
  • Book of the Crooked Sexton
  • Book of the Crow Mother
  • Book of the Dripping Crown
  • Book of the Gibbet Wind

B, continued

  • Book of the Groaning Hinge
  • Book of the Half-Shut Eye
  • Book of the Hanging Garden
  • Book of the Hooded Choir
  • Book of the Lamenting Host
  • Book of the Lantern Ghoul
  • Book of the Last Lamp
  • Book of the Leaden Sky
  • Book of the Nameless Seventh
  • Book of the Ninth Wound
  • Book of the Pale Gardener
  • Book of the Plague Bell
  • Book of the Ragged Moon

B, continued

  • Book of the Rat King
  • Book of the Red Monastery
  • Book of the Rust-Choked Bell
  • Book of the Unclosing Eye
  • Book of the Unseen Hand
  • Book of the Waking Tomb
  • Book of the Wasp Bishop
  • Book of the Wither Court
  • Book of the Withered Choir
  • Book of Thorned Halos
  • Book of Whispered Plagues
  • Book of Wounds
  • Breviary of the Faceless
  • Breviloquium of the Worm-Pope

C: 48 names

  • Canticle of Bleeding Bells
  • Canticle of the Shadow Harvest
  • Canticle of the Sleepless Hive
  • Canticles of Rust
  • Canticles of the Pale Choir
  • Cartulary of the Drowned Abbey
  • Chant-Book of the Leech Choir
  • Chartulary of the Oathbreaker Kings
  • Chronicle of the Nameless Siege
  • Chronicle of the Obsidian Plague
  • Chronicle of the Plague Kings
  • Chronicle of the Scourged Coast

C, continued

  • Codex Horrendus
  • Codex Mortifer
  • Codex Nocturnus
  • Codex of Endless Hunger
  • Codex of Shrieking Glass
  • Codex of the Broken Wheel
  • Codex of the Crooked Steeple
  • Codex of the Fallow Womb
  • Codex of the Famished Crown
  • Codex of the Gnashing Gate
  • Codex of the Gore Chapel
  • Codex of the Hollow Crown

C, continued

  • Codex of the Howling Saint
  • Codex of the Orphan Moon
  • Codex of the Pale Lantern
  • Codex of the Spider Queen
  • Codex of the Sundered Veil
  • Codex of the Thousand Stings
  • Codex of the Unblinking
  • Codex of the Unhallowed Harvest
  • Codex of the Unlit Mirror
  • Codex of the Unwashed Altar
  • Codex of the Wailing Crypt
  • Codex of the Wailing Orchard

C, continued

  • Codex Serpentis
  • Codex Vermiculus
  • Codex Vulturis
  • Commentaries on the Void
  • Commonplace Book of a Hanged Alchemist
  • Compendium Maleficarum
  • Compline for the Drowning
  • Confessions of a Plague Doctor
  • Confessions of the Hollow Bride
  • Confessions of the Last Abbot
  • Confessions of the Wormwood Nun
  • Cultes des Goules

D: 3 names

  • De Vermis Mysteriis
  • Dirge of the Sewn Kings
  • Dirges for the Last Morning

E: 5 names

  • Enchiridion of the Unquiet
  • Ephemeris of the Black Comet
  • Epistles of the Hollow Priest
  • Epistles of the Ninth Widow
  • Epistles to the Sleeping God

F: 2 names

  • Florilegium of Poisons
  • Formulary of the Lead Physician

G: 22 names

  • Glossary of the Feeding Dark
  • Grimoire of a Thousand Tongues
  • Grimoire of Ashes and Milk
  • Grimoire of Flayed Petals
  • Grimoire of Gnashing Stars
  • Grimoire of Seven Tongues Cut
  • Grimoire of the Barrow Wight
  • Grimoire of the Bonesetter
  • Grimoire of the Choking Mist
  • Grimoire of the Cradle Worm
  • Grimoire of the Drowned Saint

G, continued

  • Grimoire of the Fasting Moon
  • Grimoire of the Furrowed Grave
  • Grimoire of the Howling Well
  • Grimoire of the Lightless Sea
  • Grimoire of the Mourning Tide
  • Grimoire of the Nailed Door
  • Grimoire of the Plaguewife
  • Grimoire of the Skinless Monk
  • Grimoire of the Stagnant Star
  • Grimoire of the Starved Saint
  • Grimoire of the Untongued

H: 4 names

  • Hymnal of the Black Lake
  • Hymns for the Hanged
  • Hymns of the Cold Church
  • Hymns of the Skinned Drum

I: 4 names

  • Incunabulum of Silence
  • Index of Forbidden Hours
  • Inventory of the Fourth Catacomb
  • Itinerary of the Nameless Pilgrim

K: 1 name

  • Keys to the Forty Locked Rooms

L: 35 names

  • Lamentations of the Iron Abbot
  • Last Will of the Plague Cartographer
  • Ledger of the Leech-Lord
  • Ledger of the Pale Banker
  • Lessons of the Gutted Lamb
  • Lexicon Daemonicum
  • Lexicon of Lost Mouths
  • Lexicon of Screaming Roots
  • Lexicon of the Sunken Choir
  • Liber Abyssi
  • Liber Cadaverum

L, continued

  • Liber Carnis
  • Liber Daemonum
  • Liber Ferri Nigri
  • Liber Inferni
  • Liber Lacrimarum
  • Liber Larvarum
  • Liber Mortis Aeternae
  • Liber Noctis
  • Liber Obscurus
  • Liber Ossium
  • Liber Pestis
  • Liber Quietis Falsae

L, continued

  • Liber Sanguinis
  • Liber Sepulchri
  • Liber Tenebrarum
  • Liber Umbrarum
  • Liber Vermium
  • Liber Voraginis
  • Libram Mortuorum
  • Libram of Empty Cradles
  • Libram of Gnawing Cold
  • Libram of the Ninefold Eye
  • Litanies of the Blind Queen
  • Lives of the Unsaints

M: 11 names

  • Maledictions of Saint Orvane
  • Malefactum
  • Malleus Spiritorum
  • Manual of the Needle Saints
  • Manuscript of the Eyeless Monk
  • Manuscript of the Forgotten Door
  • Manuscript of the Grave Physician
  • Manuscript of the Stitched Mouth
  • Marginalia of the Blind Copyist
  • Minutes of the Synod of Teeth
  • Mysteries of the Cindered Womb

N: 2 names

  • Night-Office of the Sisters of the Knife
  • Ninefold Instructions for the Sealing of Wells

O: 1 name

  • Ordinal of the Inverted Mass

P: 10 names

  • Pages of the Blighted Saint
  • Pages of the Gristle Prophet
  • Pages of the Thorn Prophet
  • Pages Without a Spine
  • Pharmacopoeia of the Pit
  • Prayers for the Unhallowed
  • Prophecies of Gaunt Morrow
  • Prophecies of the Nine Eclipses
  • Prophecies of the Unborn Tyrant
  • Psalms for a Closed Heaven

R: 4 names

  • Recipes of the Midwife of Carrow Fen
  • Register of the Quiet Plague
  • Revelations of the Wet Dark
  • Rubrics for the Burial of the Living

S: 18 names

  • Sayings of the Gallows Mother
  • Scripture of Bent Bones
  • Scripture of the Ashen Shepherd
  • Scripture of the Black Tithe
  • Scripture of the Burning Mouth
  • Scripture of the Cold Altar
  • Scripture of the Marrow Choir
  • Scripture of the Poisoned Well
  • Scripture of the Tallow Saint

S, continued

  • Scripture of the Unlit Hearth
  • Scroll of Seven Sorrows
  • Scroll of the Eighth Hell
  • Sepulchral Commentaries
  • Sermons from the Gallows Tree
  • Sermons of the Carrion Bishop
  • Sermons of the Cinder Prophet
  • Sermons of the Gutter Saint
  • Seven Lessons in Unmaking

T: 261 names

  • Tablets of the Unnamed King
  • Testament of the Severed Hand
  • Testament of the Withered Oak
  • Testament of the Worm
  • The Anatomy of Thresholds
  • The Apostate's Chronicle
  • The Ash Catechism
  • The Ash-Wreathed Folio
  • The Ashen Breviary
  • The Ashwife's Almanac
  • The Bent Sermons
  • The Bile Codex
  • The Bitter Breviary
  • The Black Book of Carcosa

T, continued

  • The Black Psalter of Vorl
  • The Black Tallow Ledger
  • The Blackthorn Breviary
  • The Blasphemer's Lexicon
  • The Bleeding Primer
  • The Blister Testament
  • The Blue Folio of Yssemar
  • The Bone Chapel Manual
  • The Bone-Ink Ledger
  • The Book of Backward Prayers
  • The Book of Closed Doors
  • The Book of Eibon
  • The Book of Locked Mouths
  • The Book of Meat
  • The Book of Salt and Ruin

T, continued

  • The Book of Thirteen Hungers
  • The Book of Unkind Hours
  • The Book of Vile Darkness
  • The Book That Weeps
  • The Brackish Primer
  • The Brass Catechism
  • The Brimstone Concordance
  • The Brine Catechism
  • The Cairn Psalter
  • The Calendar of Dead Hours
  • The Candlewax Register
  • The Carrion Almanac
  • The Cartulary of Bone
  • The Cataract Gospel

T, continued

  • The Chapbook of the Lantern Man
  • The Charnel Grammar
  • The Cinder Missal
  • The Clotted Chronicle
  • The Coal-Eyed Testament
  • The Coffin-Wood Almanac
  • The Cold Hymnal
  • The Cracked Lexicon
  • The Cradle Litany
  • The Crawling Scripture
  • The Creaking Codex
  • The Crimson Concordance
  • The Crone's Lexicon
  • The Cruel Catechism
  • The Cuneiform of Hunger

T, continued

  • The Dark Water Scripture
  • The Darkhold
  • The Dead Lantern Scripture
  • The Devouring Almanac
  • The Dreaming Codex
  • The Drowned Nun's Herbal
  • The Drowning Hymns
  • The Dust Psalter
  • The Eclipse Psalter
  • The Ember Ledger
  • The Empty Reliquary Chronicle
  • The Fang Psalter
  • The Fanged Folio
  • The Fasting Rubric

T, continued

  • The Fettered Almanac
  • The Fever Codex
  • The Flensed Manuscript
  • The Flesh-Bound Ledger
  • The Fleshwright's Ledger
  • The Folio of Skinned Prayers
  • The Frost-Bitten Folio
  • The Furrow Psalter
  • The Gilded Heresy
  • The Glass-Eyed Testament
  • The Gloaming Gospel
  • The Gnawed Manuscript
  • The Gorecrow Almanac
  • The Gospel of Pale Hands
  • The Gospel of the Drowned

T, continued

  • The Gospel of the Gnawed Bone
  • The Gravedigger's Abecedary
  • The Gravel Litany
  • The Grey Ledger
  • The Half-Eaten Testament
  • The Hanged Scholar's Treatise
  • The Hemlock Herbal
  • The Heretic's Primer
  • The Hollow Queen's Grammar
  • The Hornbook of Little Deaths
  • The Howling Folio
  • The Hungering Word
  • The Hungry Almanac
  • The Hungry Concordance

T, continued

  • The Hymnal of Teeth
  • The Ink of Nine Widows
  • The Inverted Psalms
  • The Iron Hornbook
  • The Ivory Lexicon
  • The Jawbone Manuscript
  • The King in Yellow
  • The Lamentations of Ghorne
  • The Lamplighter's Confession
  • The Lantern-Eater's Ledger
  • The Last Book of Sister Agathe
  • The Last Supper Register
  • The Ledger of Debts Unpaid
  • The Leper Chronicle
  • The Lesser Key of Moth and Ash

T, continued

  • The Lich's Lexicon
  • The Lichgate Register
  • The Lime-Pit Almanac
  • The Litany of Locks
  • The Locked Cellar Register
  • The Locust Manuscript
  • The Lullaby Manuscript
  • The Marrow Manuscript
  • The Marrowless Gospel
  • The Marsh-Priest's Almanac
  • The Maw of Pages
  • The Maw Scripture
  • The Mercer's Book of Skins
  • The Mirror-Bound Grimoire

T, continued

  • The Moldering Folio
  • The Moth Breviary
  • The Moth-Eaten Revelation
  • The Mourner's Grammar
  • The Nail Psalter
  • The Necronomicon
  • The Needle Psalter
  • The Night Register
  • The Night-Bound Herbal
  • The Nightsoil Psalter
  • The Nine Whispers of Yeg
  • The Ninety-Nine Names of Rot
  • The Ninth Sermon
  • The Oath-Eater's Manual
  • The Orphan Tongue Primer

T, continued

  • The Ossified Gospel
  • The Ossuary Psalms
  • The Palimpsest of Kareth
  • The Parchment That Breathes
  • The Pitch Scripture
  • The Pnakotic Manuscripts
  • The Pox Chronicle
  • The Psalter of Maggots
  • The Pyre Chronicle
  • The Rattling Manuscript
  • The Raven Register
  • The Ravening Breviary
  • The Ravenous Chronicle
  • The Ravenous Primer

T, continued

  • The Red Vellum
  • The Rootless Herbal
  • The Rot Gospel
  • The Rust-Bound Codex
  • The Sable Missal
  • The Sallow Folio
  • The Salt-Crusted Folio
  • The Salt-Witch's Herbal
  • The Scourge Breviary
  • The Second Flood Prophecies
  • The Sepulchre Lexicon
  • The Serpent Breviary
  • The Seven Unsayable Sermons
  • The Seventeen Blasphemies
  • The Seventh Folio of Ascalon

T, continued

  • The Severed Tongue Lexicon
  • The Shrieking Breviary
  • The Shriven Manuscript
  • The Shroud Gospel
  • The Shuttered Lexicon
  • The Silent Psalter
  • The Sixth Hour Missal
  • The Skinbound Sermons
  • The Smothered Psalter
  • The Soot Gospel
  • The Sorrowing Lexicon
  • The Sour Hymnal
  • The Speculum Umbrae
  • The Spider-Silk Psalter

T, continued

  • The Stained Breviary
  • The Stillborn Gospel
  • The Stillwater Manuscript
  • The Stitched Gospel
  • The Stone Primer of Ul-Khadeth
  • The Sunken Catechism
  • The Sunless Catechism
  • The Sutured Gospel
  • The Tallow Gospel
  • The Tanner's Martyrology
  • The Tattered Testament
  • The Teeth Register
  • The Thief of Names
  • The Thirteen Locks
  • The Thirteenth Gospel

T, continued

  • The Thornback Testament
  • The Threnody of Emptied Thrones
  • The Tithe Book
  • The Tithe of Eyes
  • The Tome of Strahd
  • The Tome of Unremembered Names
  • The Tongueless Primer
  • The Unkind Almanac
  • The Unlucky Breviary
  • The Unmaker's Treatise
  • The Unnamed Sermons
  • The Unwritten Gospel
  • The Vellum of Flayed Kings
  • The Velvet Heresy

T, continued

  • The Vestry Book of Saint Helve's Ruin
  • The Vinegar Gospel
  • The Vulture Breviary
  • The Wailing Hours
  • The Wax-Sealed Testament
  • The Weeping Scroll
  • The Wheelwright's Heresy
  • The Whisper Ledger
  • The Whispering Almanac
  • The Whispering Vellum
  • The Whistling Scripture
  • The Whorl Scripture
  • The Wicker Testament
  • The Widow Tongue
  • The Widow's Almanac

T, continued

  • The Wolf-Milk Herbal
  • The Worm-Eaten Breviary
  • The Wormwood Register
  • The Wound-Red Manuscript
  • Tidal Tables for the Sunless Shore
  • Tome of Grey Ashes
  • Tome of Ruinous Song
  • Tome of the Bleeding Hart
  • Tome of the Coiled Tongue
  • Tome of the Flayed Orchard
  • Tome of the Gilded Worm
  • Tome of the Laughing Dead
  • Tome of the Seventh Mouth
  • Tome of the Sleeping Plague

T, continued

  • Tome of the Weeping Iron
  • Tomes of the Seventh Silence
  • Treatise of Devouring Light
  • Treatise of the Black Physician
  • Treatise of the Heartless Surgeon
  • Treatise of the Open Grave
  • Treatise on Infant Shadows
  • Treatise on Sorrow as Fuel
  • Treatise on the Binding of Children
  • Treatise on the Cultivation of Night
  • Treatise on the Flesh of Angels
  • Treatise on the Hollowing of Saints
  • Treatise on the Husbandry of Ghouls
  • Treatise on the Undoing of Days
  • Treatise on Unbinding the Soul

U: 1 name

  • Unaussprechlichen Kulten

V: 1 name

  • Vade Mecum of the Grave-Robber

W: 4 names

  • What the Mirror Owes
  • Writings of the Gaunt Prophet
  • Writings of the Hollow Cartographer
  • Writings of the Wretched Oracle