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Emergence
For almost 60 years, the mythology of the Nephilim and Watchers has seeped into mainstream consciousness. Mapping out the evolution of that influence through different formats over time, you can see how the mythology has grown over the past few decades, and also understand the key themes shaping the stories today.
I found the process of creating the timeline super interesting! In the late sixties and seventies, the focus was clearly on the Watchers as ancient astronauts. The US and Russia were obsessed with the Space Race, science fiction writers, such as HG Wells, Isaac Asimov and Arthur C. Clarke, were extremely popular, and no one trusted Big Brother (hey, some things never change do they?). Erich Von Däniken's book Chariots of the Gods emerged at just the right moment in time to capture public imagination. Despite many of his theories being later debunked by academia, the concept of an advanced race of Watchers, or aliens, who created and controlled mankind, providing us with technological advancements, is still with us. The idea of help from beyond the stars went against the grain of mainstream historical and religious explanations of the mysteries of our world. Further books by Robert Temple, Zach Sitchin and others cemented in the public mind that humans had precursors, masters, or creators that were not from our world. Sitchin, in particular, focused on the Sumerian Anunnaki, who we explore here as the possible source of inspiration for the Biblical Watchers story.
The 1980s continued with a public fascination of alien visitors. Cosmos by Carl Sagan and the television series “V” entrenched the idea further into our collective psyche. But the supernatural world entered the fray during this decade when a band of Victorian gunslingers arrived - Fields of the Nephilim - bringing the mythology of the Nephilim to center stage. The MTV generation (which launched in the US in 1981, I remember being glued to the television for Headbangers Ball!) were treated to visual and aural delights like “Blue Water”, which featured disturbing images of Carl McCoy hanging from a tree, or with his head in a cauldron, commanding us to “move back, step outside yourself”. The single after that, “Moonchild”, based on the Crowley book of the same name, plunged us headlong from our righteous ideals in a battle between light and dark forces. We end the 80’s in a much different place to where we started, the goth subculture, which had started in the late 70’s, picked up momentum and followers in the 80’s, and without them, I’m not convinced the Nephilim movement would have grown so quickly. In an interview, McCoy said “followers of the Nephilim take a different path”, and by the end of the 1980s that path had been well cut by a subculture of goths, metalheads, and artists who now saw the Nephilim as something else, not alien overlords, but entities, magical pathways they could directly engage with.
The 1990s blended the occult focus of the previous decade with the ancient aliens theme, as the Nephilim/Watcher movement really started to emerge strongly. For comic book and game fans, it was heaven! Chaosium Games released an occult roleplaying game called Nephilim, Rebel Studios published their comic series Gunfighters in Hell, and in the video game realm, humanity was under threat from an alien race called the Nephilim in Wing Commander: Prophecy.
"Death itself shall pour forth, obscuring the
stars in a veil of darkness. Theirs is the claw
that tears flesh from bone. Theirs is the poisoned
fang. Their numbers shall rend the universe
barren and crush the breath from our clans.
We shall be bathed in our own blood and
rotted flesh shall be our fare. With a
deafening thunder shall the dark age begin."
―The Tome of Sivar, Wing Commander: Prophecy
British author Storm Constantine also began weaving the Nephilim mythology into her writings, releasing Burying the Shadow in 1992, a reinvention of the vampire myth which also blended elements from Paradise Lost to evoke a sense of “unearthly wonder”. This was followed by her Grigori trilogy, Grigori, of course, being another name for the Nephilim. Fields of the Nephilim released Elizium in 1991, which immersed us in a dreamlike trance where ancients gather, empires fall and rise, and orchestrating it, at the center of it all, were the Nephilim. Following a break up of FoTN, frontman Carl McCoy released Zoon as a new project under the name Nefilim. A stark departure from Elizium, Zoon took us hurling into the abyss at breakneck speed, spitting nails and fire as we stared into the eyes of our creator. The theme of sacrifice is prevalent in Zoon, much as it is in Wing Commander and even in Gunfighters in Hell, where humanity’s very soul is in peril. Also interesting during the 90s were two books focused on the Nephilim/Watcher mythology from very different angles. In From the Ashes of Angels, Andrew Collins posits that the Nephilim could have been ancient aliens or interdimensional beings, but scientific evidence points more to a prehistoric race who were technologically advanced. This theory has been controversial but recent archaeological evidence does point to much older civilizations in eastern Turkey and recent writings about early shamanic tribes from Siberia also line up to some of what Collins suggests. The concept of forbidden knowledge is central to Collins' thesis. The Watchers are portrayed as fallen angels who defied divine laws to share their wisdom with humanity. On the flip side, David Icke’s book The Robot’s Rebellion stays strongly on the side of the Watchers being our alien overlords, and the Nephilim are those aliens who interbreed with humans and exert control over the development of our species. Both authors provide interesting food for thought, and combined with the other books, games, music and other media coming out in the 1990s, you can see how strongly the Nephilim mythology had begun to evolve into a rich set of stories and themes. The Nephilim were entrenched in our collective consciousness by this time, and going from strength to strength.
Andrew Collins suggests the Watchers and Nephlim were an ancient race who shared their knowledge and technology with the Sumerians and Egyptians.
The new millennium saw this permeation expand and strengthen further, particularly in the gaming world. Devil May Cry, where the main character Dante is a Nephilim (although technically incorrect as his parents are demon and angel not human and angel but they still refer to the hybrid race as Nephilim), and Lara Croft Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness brought the concept of the Nephilim to millions. White Wolf’s Demon: The Fallen and Magic the Gathering: Guildpact reached gamers who were more on the role playing side. The incredibly popular (and fun!) Assassin’s Creed series began, and although the Nephilim and Isu weren’t mentioned until AC 3 in 2012, the early games built a fanbase and set the stage for the introduction of both.
Tomb Raider: Angel of Darkness portrays the Nephilim as a hybrid race of angels and humans that lived in ancient Turkey
Two television series - Hex and Fallen - both feature Watchers or Nephilim as main characters in the storyline. In Hex, the watcher Azazel, masterfully played by Michael Fassbender, seduces the descendent of a Medenham witch (lifted from Medmenham most likely) to bear him a Nephilim son, which he names Malachi. In the Fallen series, a young Nephilim named Aaron (played by Paul Wesley) is able to redeem fallen angels so they can return to heaven. He is aided in this by Azazel, who is released from prison to help him “fulfill his destiny”.
Musically, Sirenia, Behemoth and Katatonia all released songs or albums that were inspired by the Nephilim, and specifically Fields of the Nephilim. And of course, Fields of the Nephilim also released a new album, Mourning Sun, which also loosely aligns with the concept of returning to heaven from Fallen, through songs like “Straight to the Light" and the title track.
One of the most popular book series which directly reference the Nephilim came out in 2007. Cassandra Clare’s City of Bones is set in a world where demons exist, but humans, or mundanes as they are referred to, cannot see them. Who can see them, and battle them, are Nephilim. In the book they are called both Shadowhunters and Nephilim, as they were created from human and angel blood.
The popularity of the Nephilim and Watchers has continued to grow exponentially since 2010. Video games are fertile grounds for the Nephilim, with Darksiders, Dante’s Inferno, and the blockbuster game Elder Scrolls: Skyrim including elements of the Nephilim. In Darksiders, the Nephilim were born of angels and demons who mated, orchestrated by Lilith. Incredibly powerful, the Nephilim launched a war on Eden, and were eventually killed by the Four Horsemen. In Skyrim, the Nephilim are a race that you can play as (a mod), you get the power of flight, astral projection, and some cool angelic weapons.
"What history has obscured is that the Angels;
who are the progenitors of the Nephilim race;
were brought into existence during the Dawn
Era to act as Guardians of Nirn, to protect
it from the corrupting influence of Padomay's
Children...the Daedra. A select group of
Angels known only as Watchers were to act as
protectors, teachers and warriors on Nirn,
however many became lustful of mortal women
hence why the Nephilim were born...part Anuic Angel
and part Mundane. By most they
are considered abominations; a scourge that
must be purged from the world, when
the Angels were called away from Nirn
a kill order was put into effect to destroy
any and all Nephilim. Few survived in secret while
most of their brethren were slaughtered,
even now a handful remain alive waiting for an
opportunity to resurface."
–Description of the Nephilim from
Elder Scrolls: Skyrim
City of Bones was made into a movie in 2013 (The Mortal Instruments), and although they stuck with the name Shadowhunters, anyone who reads the book series is exposed to the label Nephilim as well. Prometheus, the fifth Alien movie, doesn’t specifically refer to the Nephilim or Watchers but as we discuss here, the Engineers were heavily inspired by the Watchers / ancient aliens theories.
Many books inspired by Nephilim have come out since 2010 as well. Unchained: Nephilim Rising by Jennifer L. Armentrout and Lightfall by M.A. Phipps and Rebecca Jaycox have brought the Nephilim concept to a new generation of readers. In The Nephilim Chronicles: A Travel Guide to the Ancient Ruins in the Ohio Valley, author Fritz Zimmerman explores evidence for giants in North America, and in Sapiens Rising, Neil Freer envisions a future where humans acknowledge our genetically created species (Anunnaki / Nefilim) and leverage the knowledge that we possess to evolve our collective consciousness.
In The Mortal Instruments, the Nephilim, or Shadowhunters, use the Marks of Raziel, angelic runes given by the angel Raziel, to empower then to fight demons, but also as symbols of love, mourning or peace.
The Nephilim and Watcher mythos is as much part of the fabric of our world as Odin and the Aesir of Viking mythology, which was also heavily driven by music and other media. How will this mythos influence future generations to see humans in a different light, to see our potential as more than a “mundane species”? Time will tell.
