Aardvark

Aardvarks ("Earth Pig Born") were beings whose peculiar nature was of unknown origin. During the "Aardvarkian Age" of Estarcion, there were three known aardvarks: Cerebus, Cirin and Suenteus Po. It was the first time in history that three aardvarks existed simultaneously.

The definition of aardvarks in Ye Book of Beasties states "Snout, tail, three claws... Three fingers, opposable thumb". It includes mentions of "Aardvark Fables of Monolith Peoples", "Aardvark contributons to frozen food", "Aardvarks and Aelnap, Silver Dynasty and later...", "Causes of Aardvark Famine", "Diamondback, Apricot brandy...", and under magicial properties, "The Aardvark is the most powerful of the...", which brings up the Magnifier effect.

Dave Sim on Aardvarks

• Question: As Dave states on p205, The largest unresolved question [is] whether two aardvarks can produce aardvark off-spring . . . . Are aardvarks mutations? Or . . . spontaneous generated aberrations. So . . . can aardvarks produce aardvark offspring?

DAVE: I would assume that at one time they did so. If you look at the generations of aardvarkian ancestors in the aardvarkian suicide scene in Minds, there does seem to be a core Socratic ideal of the aardvark that I assume they all resembled sequentially and procreatively for a period of time.

Q4b: Are they strictly spontaneous mutations?

DAVE: By Cerebus’ time period, they certainly were. By that time it was considered unusual that there would be three of them alive at the same time. It seems analogous, in retrospect, to prophethood in the Torah Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are all three considered prophets. Jacob’s sons are considered patriarchs but only Judah I think has a claim to being a prophet. His bloodline produced David and his bloodline produced the Synoptic Jesus. From a YHWHist point of view, Joseph and Benjamin would be considered prophets but that seems like a seriously skewed viewpoint to me.

• Q5: In Cerebus' dream (i78/C&S I), he hears: Astoria's changing the baby into another aardvark - A hint that aardvarks are created magically?

DAVE: Oh, heavens no.

Q5: Where DO aardvarks come from? Are they born of women?

DAVE: That's a very Biblical Jacobean way of putting it: born of women, so thanks. Always glad to see more of that in the world.

Q5: Is it a random event (to the extent that any event is truly random)?

DAVE: Well, yes. I mean that opens another can of worms as to whether these aberrational forms actually exist in the real world. Apart from my speculations on the role of the Ancient Egyptians in producing literal monsters just because they could, do monsters like Cerebus appear naturally? I should probably digress a bit and mention that this came up in conversation with Billy Beach when I was over visiting him and his family a couple of months back (hello to Billy, Francesca, Kevin and Basta—sp?—Emily from Bahbee). This, it seems to me, was one of the hidden points of Cerebus, hidden even from his author until very late in the day. However Cerebus came to be, I think all you have to do is take one look at him to realize what a bad idea he is. In a larger sense (and because Billy had been kind enough to drive me around to innumerable religious churches and sanctuaries all adorned with oil paintings and frescoes—my first experience with seeing actual frescoes—I was able to make the point more immediately, tying it in with what we had both been looking at all day) this was very much something that concerned the Christian church in the Middle Ages, as the only one of the three monotheistic faiths to allow the rendering of representational religious iconography. Orthodox Judaism certainly doesn't allow any pictorial representations of, not only God, but God's prophets, man or any living thing in heaven or earth. Likewise with Islam. So the Christian church was always careful that picture-making and sculpting and what not were only allowed if the resultant art could be used to enhance the worship of God, as an assistance to prayer. Same thing with the music. And, arguably, we see the validity of the Jewish and Islamic argument everywhere. Once you allow the pictorial representation of the human form in religious iconographic art, the horse is out of the barn. Next stop, Robert Crumb. Or, perhaps more perniciously, next stop Dave Sim. Creating a half-man, half-animal character like Cerebus is not, thematically, that far removed from gene-splicing. Arguably, the fictionalized hybrid monster is the first step in creating a level of acceptance of the concept and arguably, that validates the Church's concerns. The sleep of reason produces monsters. First comes the idea, then comes the portrayal—the speciality of artists who are just f—king around then comes the actuality, once the idea has been planted in the scientific mind. The abhorrence that I wanted to generate in the audience with the two-page spread of Sheshep in Egypt seemed to have worked very well, but didn't extend to the comparable walking, talking abomination—Cerebus—they had been reading about for twenty-six years (some of them). Familiarity doesn't always breed contempt. Sometimes it breeds contentedness that can be just as appalling when you're forced to stand back and look at it. Anyway, all of this resulted from a question Francesca asked Billy, but damned if I can remember what the actual question was. Maybe Billy can help you out.But, the overall idea of the natural generation of monsters seems to be something of a centerpiece of the theory of evolution, unless I'm misreading it. Don't evolutionists believe that nature skips stages here and there and that natural selection can produce an entity better suited to the environment in the same way that plants develop different quirks depending on the soil they're growing in, climate changes, etc.? I mean, no offence, but evolution just seems like a YHWH-vantage-point theory—the idea that all life forms are the same as plants, in the process of growing into something else. As I've said elsewhere, I don't think the evidence supports it. Animate life is just too complicated to have grown from lower life forms in the length of time the planet earth has been able to sustain life and there is nothing in animate life DNA that indicates the capacity to grow into another life form. But, leaving aside that a Cerebus is a complete unlikelihood, I wonder if there are equivalents in the realm of spirit. Does spirit evolve or grow or generate itself spontaneously and then replicate? My best guess would be no. But it does seem to be an interesting thing to speculate on. Invisible aardvarks, basically.