Dark Knights, Dark City I: The Early Years of Gotham City

Something a little different: this is part one of a three part essay on the history of the Wayne family and Gotham City. It should by no means be considered canonical. Rather, it is an attempt to work together the various Batmen that have appeared in a number of Elseworlds books from DC, along with selected stories from DC Universe comics.

This is nerdcore, folks – if you’re not a comics geek, there’s probably not much here for you.

Long before human eyes ever saw it, the land upon which Gotham City now stands was covered by ice. For thousands of years, until the end of the last ice age approximately 10,000 years ago, glaciers covered the whole of the northern coast of what is now New Jersey.1 As the ice melted, it eroded the rock beneath it, forming many rivers, gorges and caves. One of these, centuries later, would become the Batcave.

The earliest known occupants of the Batcave were a pair of demons – Barbathos, a warrior demon who had served in the army of Morgan le Fay that finally defeated and destroyed Camelot, and a gigantic demonical bat that was his steed. After the fall of Camelot, le Fay dispersed her army, fearing that it would turn upon her, and this pair fled across the Atlantic, eventually reaching land at approximately the site of today’s Wayne Manor.

Here, on the bluffs above the cave, the pair quarrelled. Barbathos managed to escape his steed, trapping it in the cavern, but around its neck hung a treasure he was forced to abandon – the Stone of Aelk Hound. This stone was sought by one who had fought on the side of Camelot, Jason Blood. Blood was the host of the demon, Etrigan, Merlin’s half-brother, and believed that the stone had played a role in Camelot’s downfall. He tracked it for centuries, but to no avail, as Barbathos, the only one who knew the stone’s whereabouts, was quickly returned to Hell by native shamans.2

Hundreds of years later, Europeans settled the Eastern coast of North America. Gotham Towne was founded by a Norwegian mercenary, but later taken over by the British in the early decades of the 18th century.3 Gotham remained a sleepy town for the most part, over-shadowed by New York to the north. To the south of Gotham, a village named Blüdhaven was founded by whalers, where it would slowly grow into a small satellite city of Gotham. 4

The town slowly grew and prospered in a quiet way. The demon slept beneath it and for a time, things were good. All that would change, in 1765. In that year, a circle of mystics composed of Thomas Jefferson, Jacob Stockman, Thomas Wayne, Crosby Jacob Manfurd, Henry Queen and Bartly Langstrom invoked Barbathos, after spending six months preparing a sacrifice for him. Although the giant bat was unable to intervene and prevent the ritual’s commencement, it sent one of its progeny, a bat smaller than itself but still larger than normal bats. Terrified by the beast, Stockman and his group left the ceremony incomplete. Barbathos, half summoned but incapable of taking physical form, seeped into the wood and mortar of Gotham City. The the planned human sacrifice, a young girl named Dominique, was abandoned to die. Stockman and his compatriots fared little better – one took his own life, and another was slain at Saratoga during the American Revolution – or so many believed. Stockman himself was overcome with remorse, and eventually left the city for good in 1793, leaving behind his diaries of the events.5

In truth, four of the six were contacted by Ludwig Prinn, a misshapen dwarf who was a worshipper of the Elder Things, and the author of De Vermis Mysteriis.6 Sensing their greed, Prinn convinced Manfurd, Wayne, Queen and Langstrom to join him in a conjuration from the stolen Testament of Ghul. The four were convinced, and willingly sold their souls for immortality and power. They each had children, faked their own deaths, and assumed other identities. Wayne left behind a son by the name of Darius, who was the heir of his name and properties. In the decades that followed, Thomas Wayne would father several more children under different names, many of which would also be influential in Gotham’s history, and few of whom would escape his curse. Among others, these offspring included the ancestors of the Dent and Cobblepot. families.

Still seeking the Stone, Jason Blood returned to Gotham in 1799, and on New Year’s Eve his agent Stoker succeeded in finding the Stone, although completely by accident. Due to the intervention of the Swamp Thing, Stoker and his nemesis, the hero known as Tomahawk, crashed into the caves below the newly built mansion of Darius Wayne, where they encountered the giant bat. Grasping the Stone of Aelk Hound, Stoker found his hand became fused to it, and he died there, in the cave. The stone and Stoker’s arm would collectively become known as the Claw of Aelk Hound. It was carried away from Gotham at this time, never to return.7

Darius Wayne was ultimately ruined in business after the escape of the giant bat. Whether this was due to the vindictiveness of Barbathos or simply the result of bad luck is unclear. The Waynes left Gotham, and the mansion fell into ruin, remaining unoccupied for decades – local legend stated, not without some basis in fact, that it was haunted.

To be continued…

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