von Horst's Pellucidar

“Pellucidar, as every schoolboy knows, is a world within a world, lying as it does, upon the inner surface of the hollow sphere, which is the Earth.” So begins Tarzan at the Earth’s Core, the fourth book of the Pellucidar series written by Edgar Rice Burroughs.

David Innes and his inventor friend, Abner Perry, discover this savage world by accident. They set out on a test run in a mechanical mole only to have its steering fail. Unable to turn aside, the two companions are carried ever deeper into the bowels of the Earth. They believe themselves about to perish when they emerge in Pellucidar. There they find a young, savage world teeming with prehistoric beasts from every surface-world time period.

Jason Gridley’s rescue mission finds another way there. They fly a dirigible through a northern polar opening. This “Symmes Hole” has been used before. It is believed that the ancestors of the Korsars, colorful pirates of Pellucidar, came through this opening. Also, Ah-gilak, the old man whose name was not Dolly Dorcas, drifted through the opening following the wreck of his whaling ship. Jason and Tarzan discuss the theory that there are entrances to Pellucidar at both poles, but the existence of the southern opening is not proved.

Pellucidar is a place of geographic marvels and curiosities. Since its surface is concave, the horizon curves upward into the distance. Take a moment, look out of your window, and gaze at the horizon. Now imagine what it would look like if it curved upward. It would be a very different-looking place, indeed.

A distinguishing feature lights Pellucidar: an interior sun hanging in the exact center of its sky. Without relative movement, continuous daylight or high noon exists always. This creates a peculiar sense of timelessness.

Pellucidar’s moon, the Dead World, revolves with the Earth, remaining always above the same spot. This area is called the Land of Awful Shadow since the moon blocks the sun’s rays from ever reaching it. Within this twilight land, the vegetation is stunted, sparse, and colorless.

The atmosphere is slightly more dense than ours but also shallower, making it very cold on mountaintops. Prevailing winds normally blow north to south for half our year and then reverse direction for the other half. Clouds are very rare. It’s always springtime in there.

Pellucidar statistics:

Inside diameter………....……..7,000 miles
Ocean area………………...…..41,370,000 square miles
Land area…………………..….124,110,000 square miles
Distance to Dead World……....1 mile
Thickness of Earth’s crust….....500 miles
Location of polar opening….....85° N latitude and 170° E longitude

Innes and Perry arrive to find the primitive tribes of Pellucidar being terrorized by the reptilian Mahars. This superior race, with the help of their gorilla-like servants, the Sagoths, has enslaved the local human tribes for use in their vile experiments, and worse. Eventually Innes wins allies and pulls the kingdoms of man together into an alliance against their common enemy.

Beyond the lands of the Empire, Pellucidar’s races are as varied as its animal life. The Buried People of Amiocap, the Horibs, the insane Jukans, and the tortured Gorbuses are but a few of the strange races that exist within the inner world.

All the people possess a homing instinct that allows them to find their way home, no matter the distance. This trait is their only tool of navigation because there are no stars to guide them. This instinct is all the more amazing when you consider that the people of the Floating Islands are able to negotiate directly home even when it’s never in the same place.

The adventures of Innes and Perry, as well as Tanar, Jason Gridley, Tarzan, von Horst, and Hodon and O-aa, are told in the seven books of the series:

In these books, Burroughs has created a primitive, savage world full of mystery and romance and peopled with races and characters to love and hate. Pellucidar has captured our imaginations as few worlds have. But what if it isn’t just a creation of Burroughs? In the second book of the series, the wanderer, Cogdon Nestor, writes: