RAAMA
Real Name: Raama
Identity/Class: Human magic user (Pre-Cataclysmic Era)
Occupation: Scientist
Group Membership: None
Affiliations: None
Enemies: Aksha-Thushtra, Helgor, Silence
Known Relatives: None
Aliases: Binder of Demons, Rama
Base of Operations: Valusia
First Appearance: Creatures on the Loose I#10/1 (March, 1971)
Powers/Abilities: Raama's knowledge was unbelievable for his times; his arts enabled him to create objects with incredible properties such as the potion to restrain Silence or the gong that produced vibrations to overcome the creature.
History:
(Creatures on the Loose I#10/1 (fb) / The Savage Sword of
Conan#220 (fb) - BTS) - Raama was considered the greatest mind of all
ages. With his arts and knowledge, Raama battled against the creature
dubbed Silence. Raama created a potion that helped himself to
imprison Silence in a castle.
Raama put a warning outside the castle for
all strangers not to open the door, because he had not
destroyed Silence but had only restrained it. As last resort and
safeguard, he built a special gong, whose properties recalled the
unresting and ever-chanting sea, and placed it outside the castle.
(Conan the Barbarian I#85 (fb) - BTS) - Raama banished the demon Helgor in the abyss.
(Marvel Graphic Novel: Conan the Rogue (fb) - BTS) - Raama the prophet banished the demon Aksha-Thushtra.
(Creatures on the Loose I#10/1) - Thousands of years after Raama's death, his name was still remembered and the castle where he imprisoned Silence become known as the Skull of Silence.
A rash king opened the portal and put the entire world in peril. However, the sound from Raama's gong helped King Kull to send back Silence into its prison, but the gong was destroyed by its last strike.
(Conan the Barbarian I#38 - BTS) - Thousands years later, in the Hyborian Era, a dread sorcerer named Gimil-Ishbi taught a spell to a barbarian named Conan, which invoked Rama, Vramma and Kulthas. The barbarian used the spell and it worked imprisoning a demon, Ardat Lili and protecting him from his mate Lilitu the Were-Woman.
(Conan the Barbarian I#50 - BTS) - Lupalina the She-Wolf, a sorceress also known as Samandra, invoked Raama Binder of Demons to foresee the face of a demonic enemy.
(Marvel Graphic Novel: Conan the Rogue) - Raama was invoked to summon Aksha-Thushtra, using a copy of the Book of Vathelos the Blind. The demon appeared, imprisoned in the form of a cloud.
Comments: Created by Robert E. Howard. Adapted by Roy Thomas (writer) and Bernie Wrightson (pencils and inks).
Nowhere it was said that Raama used
magic to imprison Silence; it could also have been
science. This latter hypothesis is confirmed by the original novel
by Howard. In the story, Raama battled many demons that had
enslaved humanity. He also imprisoned a Demon of Silence; 7000
years later, Kull freed the demon. The demon struggling with Kull also
spoke to him before being defeated by the gong.
The potion mentioned in TSSoC#220 was used by the
sorcerer Nakura, in conjunction with Thulsa
Doom's skull-faced talisman, and bound Nakura's doom to the town
of Negari's.
In Conan the Barbarian I#38, Conan
called Rama, not Raama. I assume they were the same person. I do not
think it was a mistake in pronounciation because the words in the spells
must be perfect for having the enchantment work well. Of course Rama
could be another binder of demons invented by Roy Thomas.
Did Thomas have a vague idea about Rama/Raama since
Conan the Barbarian I#24? Listen: "Ka nama kaa lajeRAMA! Ka nama kaa
lajeRAMA!"
Profile by Spidermay.
CLARIFICATIONS:
Raama has no known connections to
Silence has no known connections to
Silence was a sentient being of unknown origin. Its presence could annihilate every sound. In a world used to hearing even the faintest noise, Silence could drive any man or animal mad and it could consume every sound in the universe.
(Creatures on the Loose I#10/1 (fb)) - In the Pre-Cataclysmic Era, Silence had battled Raama the sorcerer and was imprisoned in a crypt called the Skull of Silence. Raama put as guard of the crypt the greatest enemy of Silence: the sea. Raama imbued a gong with the never-ending, never-ceasing and always changing, blue-green noise of the sea.
(Creatures on the Loose I#10/1) - Many years after Raama's death, Silence was freed from its prison by a king. The resulting waves of silence stunned the warriors outside the castle and the creature's tentacles assaulted the king. But before Silence could overcome the man, he struck the gong and Silence felt pain. For minutes, the two struggled, but when the man crushed the gong with a stroke which had held the sound of the universe, Silence screamed. Weakened, it could do nothing to prevent the man from closing the door of its prison.
(Marvel Graphic Novel: Ravagers Out of Time - BTS) -
Silence's primordial power was invoked by a Pictish shaman, Gonar,
to destroy an enemy sorcerer, Rotath of Lemuria.
--Creatures on the Loose I#10/1
images: (without ads)
Savage Tales I#2, p3, pan3 (Raama)
Savage Tales I#2, p3, pan5 (the Gong and the Castle)
Savage Tales I#2, p6, pan4 (Silence)
Appearances:
Creatures on the Loose I#10 (March, 1971) - Roy Thomas (writer), Bernie
Wrightson (artist), Stan Lee (editor)
Savage Tales I#2 (October, 1973) - reprint of Creatures on the Loose
I#10 story
Conan the Barbarian I#38 (May, 1974) - Roy Thomas (writer/editor), John
Buscema (artist)
Conan the Barbarian I#50 (May, 1975) - Roy Thomas (writer/editor), John
Buscema (layouts/breakdown), Terry Austin (background/finishes), Dick
Giordano (figures)
Conan the Barbarian I#85 (April, 1978) - Roy Thomas (writer/editor),
John Buscema (pencils), Ernie Chan (inks)
Marvel Graphic Novel: Conan the Rogue (1991) - Roy Thomas (writer), John
Buscema (artist), Craig Anderson (editor)
First Posted: 04/06/2008
Previously updated: 01/01/2011
Last updated: 12/10/2021
Any Additions/Corrections? please let me know.
Non-Marvel
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