Incunabulum Kupalam
In 1498, a coven of occultists assembled what fragments they could find concerning the maleficent demon Kupala. The result was a voluminous handwritten manuscript called the Incunabulum Kupalam. Although most of it is in academic Latin, portions are encrypted in metaphors, ciphers, diagrams, quatrains, Enochian revelations and, of course, prophecy. A team of scholars could spend a century unraveling the layers of meaning within its text, and each would arrive at a different version of the truth behind the myth of Kupala.
After the coven compiled the manuscript, they financed the printing of hundreds of copies. By the middle of the 16th century, they were ready to disseminate once obscure knowledge throughout the circles, covens, sabbats and chantries of Europe. Before the first printing was complete, however, clerics of the Inquisition unmasked the conspiracy, smashed the presses, hunted the conspirators and burned as many copies as they could find. Allegedly, a handful of surviving manuscripts found their way through the flames to Arcanum chapterhouses, the cellars of the Vatican and other repositories of knowledge. Within the occult history of mankind, the tome became legendary, almost mythical.
Some occultists claim the rituals within its pages were intended to bind Kupala. Others insist that the tome can be used to summon and control him instead. Either way, many elders crave such knowledge (including entire organizations, such as the Black Hand).
