ANCIENT SCIENCE FICTION: THE CITY OF SPIDERS (1926)

THE CITY OF SPIDERS (1926) – Short story by H. Warner Munn. This quasi-Creature Feature type tale featured biologist Jabez Pentreat.

Jabez leads a scientific expedition into the jungles of Brazil. Nightly attacks by increasingly large and seemingly intelligent spiders plague the group, ultimately leading to the expedition members being surrounded by spiders the size of dogs.

Nightmarishly, the spiders are smart enough to herd the humans and various jungle animals toward a city ruled by arachnids which range from human-sized to elephant-sized.

Though all the other expedition members and the herded animals are fed upon by the monstrous creatures, Pentreat is spared only because he is the first human being the spiders have encountered who is intelligent enough for them to communicate with telepathically.

NOTE: In an eye-rolling story element, the narrative insultingly makes it clear that this is because Jabez Pentreat is the first white man to fall into the spiders’ clutches.

The largest of the spiders is the ruler and he telepathically informs Jabez of the history of his kind. Millions of years ago, the Earth was dominated by the gigantic spider ancestors of this Brazilian city’s inhabitants.

Over time, they even used a village of proto-humans near the North Pole as slave labor and sustenance. The most recent Ice Age AND a shifting of the Earth’s poles wiped out most of the arachnid race, which could not survive in the cold.

Fleeing southward, the ancient spiders eventually reached what is now Brazil which proved hot enough to keep the few survivors alive. They have been hiding deep in the jungle ever since then.

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The “Spider King” probes Pentreat’s mind and realizes the rest of the world contains countless millions of human beings and other species which he and his race can feed upon and dominate. By threatening Jabez with horrific fates even worse than death, the giant spiders convince him to lead them out of the jungle to begin their reconquest of the planet.

NOTE: An intriguing concept was missed by not making the ruling spiders be female since with many species of spiders the females are larger than the males. 

When an indigenous tribe spots and viciously attacks the spider army, the grotesque and apocalyptic battle which results gives Pentreat an opportunity. He starts a huge fire that spreads rapidly and wipes out the race of giant, intelligent spiders.   

The last one left alive is the arachnid king who communicated with Jabez. It pursues him to kill him but the biologist flees in a canoe and when the creature follows him in the water it is devoured by thousands of piranhas. The spider menace is permanently eliminated and presumably the fire is dealt with.

The City of Spiders relies more on the chilling situation than on any truly original science fiction ideas. Like Inheritors of the Earth and The Captivity of the Professor, both previously reviewed here at Balladeer’s Blog, the tale works on the aforementioned Creature Feature level but nothing more. 

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