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Message: <blockquote data-quote="chrisnd" data-source="post: 1895084" data-attributes="member: 26307">I think that D&D takes the names for the various "Outer Planes" from a myriad of religious, philosophical, and mythological sources.  I know that Bahamut (the god of all Good Dragons) is ancient Babylonyan, as is Tiamat.  Hades is the name of the "nether regions of hell" that is mentioned in the Torah (the Jewish holy scriptures).  Heaven is clearly a Christian doctrine (as well as other religions).  The concept of the Nine Planes of Hell is clearly from Dante's "Inferno", although he may not have been the original source.  Heck, even some of the names that Dante uses became names for some of the other lower planes (I think that Archeron and Abyss are mentioned in that poem).The concepts of the "planes of existence" are buried deep within many religious and mythological sources that span centuries and cultures.One neat thing that I found when I first started playing the game was how the original authors of the Monster Manual from first ed (which I can only assume were Gygax and Arneson) used the various names for Lucifer and created completely different demons and devils.  Just from the top of my head, there is Baalzebub, Orcus, Baal, Mephistophales, and some others - which were just different names given to Satan by various writers and poets throughout the centuries.  They essentially took the different names (which were clearly cultural in their generation) and applied different attributes and behaviors to what is clearly the same being in mythology (that of Lucifer).  It was all rather fascinating to me.  I think that the same approach applied to the names given for the various Planes of Existence (at least the Outer Ones).</blockquote>

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