The Origin of Bullywugs

Noun. Bullywug (plural Bullywugs) (gaming) A fictional frog-headed humanoid monster from the Dungeons & Dragons roleplaying game.

A legend of the Last Lands, a campaign setting for 3rd Edition D&D, being a tale of marriage woes, a spoiled prince, a witch from a distant land, and how the Bullywugs came to be in an event called "The Fall of the Accursed".

Long ago in the kingdom of Lyonesse, when it was a client state of the vast Kironan Empire, the king had a son, Clotair, who was finicky and difficult and refused to wed any of the potential brides his parents found for him. No matter how lovely, he always found some flaw that repulsed him in every noble lady he was introduced to. Time and again the arrogant young prince would end up insulting another princess who did not live up to his impossible standards of beauty. Eventually his exasperated father decreed he would have no say anymore in who he would have to marry. The king sent out a decree calling on any who would marry the prince to come to the palace on the first day of Spring so that the king and queen could pick a bride for their wayward heir.

Hundreds of women from across the Kironan Empire and beyond arrived, lining up to be judged by the king and queen. Finally, after days of deliberation, a dark-eyed beauty from the distant land of Thosia turned the heads of the royal couple. The king summoned his son and introduced him to his new bride. He was struck by her beauty, declaring her the most beautiful woman he had ever seen.

But when the mysterious and haughty princess from the East spoke her voice was far from lovely and made the prince cringe. Resigned to being married at the command of his father, he grinned and beared it through their engagement and wedding. At last, however, on their wedding night, while in the throws of passion for their first time, he could endure it no longer. He blurted out, "Bloody hell, you sound like a frog, I cannot stand your voice!" The princess was shocked and humiliated. Then she was furious! "A frog?" she screamed. "You think I am frog? I will show you a frog!" she sputtered with rage. She began chanting in the Thosian tongue. First the prince, then his family, then his retainers and servants, and soon everyone in the castle and the royal estates doubled over in pain and collapsed. As her keening reached a shrill crescendo they all changed, their skin turning a mottled green, their eyes bulging, their mouths stretching, their very bones warping inside their bodies. When it was done they were all transformed into loping half-frog monstrosities.

The Thosian princess turned into a cloud of dark smoke that smelled of incense and was gone, never to be seen in Lyonesse again. The bewitched people of the castle fled in horror and shame, hiding wherever they could. The common folk of Lyonesse rebelled, provincial dukes threw the country into civil war, either fighting to seize the throne or striving to split away their territories into new kingdoms. The entire nation fell to pieces until the legions of the Kironan Empire were sent to restore order and the emperor raised up a duke who had not been touched by the curse to become the new ruler of Lyonesse.

The Accursed, as they were now called, who had once been the mighty and fair of the nation, were now driven out of the capital to dwell in the wilderness and become beggars and thieves. The curse stayed with them and was passed onto future generations. These descendants came to be called the Bullywugs. After the Age of Cataclysm those that made it to the Last Lands settled on the moist southern coasts in Ys and Shosnar, becoming merchants and seamen of the lowest, least honourable type.

Prince Clotair did not live happily ever after, he fell into drunkenness, became the shame of his whole family, and was eventually strangled by his father for the shame he brought to his kingdom.