Howard's Picts are said to have originated on "islands far out on the Western ocean" and gradually migrated into the Mediterranean area. At one point, they spread across large areas of the world, but gradually vanished except for several splinter groups. Although some of these groups lived in remote jungles and southern continents, the most prominent body of Picts settled in the British isles, where they displaced a supposedly mongoloid race that had been the initial residents of the isles (though their origins were elsewhere). This previous race sought refuge underground, where over a millennia they evolved into stunted and hideous creatures, who were the initial subjects of tales concerning elves or dwarves, as described in the Bran Mak Morn short story "Worms of the Earth", as well in "The Children of the Night".