List of The Sandman characters

This is a list of characters appearing in The Sandman comic book, published by DC Comics' Vertigo imprint. This page discusses not only events which occur in The Sandman (1989–94), but also some occurring in spinoffs of The Sandman (such as The Dreaming [1996–2001] and Lucifer [1999–2007]) and in earlier stories that The Sandman was based on. These stories occur in the DC Universe, but are generally tangential to the mainstream DC stories.

The Endless are a family of seven anthropomorphic personifications of universal concepts, around whom much of the series revolves. From eldest to youngest, they are:

All debuted in the Sandman series, except Destiny, who was created by Marv Wolfman and Berni Wrightson in Weird Mystery Tales #1 (1972). A more traditional version of Death had appeared in various previous stories, however.

These inhabitants of the Dreaming are often gods, myths, and even ordinary human beings who later became dreams.

Cain and Abel are based on the Biblical Cain and Abel and adapted by editor Joe Orlando with Bob Haney (writer) and Jack Sparling (artist) (Cain), and Mark Hannerfeld (writer) and Bill Draut (artist) (Abel). They were depicted together in Abel's first appearance, and parted to their respective Houses at the end of the story. Although Cain would abuse Abel, he was not shown killing him until Swamp Thing vol. 2 #33. In Elvira's House of Mystery #11, Cain expresses shock at having killed his brother in recent times. In the same issue, a contest-winning letter establishes that Cain and the House exist both in the dream world and the real world, and that only in the dream world Cain continues to harm Abel. In The Sandman, Cain is shown to kill Abel quite often. In issue #2, Lucien calls this unusual, and recent.

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