The Conan Chronology Read online

  The Karlsson Chronology

  J. R. Karlsson

  When I tasked myself with editing down William Galen Gray's exhaustive chronology into one cohesive volume, I asked one simple question: What pastiche truly deserves to stand alongside the original works of Robert E. Howard without looking completely out of place?

  This led to the immediate removal of a number of authors from the Tor publications of Conan, as discussed in the introduction below.

  The next big decision I needed to make was whether to cherry-pick from the corpus of L. Sprague de Camp's work or include all of it, knowing that Conan and the Spider God and Conan the Liberator were quite frankly sub-par, even if the latter was important in terms of chronological significance.

  I decided that the old phrase 'in for a penny, in for a pound' was apt and concluded that I must include all the canonical works of the man responsible for this very compilation. As a result, the Robert E. Howard fragments that were included in the Del Rey publications of Conan have also been replaced with their respective fleshed out De Camp versions (the only controversial decision being the inclusion of The Treasure of Tranicos).

  Lastly was the decision to go against Gray's chronology and include the new origin story of Conan written by Michael A. Stackpole. A novelization of the movie remake of the movie that De Camp himself novelised with the help of Lin Carter. Much like Queen of the Black Coast, it has been split into two parts, as this is most appropriate given the jump in time.

  With that in mind, here are the contents this vast volume:

  The Karlsson Chronology

  Foreword

  Cimmeria

  Conan the Barbarian (Part I)

  Legions of the Dead

  The Thing in the Crypt

  The Tower of the Elephant

  Conan and the Sorcerer

  Conan the Mercenary

  Conan: The Sword of Skelos

  Conan the Magnificent

  Conan the Invincible

  The Hall of the Dead

  The God in the Bowl

  Rogues in the House

  Conan the Victorious

  Conan the Unconquered

  The Hand of Nergal

  The City of Skulls

  The People of the Summit

  The Curse of the Monolith

  Conan and the Spider God

  The Blood-Stained God

  Conan the Valorous

  The Frost Giant's Daughter

  The Lair of the Ice Worm

  Conan the Defender

  Conan the Triumphant

  Queen of the Black Coast (Part I)

  Conan the Rebel

  Queen of the Black Coast (Part II)

  Conan the Barbarian (Part II)

  The Vale of Lost Women

  The Castle of Terror

  The Snout in the Dark

  Conan and the Emerald Lotus

  Hawks Over Shem

  Black Colossus

  Shadows in the Dark

  Conan: The Road of Kings

  Shadows in the Moonlight

  Conan the Champion

  The Road of the Eagles

  A Witch Shall be Born

  Black Tears

  Conan and the Manhunters

  The Man-Eaters of Zamboula

  The Star of Khorala

  Conan and the Amazon

  The Devil in Iron

  The Flame Knife

  The People of the Black Circle

  Conan the Marauder

  Xuthal of the Dusk

  Drums of Tombalku

  The Gem in the Tower

  The Pool of the Black One

  Conan the Buccaneer

  Red Nails

  Jewels of Gwahlur

  The Ivory Goddess

  Conan and the Treasure of Python

  Conan the Rogue

  Beyond the Black River

  Moon of Blood

  The Treasure of Tranicos

  Wolves Beyond the Border

  Conan the Liberator

  The Phoenix on the Sword

  The Scarlet Citadel

  The Hour of the Dragon

  Conan the Avenger

  The Witch of the Mists

  Black Sphinx of Nebthu

  Red Moon of Zembabwei

  Shadows in the Skull

  Conan of the Isles

  Foreword

  J. R. Karlsson

  I have done the unthinkable.

  Or at least, that's what many of Robert E. Howard's fanatical readers would have you believe.

  This collection of digitised Conan literature is different from any other on the internet today for one sacrilegious reason: it mixes the original Howard works with pastiches in the chronological order of Conan's life according to the newly created Karlsson Chronology, a non-exhaustive modified version of the William Galen Gray model which chooses only the best pastiche for inclusion alongside the originals.

  For those of you who are unaware of the controversy surrounding this issue, a short history lesson is required, though I am neither old enough nor wise enough to offer you more than a brief skimming.

  Robert Ervin Howard (1906 – 1936) was an American author who wrote pulp fiction in the heyday of Weird Tales and other serial publications. Along with his contemporaries Clark Ashton Smith and H. P. Lovecraft, Howard went about creating what is widely considered the greatest short fantasy ever written. He then proceeded to tragically commit suicide upon the passing of his mother into a coma she was unlikely to wake from.

  The tales of Conan may well have been relegated to the annals of history at this point, were it not for the actions of a writer called Lyon Sprague de Camp (1907 – 2000), who was instrumental in the revival of Sword and Sorcery during the 50's and 60's.

  L. Sprague de Camp's questionable motivations helped put together a number of volumes for Gnome Press while also presiding over the chief editing duties of Björn Nyberg's pastiche, The Return of Conan, later republished as Conan the Avenger. This became the first pastiche of Conan the Barbarian ever written.

  It wasn't until the late 60's that the true revival began though.

  Teamed up with the legendary fantasy artist Frank Frazetta (1928 – 2010) and editor/collaborator Lin Carter (1930 – 1988), de Camp, who was now fully in control of Howard's works, released a trade paperback simply titled Conan, through Lancer Books.

  Thus began the 12-volume 'super-seller' series featuring a mixture of Robert E. Howard's work side-by-side with de Camp, Carter and Nyberg's own stories in chronological order, which was continued in spite of Lancer's bankruptcy, by Ace Books.

  With Frazetta presenting the definitive imagery of Howard's pulpy hero and de Camp and Carter's combined attempts at fleshing out his back-story, the series ensured that Conan and Howard would have their place in fantasy history and also released the majority of Howard's Conan tales, albeit in altered form.

  The controversy surrounding this series in particular involved the liberties that de Camp took with the original text presented to him. Often he has been criticised for editing the text to appease political correctness and unnecessarily changing the language to make it worthy of publication in his eyes. When the original versions of the texts were finally released they proved superior to his own.

  In a series of blog posts titled 'The de Camp controversy', The Robert E. Howard United Press Association paints a fascinating picture of the man and makes a strong case for Howard purists and their original versions, now published by Del Rey books in the order that Howard wrote them.

  Howard's more vocal fans and editors such as Karl Edward Wagner (1945 – 1994), who himself was marginalised by de Camp and actively prevented from creating superior writings of the barbarian, deplore de Camp's usage of chronolo
gical order as Howard did not originally write them that way. Conan's stories were intentionally meant to stand alone irrespective of their time period and did not require an interwoven chronology. Howard himself likened it in letters to an old warrior re-telling fragments of his life from memory.

  The works of Carter, de Camp and Nyberg are almost universally seen as inferior to Howard's original tales, with the hero often rather damningly renamed by critics to Spragnan or Björnan in order to differentiate him from the original Conan.

  While there is no renaming involved here, each story will be credited with both its title and author so that the reader need not speculate as to who is writing what.

  L. Sprague de Camp's greatest crime in the eyes of many was his re-writing of original works from Howard outside of Conan to transform them into Conan tales. In a sense this collection is canonising his Conanising, in-so-far as there is a canon beyond Howard's original tales. A subject which in itself is open to much debate.

  Personally I consider this the extended canon and ultimately definitive adventures of Conan as seen by de Camp and his co-conspirators. Your mileage may vary.

  Where possible in this volume, the original versions of Howard's work have been used, with alterations by myself restricted to formatting and de Camp's changes only added where they are deemed to improve or extend a fragmented story.

  In addition to the Lancer/Ace paperbacks, the Bantam and Ace Maroto editions of De Camp, Carter and Nyberg's work are also included.

  This volume was originally meant to include de Camp and Howard-related Conan but is now additionally supplemented with the critically acclaimed Sphere editions of Conan written by fantasy masters Karl Edward Wagner, Poul Anderson and Andrew J. Offutt. The complete Tor publications from Robert Jordan and John Maddox Roberts are also included.

  Excluded from this work are the later Tor publications from Steve Perry, Roland Green, Leonard Carpenter, Sean A. Moore and Harry Turtledove. These writers' attempts at creating Conan have largely been lambasted to the point that I don't consider them worth adding. Anyone reading this who disagrees with that assessment is more than welcome to create an equivalent compilation of what has been left out, I shall not be doing so.

  Non-canonical movie tie-ins such as Conan the Destroyer and Conan the Barbarian by Robert Jordan, L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter are absent. As is the non-canonical Conan the Bold by John Maddox Roberts, however Conan the Barbarian by Michael A. Stackpole intentionally fits with Howard's canon and is included in two parts to provide an alternative origin story.

  Conan and the Spider God has a minor edit in order to fit with canon, the change of both Conan's pseudonym and father's name from Nial to Corin.

  The last missing Conan books are mostly untranslated from their original Polish and Russian and have not been chronologically verified, a future project for any aspiring collectors no doubt.

  Finally, Tor's Conan and the Emerald Lotus by John C. Hocking is included as it represents one of the finest pieces of pastiche ever written.

  Conan the Rogue, Conan and the Treasure of Python, Conan the Marauder, Conan and the Manhunters, Conan the Swordsman, Conan: The Road of Kings and Conan the Rebel appear here in digital format for the first time anywhere.

  There will be a number of typographical errors and line spaces throughout the over two million hand-scanned words of this volume, you have been warned. Feel free to proof them yourself and upload an edited version of any or all parts of this work.

  Further edits include changing all chapters to the Roman numerals that Howard originally used, and removing all titles in block capitals to provide a degree of standardisation.

  I welcome anybody to convert and/or edit this file as they see fit, however they come across it. That includes removing this foreword if they wish!

  Don't ask me how many months it took me to create this, I've since lost count.

  My meagre words cannot possibly sum up the multitudinous number of writers and scholars that have written or spoken about the subject of Conan's adventures, the largest fantasy series in history.

  May Crom, Mitra or whatever pagan Gods you worship watch over your deeds, and judge you accordingly.

  - J. R. Karlsson

  Cimmeria

  Robert E. Howard

  I remember

  The dark woods, masking slopes of sombre hills;

  The grey clouds’ leaden everlasting arch;

  The dusky streams that flowed without a sound,

  And the lone winds that whispered down the passes.

  Vista on vista marching, hills on hills,

  Slope beyond slope, each dark with sullen trees,

  Our gaunt land lay.

  So when a man climbed up

  A rugged peak and gazed, his shaded eye

  Saw but the endless vista – hill on hill,

  Slope beyond slope, each hooded like its brothers.

  It was a gloomy land that seemed to hold

  All winds and clouds and dreams that shun the sun,

  With bare boughs rattling in the lonesome winds,

  And the dark woodlands brooding over all,

  Not even lightened by the rare dim sun

  Which made squat shadows out of men; they called it

  Cimmeria, land of Darkness and deep Night.

  It was so long ago and far away I have forgot the very name men called me.

  The axe and flint-tipped spear are like a dream,

  And hunts and wars are shadows. I recall

  Only the stillness of that sombre land;

  The clouds that piled forever on the hills,

  The dimness of the everlasting woods.

  Cimmeria, land of Darkness and the Night.

  Oh, soul of mine, born out of shadowed hills,

  To clouds and winds and ghosts that shun the sun,

  How many deaths shall serve to break at last

  This heritage which wraps me in the grey

  Apparel of ghosts?

  I search my heart and find

  Cimmeria, land of Darkness and the Night.

  Conan the Barbarian (Part I)

  Michael A. Stackpole

  I

  Corin, Blacksmith, son of Connacht and, like every other Cimmerian, a warrior, watched the young men of his village. He measured them with a careful eye, aware that soon he would be fashioning for each a sword. It would match them in length and personality, becoming a part of them. In the south it was said Cimmerians were born with swords in their hands, but Corin knew that this was not true.

  We are born with the courage to wield a sword, as Crom grants. He smiled. A Cimmerian needs little else.

  A dozen young men, some showing only the first wisp of a beard, practised with the fellows in a circle of hard-packed snow. Two warriors circulated among them, snapping order. The youths’ swords came up and flashed out, high cuts and low. Warriors lashed the youths’ bellies when their charges displayed sloppy guards, and tipped elbows up and kicked feet into their proper place. Smiles betrayed boys who thought learning the deadly arts was but a game; and harsh cuffs disabused them of that notion.

  Only survivors earned the right to smile after the grim work of swordplay was done.

  The youths moved in unison―some clumsy, some certain, some bold enough to add a flourish to a cut. They watched each other, being impressed and trying to impress. Clusters of giggling girls standing on the shadowed side of huts increased their desire to preen and sapped their focus.

  Corin shook his head slowly, a lion of a man with a thick mane and beard. Despite the late-fall chill, he wore no tunic, only a leather apron. The smith’s strong arms displayed thick muscles over which a tracery of pale scars played. A few were the marks left by hot metal from the forge. The rest had been earned in battle.

  The boy’s grunt caught Corin’s attention, but he did not turn toward it, not immediately. Had he done so, he would have smiled and his smile would have been seen. The boy needed no encouragement, but Corin, remembering his o
wn childhood, saw no reason to discourage either.

  Slowly he glanced over, and there, opposite the circle where the young men fought, his son, Conan, aped their movements. The stick his imagination had transformed into a Cimmerian broadsword slashed the air with a whistle. The boy ducked and twisted, then brought the stick around in a fluid riposte that would have cut a throat. Another twist, then a downward stroke to break a shin. The stick whirled up and around, both hands on the hilt, and came down in a beheading stroke.

  Conan’s father ran a hand over his beard to hide a smile. Conan’s movements did not ape those of the young men; if anything, his fluidity mocked their stiff awkwardness. Where they were slow and tentative, he moved quickly and with certainty. Though battling at shadows much as they were, Conan was winning, whereas they would die easily.

  Pride swelled Corin’s breast, but the soft voice of his wife came to him. Her dying words echoed inside his skull. In their wake came a weariness of the soul, and an ache that reminded him of old wounds. He composed his face, his brows narrowing, and turned to face his son.

  'Boy, what are you doing?'

  Conan froze, stick quivering in an aborted thrust. 'Father, I was―'

  'I sent you to gather firewood, Conan. My forge grows cold.'

  The boy pointed at a stack of wood. 'But I . . .'

  'That’s a thrust near the heart, Conan, not in the heart.' Corin shook his head. 'I give you a simple task and then find it half done, and you playing with a stick like one of those Aquilonian sorcerers in your grandfather’s stories.'

  Conan dropped the stick as if it were a viper. 'Father, I wasn’t . . . that wasn’t a wand. I was watching the others and . . .'

  Corin waved his son to him. 'Conan, those young men are being trained as warriors because they have earned that right.'

  'Only by being older than I, Father.'

  'Which means they are closer to death than you.' Corin cupped the back of his son’s neck in a hand. 'You have it in you to be a great warrior someday, my son, but not today.'

  'But I’m already taller than Eiran, and he’s only just started shaving . . .'

  'Conan, enough.'

  'But, Father―'

  'Enough.' Corin pointed to the small pile of wood his son had gathered. 'Double that, stack it inside the woodshed, then I want you to go check your trap-line. You’d best be quick, too, since winter’s stealing up on us, and night will be on us soon enough.'