SAGAS,
SCROLLS & SORCERY:
A
Survey of Literature in the Hyborian Age
by
Eric
Leif Davin
Of all the ancient civilizations, only Atlantis holds
more mystery than the Hyborian Age.
Unlike all other vanished societies of which we know, not a single
Hyborian archaeological site has been uncovered. All that is known of these intriguing people
is deduced from their surviving literature -- which is itself meager,
fragmentary, and obscure -- translated and passed on by later societies. Even the originals have long since been lost,
leaving only reproductions to us.
This, in itself, in not entirely without
precedent. The fame of Sappho, one of
history's first known female poets, lives on, but most of her work has not
survived. Aristotle's Constitution of the Athenian People is
the sole remnant of the work he, or his assistants, prepared on all the Greek
city-states -- and we have this work only by the sheerist accident. Irreplaceable literary treasures were lost
forever in the burning of the Alexandrian library by Caesar's troops. The Etruscans, who ruled the Italian
peninsula before the rise of Rome, left no literature of their own and what we
know of them is derived largely from the written records of the Greeks and
Romans. It is believed that the Roman
Emperor Claudius, a respected historian in his own time, wrote a comprehensive
history of the Etruscans -- but this, too, has vanished utterly. All else that we know of the Etruscans is
gleaned from an archaeological study of their tombs.
Of the Hyborians, however, not even their tombs
remain, due to the massive geological upheavals between their time and our
own. Since the close of the Hyborian
Age, new lands have risen from the sea and others buried beneath oceans. Therefore, we must turn to their written
records, sketchy though they be, for whatever knowledge we have of them.
THE NEMEDIAN CHRONICLES:
Outside of a few ritualistic and religious
inscriptions, the Hyborian record is composed almost entirely of a single
historical work, The Nemedian
Chronicles. Although paleolinguists
have been able to decipher ancient Nemedian, the fundamental structure of the
language remains a mystery. Pre-dating
even early Indo-European sources, no convincing linguistic affinity between
Nemedian and other languages has been shown.
Although some scholars have made claims for ancient Nemedian being the
progenitor of Gaelic, Finnish, Albanian, and even Basque, no sufficient
evidence for this position has been produced.
Nevertheless, much as Latin came to be the universal
language of learning in medieval Europe, Nemedian can be presumed to have been
the universal language of at least the literate in the Hyborian Age. One indication of this universality is the
central epic of the Chronicles: The
Saga of Conan, King of Aquilonia. While
only fragments remain, it is likely that the Chronicles dealt with a wide variety of subjects and heroes -- yet
from his story, surely King Conan must have been the greatest hero of a heroic
age and he dominates the sections of the Chronicles
which have come down to us, as he must have dominated his age. Indeed, some have speculated that it was the
very emergence of Conan as the hero-king of Aquilonia which prompted the
genesis of the Chronicles. Heroic adventures and war have often been an
early stimulus to literature; witness The
Iliad, The Odyssey, Herodotus' history of the Persian Wars, the
Peloponnesian War chronicle of Thucydides and Xenophon's story of the March of
the Ten Thousand, which inflamed the minds of Greek readers at the time.
THE PHYSICAL RECORD:
In the Chronicles,
Conan often contemptuously refers to writings, most especially sorcerous
writings, as "scraps of parchment." As parchment
is the skin of a sheep or goat prepared to be written on, this was probably a
common medium of writing among the more barbarous tribes familiar to
Conan. Indeed, the only examples in the Chronicles of writing by the savage
Hyperboreans is on parchment. As such --
particularly in regard to mystic books -- it was probably meant as a term of
derision when used by Conan. Still, it
is possible that centers of learning in Nemedia and elsewhere may have retained
the use of parchment -- that is, sheepskin -- for various ceremonial writing
purposes, much as medieval European universities retained the use of sheepskins
to produce academic diplomas.
Nevertheless, the large scale use of sheep or
goatskins would have been unfeasible and a primitive form of paper -- most
likely papyrus -- was probably more widely used. Indeed, the Chronicles seem to indicate quite strongly that the basic writing
material of Argos and even Aquilonia, two of the most advanced nations of the
time, was papyrus. Papyrus itself
(Cyperus papyrus) is a tall sedge
plant of the Nile Valley, the pith of which was cut into strips and pressed
into a writing material by Egyptian scribes of historic times. Prior to the cataclysm which ended the
Hyborian Age, the Nile was known as the Styx and flowed through what is now the
Mediterranean Sea toward what is now known as the Atlantic Ocean. There is no reason to believe that papyrus
did not grow in abundance along the entire length of antiquity's most majestic
river and, thus, must have been available in quantity to ancient scholars.
Beyond this, it is conceivable that scribes might have
used wax tablets, baked clay tablets, and even carved passages (perhaps meant
for posterity) into stone stele -- but of these possibilities we have no
written reference and, of course, no surviving physical representatives at all.
THE NEMEDIAN SCHOLARS
Renowned even in their own time for scholarship, the identity of
the Nemedian authors of the Chronicles nevertheless
remains a mystery. Much like our own
Bible, the Chronicles seem to have
been a composite work of which the original authors are anonymous. Indeed, the very concept of
"authorship" -- the "owning" of one's artistic creations --
may have been as foreign to the Nemedian scholars as it was to the nameless
artisans whose works accompanied the Egyptian Pharaohs on their journeys to the
afterworld.
Still, the names of two Hyborian scholars are handed
down to us. The first of these, Selem
the Scholar, was most likely a Nemedian. Selem the Scholar discovered the fabled Mirror of the
Manticore in a tomb excavation on the lower reaches of the river Styx. This mirror was reputed to have belonged to
the Atlantean mirror-wizard Tuzun Thune.
However, Selem the Scholar never returned this mirror to Nemedia for
further study, as he and his daughter were overtaken by the outlaw riders of
the desert chieftain Khemal Bey south of Khauran and slain. The mirror itself then vanished from history.
The other scholar of whom we know anything was F'Gahl
Ben Akiff, a wizened Turanian captured
as a young man by the white Amazons of Z'harr Hr'ann. Sahriana,
Queen of this uncharted island city-state in the Vilayet Sea, seized him and
kept him alive for his esoteric knowledge after his "expeditionary
vessel" capsized in a storm.
From what we know of these two scholars, and from more
recent scholars of antiquity (such as the Emperor Claudius), we can surmise not
only that they tended to be of the nobility, but that they also followed a more
activist tradition than present academics.
Their leisured wealth made it possible not only for them to find the
time to conduct research in archives and to write, but also frequently leave
their ivory towers in search of arcane bits of lore or relics -- much like the
fictional "Indiana Jones."
In addition, we have one recorded instance of a
"royal scribe," this being to Akter Khan of Zamboula. This scribe,
Uruj, silently recorded the actions and words of his Khan, of Conan, and of the
adventuress Isparana at an audition before the Khan in the Zamboulan throne
room and at a following banquet. Indeed,
Isparana encouraged Uruj to turn her and Conan's adventures into a
"national epic," which might well have been incorporated, therefore,
into The Nemedian Chronicles.
The existence of the scribe Uruj leads one to believe
that there may have been a scribe class
in ancient Hyboria similar to that of later Egypt. These scribes and scholars, however, seemed
to have concentrated on official recordings and histories of their time. It is doubtful that a "literature"
as we know it consisting of novels, short stories, and the like existed. This type of literature is associated
historically with the rise in Europe of the educated and numerically large
middle classes. Authors then tended to
be middle class and wrote for members of their own class.
Ancient societies, however, lacked the economic
infrastructure to support such an educated "middle class." Additionally, the lack of literacy on the
part of the populace as a whole would have militated against the spread of a
"popular" literature. We find
in the Chronicles, for instance,
that Mitralia, a servant girl to Akter Khan's mistress, Chia, could not read. If a personal
servant to a member of the high nobility could not read, it would seem unlikely
that the mass of people would be able to read, given the absence of any system
of schools and education -- as even historical times have borne out.
Thus, literacy was probably the prerogative of only
the privileged classes: The scribes, the priesthood, and perhaps the nobility
(though even the nobility of medieval Europe was often illiterate). This was a situation which would only have
contributed to the absence of any mass base for a widespread written literature
and to the awe in which this arcane skill was viewed by most people.
THE ORAL TRADITION:
Histories such as The
Nemedian Chronicles do not spring
into existence full-blown, like Athena from the brow of Zeus. They are the product not only of a vast and
ancient tradition of learning, but of an even more ancient oral tradition. But, of this Hyborian Age oral tradition,
which must have existed, we have scant knowledge. Clues to the cultural history of the age are
so sparse and so scattered that it is difficult to reconstruct any accurate
picture. Thus, there is the danger of
anachronistically modernizing ancient life and expression, and so distorting
it.
We know little of the songs, dances, march-hymns,
devotional prayers, dirges, entertaining narratives and epic sagas, or mimic
representations of the Hyborians. In
general, there are few myths or fairy tales which have been handed down to us,
although the semi-legendary stories of Atlantis, Valusia, and the Pre-Cataclysm
are mentioned in passing by the Chronicles.
What of painting or mosaics? No examples.
Tapestries? There must have been
many and of intricate quality to judge by the animistic banners of the feuding
Aquilonian factions referred to during the War of Liberation. But, again, no descriptions of them have
survived.
And, where is their drama? Certainly there must have been religious or
semi-magical rituals, accompanied by song, which would have evolved into
drama. Indeed, outside of song, drama
must have been the most accessible of the "literary" forms for the
mass of the populace. But, again, there
are no surviving traces.
Thus, with only scribes, scholars, and priests
actually committing words to paper, it would seem that the main form of
"literature" available to most people would have been traditional
songs and ballads: The eons-old oral literature of the people. Indeed, ballads have traditionally been the
earliest form of "literature," coming before any other form. Of course, we today cannot know the rhythm of
Hyborian ballads, but, fortunately, the Chronicles
have preserved six samples of Hyborian lyrics -- the music to which we can
only guess. All of them are associated
with the Conan Saga: "The Road of Kings," "Song of the Bossonian
Archers," "The Ballad of Belit," "The Song of Red
Sonja," and two compositions whose authors are known to us: "The
Lament for the King," by Rinaldo of Aquilonia, and "The Dark
Valley," by Laza Lanti, both of whom have their own sagas in the Chronicles.
While this is a meager remnant of what must have been
a rich oral tradition, nevertheless certain societal attitudes may be gleaned
from scraps of poetry and song.
"The Song of Red Sonja" is typical in
its exultation of a semi-barbaric world view of rape and pillage:
All
the world's a gore-rimmed sea,
Lo,
the devil laughs with glee.
Come
and dance then, you with me --
Come
and caper wild and free!
With
red blood those fires are lit;
Hades'
smoke is tinged with it!
Most likely, the songs Conan sang when in his cups
closely resembled this fragment: moody, bloody, violent. Indeed, in the second chapter of the Chronicle tale of King Conan known as
"The Phoenix on the Sword," the Aquilonian Count Prospero tells Conan
that he never heard Cimmerians sing anything but dirges (although this was
perhaps meant as humorous exaggeration).
We know, however, that Conan's ancient Cimmeria had a
class of "blind bards," a category fairly common among pre-literate
peoples, as the "repository" of the oral "literature." Peoples bereft of the written word tend to
compensate with much more powerful memories than we, coming from a literate
tradition, are accustomed to, as the Spanish Conquistadores discovered to their
amazement among the Aztecs and Incas.
The Cimmerian bards might have carried this ability to even further
extremes. Like blind Homer recounting
tales of heroes and glory or West Africa's griots, who retained entire tribal
histories in their heads, ancient Cimmeria's blind bards were probably the
living libraries of their people.
In the case of Cimmeria, the subject matter was
perhaps limited almost entirely to mythic tales of battle and war. We have but one example, and it is indeed of
this nature: According to the saga, Conan was born on a frozen battlefield
where Cimmerians vanquished a raiding party from Vanaheim. Of that battle, Conan once said, "The
blind bards have sung the story...around every campfire in Cimmeria." One can only
assume that this sole example of Cimmerian entertainment was typical.
An interesting consideration never elaborated upon in
the Conan Saga is the training given these bards. It is known that they were blind. Was it an aspect of Cimmerian society to
orient warriors blinded in battle or boys blinded in youthful accidents toward
the bardic calling? If so, it would seem
this tradition is a welcome humanitarian exception to the assumption that
Cimmerian society held no place for the weak and lame.
Of course, an opposite and somewhat ghoulish
interpretation, propounded by some younger scholars in the field, is that the
bards were chosen in youth by some unknown logic and deliberately blinded and
trained in their imposed profession -- much as the Catholic Church at one time
castrated young boys to preserve their youthful voices for church choirs. While the Christian tradition at least forces
us to consider this grisly possibility, we must admit there is no evidence to
support this rather extreme hypothesis.
In his youth, the ballads of Cimmeria's blind bards
would have been Conan's sole exposure to a "literary" tradition. While a few other barbaric peoples, such as
the Picts and, possibly, the Vanir, had no written language, Cimmerians seem to
have been unique among Hyborian Age barbarians in viewing writing as a mystic
skill to be held in dread and revulsion. As a young man,
Conan once came upon a wizard-king's sword in a tomb guarded by
hieroglyphics. He is said to have
exclaimed at the time, "The Elders of our tribe have whispered of this magic thing called writing..." His response highlights the superstitious awe in which
this skill was viewed and the association of writing with the despised
handiwork of wizards goes far in explaining why Cimmeria never developed a
written language, despite bordering upon Aquilonia, the most advanced nation of
the time.
Yet this very absence of a written language may have
enriched Cimmerian cultural life in other ways.
As the linguist Guenon was fond of pointing out, speech is nomadic in
nature -- but "literature," as we know it, the artistic creation of
an individual, belongs to the
city. Myths, however, the subject matter
of the oral tradition from Homer to Beowulf,
arise from "the folk." Their emergence and elaboration occur early in
the oral traditions of a culture; they do not spring from the speculations of
the individual. "Literature" -- by which we now are
indicating written expression -- is too individual, too deliberate, too
permanent for the sustenance of myth.
Thus, Cimmeria was truly a land of myth and
legend. It was a land where the Frost
Giant's Daughter still danced among men and the Red God stalked the
battlefields. Illiterate Cimmeria may
have been, in a sense, more "religious" than any urban and literate
society. Being closer, more a part of mythology himself, Conan may
well have viewed his principal god Crom as a supernatural being -- yet,
nonetheless, a vital, living, breathing, existing
god who yet walked among men on the icy hills of Cimmeria.
While Cimmerians avoided writing, such was not the
case of other northern societies, including even the primitive Hyperboreans. We know the latter possessed a runic or
hieroglyphic writing, as exhibited on the forehead of the mammoth skull
demarking the border between Hyperborea and The Border Kingdom. The painted runes on this landmark,
well-known in antiquity, warned, "The gate of Hyperborea is the gate of death to those who come hither
without leave." Obviously, not only did the savage Hyperboreans thus
possess an alphabet, but this was shared with the barbaric Border Kingdom --
else the warning was useless.
Additionally, at least some among the Hyperboreans,
perhaps tribal "scribes," also understood the writing of other, more
advanced societies as well -- something never mastered by the Cimmerians. We can see this, for instance, in the
"parchment" message "crudely scrawled in Aquilonian," left
for King Conan by the Hyperboreans after kidnapping his son, Prince Conn.
One puzzling postscript to the deliberate illiteracy
of Cimmerian society was Conan's knowledge of written Thelic, an ancient
language dating to Pre-Cataclysm times. Scholars know nothing of Thelic -- where it came from,
who spoke it, what it looked like. We
know only that it was the language of Conan's grandmother and that Conan could
read it in adulthood. Was Conan's
grandmother a war captive carried off by his grandfather? Did she, instead, come willing to Cimmeria?
And when and where -- after his illiterate childhood
and adolescence -- did Conan belatedly learn to read his grandmother's
language? Indeed, given the
superstitious apprehension with which Cimmerians viewed writing, how did
Conan's nameless grandmother even preserve her knowledge and overcome his
superstitious resistance to pass it on to her grandson? Provocative as these questions are, they must
remain forever a blank page in the history of Hyborian literature.
RELIGIOUS
AND MYSTIC WRITINGS:
Of course, the central epic of The Nemedian Chronicles is the saga of King Conan. Within this epic there are references to
written works dealing with only two other subjects: Religion and sorcery
(though perhaps some would see them as one subject in ancient societies). It seems reasonable to assume, therefore,
that these subjects were of central importance to whoever authored the Chronicles, if not to the society
itself.
Of the religious works, the text of none remain. Indeed, the Chronicles make mention of only one such work, the holy book of the
Azweri known as The Book of the Death God, but of its
contents nothing is known. The total
obliteration of Hyborian religious works has long been a frustration to
researchers and greatly hampers any true understanding of how Hyborians viewed
themselves in relation to their cosmos and their gods.
Perhaps the most intriguing elements in the lost
literature of the Hyborian Age, however, are the fabulous writings of the
wizard-scholars of that time. Noted
scientist and science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke has stated that there is
no difference between magic and a highly advanced technology to one who doesn't
understand the technology. Seen in this
light, ours was a magical society to
members of South Pacific Cargo Cults during and shortly after World War
II. Yet ours is also a society which has
lost the understanding of a much different technology -- the ancient science of
sorcery, of which gypsy fortune tellers are only a pathetic reminder.
It is now acknowledged that ancient Hyboria was more
advanced than our own age in the realm of sorcery. But, alas, The Nemedian Chronicles can only name the authors of that age's Six
Mystic Works; it cannot reveal their long-lost contents. None of the Six Mystic Works have titles per se.
Perhaps this was forbidden for sorcerous reasons. They are known, rather, by the names of their
authors. Foremost of the ancient works
was The Book of Skelos, closely
followed in magnitude by The Books of
Vathelos the Blind. The four
remaining texts were The Tomes of
Sabatea, The Book of Shuma-Gorath, The Scroll of Amendarath, and The Book of Guchupta of Shamballah.
Virtually nothing is known of these wizards but that
two were blind: Vathelos the Blind, from his name, was sightless, while Skelos,
the most important sorcerous author, is also known to have been blind. As the Chronicles
detail not a single instance of a practicing wizard being blind, one might
guess that Skelos and Vathelos were elder wizards who had "retired,"
perhaps even due to their blindness, to the preservation and transmission of
their knowledge.
An abiding mystery to scholars of Hyboria's literature
is why only magical works appear to be in what we today know as
"book" form. With the
exception of sorcerous tomes, all writings of the Hyborian Age seem to have
been in the form of scrolls. We know,
for instance, that all the important documents of Aquilonia, one of the most
progressive and powerful nations of the age, were in scroll format: Treasury
accounts, legal petitions, deeds and wills, and so on.
Yet, although even blind Skelos is described by Conan
as the author of "sorcerous scrolls," clearly the physical act of writing by wizards was
done, perhaps for ritualistic reasons, in what we today know as the offspring
of Gutenberg: Books -- rather than in scrolls.
The Chronicles repeatedly
refer to magical works as "iron-bound books." Both the works of Skelos and Vathelos the
Blind are described thus. In addition,
Shu-Onoru, wizard of Kheshatta, Stygia's City of Magicians, refers to his
wizardly texts as "my iron-bound books." Indeed, with
the single exception of the possibly fraudulent Book of Guchupta of Shamballah, which is ambiguously described as
an "ancient python-bound tome," all Hyborian
sorcerous works are referred to as "iron-bound books."
Originally, scholars believed this intriguing phrase
from the Chronicles referred to
sorcerous scrolls which were
deposited in iron chests for either mystic reasons or for safe keeping. A more recent interpretation, however, which
is gaining credence, is that the phrase means exactly what it says: That all
truly sorcerous books actually were books,
as we know them, rather than scrolls, and had borders and hinge-bindings of
iron clasps.
An excerpt from the Conan Saga which had long hindered
this interpretation was the tale of "The Children of Rhan." Near Surhon,
"a city just east of Vanaheim" (in the Asgardian wilderness?), Conan
discovered an ancient Pre-Cataclysmic ship dating back to when Vanaheim was
covered by waters. Inside the rotting
artifact, Conan found the ship's log -- the only such reference to a ship's log
in the Chronicles. This log -- known as The Rhan Log -- was shaped
like a book rather than a scroll. This
is the only description in the Chronicles
of any written work outside of a sorcerous text being in "book"
format.
For many years, the existence of The Rhan Log was viewed by one school of scholars as indicative of
a widespread use of the book format, contemporary with and possibly supplanting
scrolls over time. However, it is now
possible to place The Rhan Log firmly
within the mystic tradition, for there is reason to believe that Ehestes Rhan,
the pirate captain who kept the log -- was a sorcerer! Indeed, that very accusation was made against
Capt. Rhan by his own men as their justification for their mutiny against him
after one of them discovered "a few tomes of ancient incantations" in
his cabin. Rhan's crew marooned him
along with his "books" of "ancient incantations" and the
sorcerous-appearing log as well.
The Rhan Log
itself reveals that Capt. Rhan
followed the solitary path of the wizard-scholar. "I have studied the teachings of Set and
Mhur!" Rhan claimed. "I pray
to the Dark Ones -- to the Great Goat Gods and their brethren." The Conan Saga then details how the marooned
and now openly wizardous Capt. Rhan created the "Children of Rhan" --
beautiful young girls who metamorphosed into ravening monsters, eventually
destroying Capt. Rhan's crew when they returned.
Accordingly, it was only natural that a pirate
captain-turned-apprentice wizard would have sorcerous "books" in his
possession -- nor is it strange that his personal diary, or "log,"
should have been of the same nature. Why
else would his superstitious crew have abandoned the ship's very log along with
their captain had it not been of a "sorcerous" appearance? Thus, it seems there may have been a certain
proscription upon the very use of the book format -- as we know it in the
post-Gutenberg world -- as "evil," "unholy," or, simply, unlucky.
This would not be the only time an ancient people had
working models of a "technology" which they never utilized. Scholars have hypothesized about an
Industrial Revolution occurring in ancient Greece, which knew of and
demonstrated the principle of the steam engine.
The ancient Mayans knew of and used the wheel on many vehicles -- all
children's toys. The wheel was never
adapted by the American Indians for adult use.
But, just as historians will never adequately explain
the failure of ancient Mayans to fully utilize the wheel, it is doubtful we
will ever explain the exclusion of the book format from the secular writings of
the Hyborian Age to our satisfaction.
Like the people themselves, it remains a mystery, lost in the mists of
time.
THE MAKING
OF A SORCERER:
But, how did one become
a wizard in ancient Hyboria? A
possibility might have been by starting as a priest fallen from grace, or as a
renegade scholar lusting for "profane," meaning "unholy,"
knowledge and power, much like our own Dr. Faustus. Indeed, there is reason to believe there may
actually have been a close interchange between "profane" and
"sacred" scholars. We know,
for instance, that the Ibis Priest Karanthes, once of "wizard-haunted
Stygia", chose exile among the scholars of Nemedia -- where he sought the
knowledge of long-dead Skelos.
But, if such was the case, the pursuit of such
knowledge must have been primarily an individual, solitary quest -- as was that
of Dr. Faustus. This would help explain
the vital importance the Chronicles say
wizards placed upon their books, these being their only guides and
mentors. Indicative of the great value
they placed upon these texts is the story of the Zul brothers, wizards both. Akter Khan, Satrap of Zamboula, ordered the arrest and
execution of Hisarr Zul and his brother Tosya Zul for plotting against his
throne. They fled Zamboula in haste,
regretfully abandoning a 15-year collection of sorcerous texts. The only
remnant of their magical tomes which they could rescue -- and presumably,
therefore, their most precious wizardly accoutrement -- was the single page
which they possessed from The Book of
Skelos.
In addition, the Chronicles
mention the self-education of two minor wizards, Zafra of Zamboula and the
black warrior Zula -- the latter, actually, a novice. We know that Zula, Conan's warrior companion,
had certain minor magical abilities.
These he acquired, he stated, from stealthily studying, as a sort of unauthorized
"sorcerer's apprentice," the works of Skelos, Vathelos the Blind, and
"time-lost Shuma-Gorath" in the library of his wizard master.
Corroboration that the pursuit of sorcerous knowledge
was isolated and solitary is found in the career of the wizard Zafra of
Zamboula, the only "official" city wizard mentioned in the Chronicles (although there are, of course,
several other instances of a mage allying himself with a king or ruler). Zafra, "a mere court magician," gained all
he knew from his private perusal of "the unholy Book of Skelos, the evil-reeking Tomes of Sabatea, and the forbidden texts of Vathelos the
Blind." One might even go further and say that his was a
clandestine study, as well, for he painstakingly concealed the contents of his
books even from his confidante and mistress, Chia, the Khan's concubine.
Zamboula must have been, at least at this time, a
major center of sorcerous scholarship for Zafra, "a mere court
magician," to have had access to all the aforementioned texts. Remember, also, this is the same city and
time in which the exiled Zul brothers boasted of owning a page from The Book of Skelos, as well as many
other mystic writings.
Nevertheless, one can deduce from the references to
Zafra's studies that sorcery did not reign unchecked in Zamboula -- even though
it may have had the Khan's blessings. Someone or some thing labelled The Book of
Skelos "unholy," The Tomes
of Sabatea "evil," and succeeded in having the texts of Vathelos
the Blind actually forbidden (the
only such instance in the Chronicles).
SORCEROUS
SUBJECTS:
What was the nature of the magics dealt with by these
long vanished "unholy" tomes?
Again, we can only guess. It is
possible that The Book of Guchupta of
Shamballah discussed in some fashion the quest for eternal life, for
Thulandra Thuu, the nominal "servant" of Aquilonia's King Numedides,
sought its secret therein. However, Thuu
dismissed Guchupta's work as useless, so eternal life, after all, may not have
been its theme, or the book may not have even dealt with the mystic arts after
all! Thuu also consulted The Scroll of Amendarath for the
correct positioning of the planets, implying that the work was of an
astrological nature and, thus, perhaps relatively minor.
However, the major tomes referred to again and again
by sorcerous students were the books of the two blind seers Vathelos and
Skelos. Of the two, The Book of Skelos seems to have been the major work. The exact nature of its contents is, of
course, unknown, but it must have been the premier compilation of spells and
general magical principles. Thus, for
instance, Zafra of Zamboula states that he cannot ensorcel more than two swords
at a time because, "It's a Law of Skelos."
Of The Book of
Skelos, the Chronicles say,
"The direst whispers you have heard are true -- for, it contains dark
secrets handed down from untold ages, before Atlantis sank...secrects to blast
men's eyes -- or tear their souls asunder!" Of course, the
Chronicles then go on to say that
Conan disparaged this description as merely a "tradesman's pitch."
Nonetheless, a single page from a copy of The Book of Skelos, such as the Zul
brothers possessed, was deemed a "treasure of treasures." In Conan's quest for one of those dread
treasures, the Chronicles provide a
tantalizing glimpse of the language and nature of The Book of Skelos.
A "page" looked like a scroll, rather than a
page as we know it. The language
in which the book was written appears to have been a hieroglyphic
language. The one image which scholars
are certain was used in the text is that which the later Egyptians termed The
Eye of Horus. The Eye of
Horus is a strange glyph to find in a tome of the Dark Arts, for Horus was the
Egyptian god of light who overcame darkness and possessed the life-giving power
of the sun. Yet, while we do not
understand the presence of this glyph in The
Book of Skelos, it might perhaps give us a clue to the ethnicity of Skelos
himself.
Linguists generally consider the ancient Egyptian
language to have been a remote descendant of Stygian which, in turn, evolved
out of ancient Acheronian. But, besides
the linguistic clue, the nature of archaic Acheron itself argues for an
Acheronian origin of Skelos. Grim
Acheron was a land of darkness ruled by wizard-kings -- a most appropriate
cradle for the most sorcerous book of all.
It is in The
Book of Skelos that we also learn of The Hand of Nergal, a mystic amulet
bringing its bearer two gifts: Power beyond all limit -- then, death beyond all
despair. The Chronicles describe The
Hand of Nergal at some length, the only such detailed example retrieved from The Book of Skelos. The Hand looks like,
a clawed hand carven of old ivory, worked all over
with weird glyphs in a forgotten tongue.
The claws clasp a sphere of shadowy, dim crystal....They say it fell
from the stars into the sunset isles of the uttermost west, ages upon ages
before King Kull rose to bring the Seven Empires beneath his single
standard. Centuries and ages beyond
thought have rolled across the world since first bearded Pictish fishermen drew
it dripping from the deep and stared wonderingly into its shadowy fires! They bartered it to greedy Atlantean
merchants, and it passed east across the world.
The withered, hoary-bearded mages of elder Thule and dark Grondar probed
its mysteries in their towers of purple and silver. The serpent men of shadow-haunted Valusia
peered into its glimmering depths. With
it, Kom-Yazoth whelmed the Thirty Kings until the Hand turned upon him and slew
him.
The Book of
Skelos, however, also speaks of a
counter-talisman to this Demon Hand -- The Heart of Tammuz. Later Tammuz was to evolve into the Babylonian
god of vegetation who was reborn each Spring and was the husband or lover of
Ishtar, the principal Babylonian deity.
This incorporation of Babylonian -- and Egyptian -- symbols of life and
light into the teachings of The Book of
Skelos, however, merely serves to reinforce the accepted interpretation
that this work was a tome of general principles. Therein, one could find the uses of
"good" magics -- as well as the mis-uses of "evil" magics.
Finally, it seems, The Book of Skelos was itself an actual vessel of sorcery, as well
as a transmitter of sorcerous knowledge.
The Chronicles relate that
Conan failed in his quest for the Skelos page, as it spontaneously burst into
flames once he possessed it.
This posthumous protection of things Skelos seems also
to have extended to the mage himself.
While Conan's ultimate fate is lost to history, we do know the final
resting place of Skelos. The pirate
Belit, beloved of Conan, seems to have cached her plunder on a "nameless
isle" far to the west of the Shemitish coast, an isle not to be found on
any Hyborian map. This isle scholars
have come to call Skelos Island, for it was here that demons were set to haunt
the Temple of the Toad and protect the Well of Skelos, wherein the long dead
remains of the Acheronian sorcerer were laid.
The demon-guarded Grave of Skelos demonstrates, if nothing else could,
the power of Skelos himself -- most illustrious of ancient wizards!
