The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian

by Robert E. Howard

  Writing that his characters and stories came easily to him was customary with Howard, who almost never mentioned unfinished or unsold stories in his correspondence. In the case of the Kull series, for example, only three tales had been published while a dozen others were either left unfinished or rejected. Yet Howard wrote to Lovecraft:

  “Thanks for the kind things you said about the Kull stories, but I doubt if I’ll ever be able to write another. The three stories I wrote about that character seemed almost to write themselves, without any planning on my part; there was no conscious effort on my part to work them up. They simply grew up, unsummoned, full grown in my mind and flowed out on paper from my finger tips.”

  In fact, drafts survive for almost every Kull story, indicating that much more work was involved than Howard suggests. How then can we give credence to his intimation that the creation of the Conan stories was virtually a case of automatic writing? Things were not as easy and straightforward as Howard would have Clark Ashton Smith – and us – believe.

  In October 1931, Howard completed the first version of a story titled People of the Dark and sent it to Clayton Publications’ new magazine, Strange Tales of Mystery and Terror, a direct competitor to Weird Tales. Editor Harry Bates liked the story, but asked for some rewriting. Howard complied and a few weeks later Bates accepted the story, along with another tale Howard had sent him, The Cairn on the Headland.

  People of the Dark is a remembrance/reincarnation story. In this first-person narrative, protagonist John O’Brien tells of re-experiencing an episode in the life of one of his previous incarnations, one “Conan of the Reavers,” a black-haired Gael who swears by the Celtic deity Crom. It is tempting indeed to see in this Conan a direct prototype for his more famous namesake (and in fact some commentators have done so), were it not for the fact that People of the Dark is a first-person remembrance/reincarnation story, while the Conan stories are not.

  Or are they?

  With the sale of People of the Dark, Howard had found a new market – one that, unlike Weird Tales, paid on acceptance. When the money arrived a few weeks later, Howard was overjoyed:

  “I finally made Claytons’. I sold them a couple of yarns in a row, and while they kept me waiting awhile for the dough, they paid well when they did pay – $134 for one, and $144 for the other. Short stories too. I hope to gosh I can sell them a long novelet.” (REH to Tevis Clyde Smith, ca. February 1932)

  Thus in February 1932 Howard was suddenly richer by $278, and it was probably this, rather than any lack of inspiration, that was behind his decision to take a vacation to the southern parts of Texas.

  Howard commented to Wilfred Blanch Talman a few weeks later: “I spent a few weeks wandering about in the south part of the state, along the Border mainly, and didn’t get any work done during that time – my main occupation being the wholesale consumption of tortillas, enchiladas and Spanish wine.”

  If he didn’t write any stories or letters – probably having left his typewriter behind – Howard at least wrote one poem during his stay: Cimmeria. In 1934 Howard sent Emil Petaja a copy of the poem with the comment: “Written in Mission, Texas, February 1932; suggested by the memory of the hill-country above Fredericksburg seen in a mist of winter rain.”

  We do not know whether Howard already had the idea of Conan by the time the poem was written; certainly both the character and the poem were conceived within a matter of days:

  “Conan simply grew up in my mind a few years ago when I was stopping in a little border town on the lower Rio Grande. I did not create him by any conscious process. He simply stalked full grown out of oblivion and set me at work recording the saga of his adventures.” (Quoted in Alvin Earl Perry, A Biographical Sketch of Robert E. Howard, 1935)

  It has been shown that much of Howard’s description of the poem’s Cimmeria echoes specific passages in Plutarch’s Lives. Like Howard, Plutarch linked the Celtic Cimbri to the Cimmerians, saying they “live in a dark and woody country hardly penetrable by the sunbeams, the trees are so close and thick, extending into the interior as far as the Hercynian forest.”

  The poem is more than mere description, however. The first line of the poem – “I remember” – makes it quite clear that we are dealing with the themes of reincarnation and remembrance, as was the case in People of the Dark. The protagonist of the latter, John O’Brien, is an American of Irish stock, living in the American Southwest. He thus clearly evokes Howard himself; and if O’Brien can remember his past life as Conan of the Reavers, did Howard believe, or fancy, he also could “remember” having lived in Cimmeria in a past life?

  Inquiring further in this autobiographical vein, one is struck by the strong resonance between the descriptions of Cimmeria in the poem and those found in Howard’s reminiscences of the land of his birth, Dark Valley, in Palo Pinto County, Texas. He wrote to H.P. Lovecraft, in October 1930:

  “I believe, for instance, that the gloominess in my own nature can be partly traced to the surroundings of a locality in which I spent part of my baby-hood. It was a long, narrow valley, lonesome and isolated, up in the Palo Pinto hill country. It was very sparsely settled and its name, Dark Valley, was highly descriptive. So high were the ridges, so thick and tall the oak trees that it was shadowy even in the daytime, and at night it was as dark as a pine forest – and nothing is darker in this world. The creatures of the night whispered and called to one another, faint night-winds murmured through the leaves and now and then among the slightly waving branches could be glimpsed the gleam of a distant star.”

  Similar imagery combining evil, gnarled trees and an aura of terror can also be found in Howard’s poem The Dweller in Dark Valley, which concludes with “I go no more in Dark Valley which is the gate of Hell.”

  Dark Valley and Cimmeria may thus have been very closely linked in Howard’s mind. But the “memory” they evoke is of a very peculiar nature. Howard’s memories of Dark Valley are no less fantastic than John O’Brien’s of his past life: the Howards left Dark Valley when Robert was barely two years old, and he would not see Dark Valley again until the spring of 1931. Reincarnation can then be seen as a solution to escape one’s biography, just as in Jack London’s The Star Rover, a Howard favorite, in which the protagonist is a prisoner who finds relief – and escape – from torture by remembering his past lives. There is a definite pattern here, since Howard completed his first reincarnation story – The Children of the Night – the same month he wrote to Lovecraft about Dark Valley, and his second one – People of the Dark – only a few weeks after having seen Dark Valley again.

  All these elements were combined in the first Conan story, The Phoenix on the Sword, where the description of Cimmeria echoes Plutarch, Dark Valley and the poems:

  “A gloomier land never existed on earth. It is all of hills, heavily wooded, and the trees are strangely dusky, so that even by day all the land looks dark and menacing. As far as a man may see his eye rests on the endless vista of hills beyond hills, growing darker and darker in the distance. Clouds hang always among those hills; the skies are nearly always grey and over-cast. Winds blow sharp and cold, driving rain of sleet or snow, and moan drearily among the passes and down the valleys. There is little mirth in that land, and men grow moody and strange. (Unpublished draft a, pp. 9-10)

  If Howard could attribute the “gloominess” in his nature to what he thought he remembered of Dark Valley, a similar argument can be put forward to explain Conan’s own moody temperament. While many readers see in Conan a projection of Howard, what they primarily see is Conan as an idealized version of Howard: the conquering, irresistible, devil-may-care barbarian. The gloominess inherent to the character has passed largely unnoticed, and understandably so. This feature was rarely mentioned by Howard himself, at least in the published versions of the stories.

  In its final form, The Phoenix on the Sword opens with a passage from the “Nemedian Chronicles.” It is in those lines that we first see Conan mentioned; the character himself doesn’t ap
pear until the second chapter of the story. The passage in question reads: “Hither came Conan, the Cimmerian, black-haired, sullen-eyed, sword in hand, a thief, a reaver, a slayer, with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandalled feet” (italics mine). “The Nemedian Chronicles” were only introduced into the story because Farnsworth Wright (the editor of Weird Tales) had asked Howard to rewrite and condense his first two chapters. The short extract’s function was to replace lengthy passages on, respectively, some countries of the Hyborian Age, and some character traits of the Cimmerian.

  And if Howard attributed his gloominess to Dark Valley, Conan seems to attribute his own “gigantic melancholies” to his Cimmerian origin:

  “Well,” grinned Prospero, “the dark hills of Cimmeria are far behind you. And now I go. I’ll quaff a goblet of white Nemedian wine for you at Numa’s court.”

  “Good,” grunted the king, “but kiss Numa’s dancing girls for yourself only, lest you involve the states!”

  His gusty laughter followed Prospero out of the chamber. The carven door closed behind the Poitanian, and Conan turned back to his task. He paused a moment, idly listening to his friend’s retreating footsteps, which fell hollowly on the tiles. And as if the empty sound struck a kindred chord in his soul, a rush of revulsion swept over him. His mirth fell away from him like a mask, and his face was suddenly old, his eyes worn. The unreasoning melancholy of the Cimmerian fell like a shroud about his soul, paralyzing him with a crushing sense of the futility of human endeavor and the meaninglessness of life. His kingship, his pleasures, his fears, his ambitions, and all earthly things were revealed to him suddenly as dust and broken toys. The borders of life shrivelled and the lines of existence closed in about him, numbing him. Dropping his lion head in his mighty hands, he groaned aloud.

  Then lifting his head, as a man looks for escape, his eyes fell on a crystal jar of yellow wine. Quickly he rose and pouring a goblet full, quaffed it at a gulp. Again he filled and emptied the goblet, and again. When he set it down, a fine warmth stole through his veins. Things and happenings assumed new values. The dark Cimmerian hills faded far behind him. Life was good and real and vibrant after all – not the dream of an idiot god. He stretched himself lazily like a gigantic cat and seated himself at the table, conscious of the magnitude and vital importance of himself and his task. Contentedly, he nibbled his stylus and eyed his map. (The Phoenix on the Sword, first submitted draft, see pp. 360-361)

  When Howard said that “the man Conan seemed suddenly to grow up in my mind without much labor on my part,” he was probably telling the truth. What he did not realize was that this act of creation obeyed deep-seated motives: Conan’s “gigantic melancholies” echo Howard’s “black moods,” as he called them, just as Cimmeria echoes Dark Valley. And just as Dark Valley was a haunting memory for Howard, “a gloomier land” than Cimmeria never existed for Conan.

  Howard’s Conan, at least in the early phases of his creation, was thus much more a projection of what Howard was, than what he wanted to be.

  The poem Cimmeria is not, strictly speaking, part of the Conan canon, but it is the piece of writing that helped bring about the Conan stories: Conan – or Howard – can only “remember” Cimmeria; it is a terrible land, the mere evocation of which brings unhappy recollections and invites forgetfulness. This is why no Conan story can take place in Cimmeria and why no other Cimmerian is – or could be – ever featured in any of the Conan tales. In Queen of the Black Coast, Conan will explain to Bêlit that “[i]n this world men struggle and suffer vainly, finding pleasure only in the bright madness of battle…. Let me live deep while I live; let me know the rich juices of red meat and stinging wine on my palate, the hot embrace of white arms, the mad exultation of battle when the blue blades flame and crimson, and I am content. Let teachers and priests and philosophers brood over questions of reality and illusion. I know this: if life is illusion, then I am no less an illusion, and being thus, the illusion is real to me. I live, I burn with life, I love, I slay, and am content.” This is what the Conan series is really about then, a wish to drown oneself in a turbulent life. Conan’s intense physical life appears as a desperate attempt to forget Cimmeria and whatever frightful memory is associated with that country. Perhaps the same can be said of Howard’s intense writing activity, which could be seen as an attempt to forget Dark Valley. When Conan is inactive – as is the case at the beginning of The Phoenix on the Sword – and reminded of Cimmeria, his first reflex is to seek oblivion and drink his gloominess away. Different solutions to the same problem.

  Once Cimmeria was written, after having expressed the need to flee that country and to forget it as much as possible, Howard was psychologically ready to compose the first of these action-filled Conan stories.

  When Howard returned to Cross Plains in February 1932, there still remained the task of creating what was to become known as the “Hyborian” world.

  The reasons behind the invention of the Hyborian Age were probably commercial. Howard’s sole market up to 1929 had been Weird Tales, but in the early thirties several new markets opened up to him, notably Oriental Stories and the short-lived Soldiers of Fortune. Howard had an intense love for history and the stories he sold to Oriental Stories rank among his best. At the same time he recognized the difficulties and the time-consuming research work involved in maintaining historical accuracy. By conceiving a universe that was not ours but that may once have been ours, by carefully choosing names that resembled our past history, Howard skirted the problem of anachronisms and the need for lengthy explanatory chapters. Lovecraft later criticized him for this, but concluded that: “The only thing to do is to accept the nomenclature as he gives it, wink at the weak spots, and be damned thankful that we can get such vivid artificial legendry.” (Letter to Donald Wollheim, used in the introduction to The Hyborian Age, 1938)

  Howard was perfectly able to come up with imaginary names when he wanted to: the Kull stories that Lovecraft so much admired feature strange-sounding empires such as Zarfhaana, Valusia and Grondar. But by dubbing Howard’s method “artificial legendry,” Lovecraft had touched upon one of the most important factors presiding over the creation of the Hyborian Age.

  Although he is not represented in Howard’s library, nor alluded to in his papers and correspondence, there seems a strong likelihood that Howard’s conception of the Hyborian Age originates in Thomas Bulfinch’s The Outline of Mythology (1913), acting as a catalyst that enabled him to coalesce into a coherent whole his literary aspirations and the strong psychological/autobiographical elements underlying the creation of Conan.

  Bulfinch (1796-1867) had a keen interest in classical studies and much of his spare time was spent writing a series of books popularizing classical legends and mythological episodes. The Outline of Mythology combines his three most famous books, The Age of Fable (1855), The Age of Chivalry (1858) and Legends of Charlemagne, or Romance of the Middle Ages (1863). Between the covers of Bulfinch’s books were heroic tales set in various places and epochs of history and legendry, that is to say, the very substance of the Hyborian Age. It is thus not surprising to find that many of the names used in Howard’s early conception of his imaginary world are found in Bulfinch, beginning with Conan:

  “...the next event of note is the conquest and colonization of Armorica, by Maximis, a Roman general, and Conan, lord of Miniadoc or Denbigh-land, in Wales.” (Bulfinch, The Outline of Mythology, p. 388)

  Of course, Howard was familiar with the name Conan before the inception of the Hyborian series, since he had already used the name for the protagonist in People of the Dark. But perhaps this only indicates that Howard had already read or was reading Bulfinch by the time he wrote that story.

  As to the country of Conan’s birth, Cimmeria, Bulfinch offers a description similar to Howard’s:

  “Near the Cimmerian country, a mountain cave is the abode of the dull god Somnus. Here Phoebus dares not come, either rising, at midd
ay, or setting. Clouds and shadows are exhaled from the ground, and the light glimmers faintly. The bird of dawning, with crested head, never there calls aloud to Aurora, nor watchful dog, nor more sagacious goose disturbs the silence. No wild beast, nor cattle, nor branch moved with the wind, nor sound of human conversation, breaks the stillness. Silence reigns there; but from the bottom of the rock the River Lethe flows, and by its murmur invites to sleep.” (Bulfinch, pp. 71-72)

  Some commentators have noted the closeness of description between Howard’s Cimmeria and Herodotus’ description of this country; this could well have come from Bulfinch, who drew some of his material from Herodotus. Bulfinch adds: “The earliest inhabitants of Britain are supposed to have been a branch of that great family known in history by the designation of Celts. Cambria, which is a frequent name for Wales, is thought to be derived from Cymri, the name which the Welsh traditions apply to an immigrant people who entered the island from the adjacent continent. This name is thought to be identical with those of Cimmerians and Cimbri, under which the Greek and Roman historians describe a barbarous people, who spread themselves from the north of the Euxine over the whole of Northwestern Europe” (p. 529). In March 1932, precisely at the time he was writing the first Conan tales, Howard echoed Bulfinch, writing to Lovecraft that “Most authorities consider the Cimbri were Germans, of course, and they probably were, but there's a possibility that they were Celtic, or of mixed Celtic and German blood, and it gratifies my fancy to protray [sic] them as Celts, anyway.”