The Early History of Europe in Fictional Renderings

The World According to Ptolemy

This is a segment of Ptolemy's "Mappa Mundi" or Map of the World as it was known in the Middle Ages. It is also a map of locations for web pages related to fiction about the early days of European civilization. Click on hot spots within this map to go to different sources. The three faces above the World of Men are named Atlantis, Polaris, and Hyperborea; they will lead you to other realms that are not so historical.

Areas on the Map:

Egypt and North Africa

No, don't stop! This is just my under-construction sign, photograph taken on a vacation in Scotland where this man actually had to do this all day on a road that had no traffic (there is a Go sign on the back).

There is nothing here covering Asia and the Far East, southern Africa, the Americas, or Australia (Middle Eastern, north African, Balkan, and Russian areas are also hardly covered) -- that's another project! This site is constantly but sporadically under construction. Please bear with me, as it will not take as long as the repairs to the Gowanus Expressway. It is, however, rather ambitious and will last well into spring of the Millennium. If you like it, just come back and visit from time to time to see what's been added (but I'm not going to put any of those damn "new" or "updated" graphics here, because that's all relative, and they are irritating when you find that "new" refers to something a couple of years old). Note: My divvying up of various subject geographically and historically is rather eccentric, so be warned! --Grobius

Additional incidental web pages: H. Rider Haggard, Hope Muntz, James Hogg

This is a very selective and prejudiced list of novels about prehistorical, classical, and dark-age times before the European Middle Ages. Books listed are there only because (a) I read them, and (b) enjoyed them. I'm more than willing to read anything else you web browsers with similar interests might have in mind, although I prefer the 'ripping good yarn' to the sort of book that preaches Druidism or some other Great Cause. E-mail me at Grobius with any worthwhile information, or if you want to criticize my opinions. I have left out the Julian May's, Jean Auel's, and other books of the like, because I am not that comfortable with them as 'histories'. But you should click on the "Boreals" to see things beyond this pale.

Here follows a list of some of the books referred to. They are not categorized according to the "map" -- you, as the Explorer, must go searching for them (view source in your browser to find the web page reference).

GENERAL PRE-HISTORY

Stone Age and Bronze Age
- Björn Kurtén: Dance of the Tiger (Cro Magnons and Neanderthals)
- William Golding: The Inheritors (Cro Magnons and Neanderthals, another viewpoint)
- Henry Treece: The Golden Strangers (The Beaker Folk, who conquered Britain before the Celts)
- Harry Harrison: Stonehenge (Atlantis/Britain)
Asia Minor
- Robert Silverberg: Gilgamesh the King (Sumerian epic)
The Egyptians
- Linda Robinson: Murder in the Place of Anubis (and other mystery novels about Lord Meren, Tutankhamen's chief of police)
Finns and Phoenicians
- Lou Goble: The Kalevide (Estonia)
- Gustave Flaubert: Salambo (Carthage)

THE CLASSICAL WORLD

Graves was a true Pagan in these modern times, and probably one of the best poets/novelists of this century

The Greeks

Robert Graves: Hercules, My Shipmate (and his other books of this ilk)

The Romans
- Robert Graves: I, Claudius (the all-time classic); Claudius the God
- Steven Saylor: Murder on the Appian Way (and other mystery novels about Gordianus the Finder)
- Lindsay Davis: Venus in Copper, etc. (series of books about Marcus Didius Falco, the Informer)
- Gore Vidal: Julian (the Apostate, too bad he failed)
- Robert Graves (again): Count Belisarius (amazing story of a virtuous man in the Byzantine Empire)
A couple of fantasies that are not strictly historical novels
- Richard Ben Sapir: The Far Arena (the champion gladiator's body is found frozen in an ice floe and he is revived into modern times)

NORTHERN EUROPE

The Celts and King Arthur
- [this has its own web site]
- Rudyard Kipling: Puck of Pook's Hill. A rousing book for intelligent children; few books fit this genre (enjoyable for adults too).
Saxons and Siegfried
- [this has its own web site]
Vikings and The Northerners
- Dorothy Dunnett: King Hereafter (Thorfinn of the Orkneys, aka Macbeth)

REALMS OF THE UNREAL

Atlantis: Atlantis, Lyonesse, and Hy-Brasil -- the Fantasy Realm
Polaris: Dune, Darkover, Barsoom -- the Heroic Age in the rest of the Galaxy
Hyperborea: Conan, Lankhmar, Braise of Lepidopter -- Swords and Sorcery

Notes

I don't claim to be a 'scholar' but I have an extensive library -- mainly fiction because I am not particularly interested in dry treatises on archeology, sociology, economics per se -- it needs to be dramatized. Some of these books are fantasy novels, some mysteries, some histories, all good stories. A common requirement is that they are all historically based interpretations in the sense that the authors had to do their research properly.* So, reluctantly, I've omitted Conan the Barbarian and books of that sort. (Well, not quite -- you can click on Atlantis, Polaris, and Hyperborea above the map of Europe and go to web sites in the fantasy category.)

* I do read the dry-as-dust books, too, so I know enough to make judgments about this.

--Grobius Shortling (New Year's Day 1998)

Please return to this Site from time to time, as you will eventually find links to more web pages (unless you think I'm full of crap, in which case e-mail me and say why you think so: e-mail)

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If you see any book on these pages that you would like to read, please try the following site and order it on-line if it's available

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The Strange Aeons Historical Society SiteRing

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Mythology: A good page of links to various sites concerning the myths of the world.

Pagans: Grobius Shortling's new web site (Feb 1999) reuses quite a bit of material from the Mappa Mundi web pages, but from a different slant.
Both sites are now Dead Links (in my case, somebody complained about Pagans to Tripod management and they deleted it). However, Pagans has been restored at this site.

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