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Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
“A.J. Soltare is one of our authors of whom we’re very proud. He has worked with Bulwark under my father and my uncles Rupert and Sebastian. He claims I’m the easiest `boss’ with whom he’s ever had to work, but I suspect I let him get away with more as he’s been around the offices for decades longer than I’ve been alive.”
—Oscar Kharm, Bulwark publisher, in an interview on March 12, 1981
</p>“What can I tell you about A.J.? Precious little, I’m afraid. Gentlemen’s agreement, you see. I keep his secrets and he keeps mine. All I’ll say is what he’d say about me—look to our fictions and therein you’ll find more than a little of us looking back at you. That’s as close a secret as I’ll share with you and your readers.”
—Blake Hart Montgomery, in an interview on March 4, 1981
</p>“A.J. Soltare is an enigma, to be sure. His ACE BARRIGAN stories are far more polished than most writers’ early works and have an energy that made his stories stand out from his fellow pulpsters. He continues with other Bulwark properties like THE REDRESSOR, BRASS BRADLEY, and THE GASLIGHT and finds new niches within their tales to not just duplicate his success with Fairgeth’s mystic P.I. but transcend it while crafting new shadowy worlds around every character.
“His writing shares some similarities to earlier writers like Jack London and John Solo, though his longevity and his variety make him the stronger author. His work now spans seven decades and while his craft improved as he aged, Soltare’s entire output is eminently readable, no matter when he penned it. Whether he writes hardboiled pulp noir, supernatural horror, weird fantasy, romance, or sword and sorcery, this author knows how to appeal to his readers and expand the boundaries of any genre he chooses.”
—Critic Virginia Harold, New York Times Book Review, October 15, 1994, reviewing Nemeses Nocturnal: The Collected A.J. Soltare (Volume 2) Bulwark/Prospect 1994
</p>“I’m embarrassed to say that I read A.J.’s stuff almost backwards. He hooked me as a reader with his Silver Age comic book work, really. I loved what he did in KHARNDAM Tales, and those led me back to the earlier stories in SAGAS SUPERNATURAL and other places. Only after I’d read through all the KHARNDAM material I could find did I look back and find his reprinted comic book work on DOC ENIGMA, and that was mind-blowing stuff for 1972, let alone for 1942 when it was originally done. A.J.’s a marvel to read in any medium and he’s only gotten better over the years. Doesn’t matter what you first read—you’ll end up reading it all because his knack for characters and plot grabs you too and won’t let go.”
—Curtis Winter, writer of the Ignisceror and Arcaniac Quartets
</p>Alexander James Soltare was born on August 26, 1910 in Portsmouth, Maine. He led an uneventful childhood and only came to notice after his move to Chicago in 1932 where he got work at the Chicago Tribune. His first foray into fiction was “Six-Spell-Shooter,” the first ACE BARRIGAN story in OCCULT THRILLS #264 (November 1935), and he continued to regularly publish in Bulwark’s pulps and magazines and books for decades. Whether as an author or editor of fiction, nonfiction, or comic books, A.J. worked for Bulwark Publications until the age of 75.
A.J.’s penchant for gripping stories and tight plots, combined with his gift for speedy writing, garnered him a lot of work. According to some pulp historians, he approached H. Bedford Jones’ and Lester Dent’s phenomenal outputs in total words per year. Unlike some pulp authors, he worked exclusively for Bulwark, though this did not limit him from working in many different magazines or genres: BOOKS BIZARRE, BOXING THRILLS, GAMING THRILLS, GREEN GAZETTE, HERO THRILLS (pulp & comic), MISTER CONUNDRUM, OCCULT THRILLS, ORKNEY STREET, RACING THRILLS, ROMANCE THRILLS, SAGAS SUPERNATURAL, SCIENCE THRILLS, SPACE THRILLS, TALES TERRIFIC, TRUE-LIFE MAGAZINE, and WESTERN THRILLS.
While many of Soltare’s works appeared under his own name, editors disguised some of his work under house pseudonyms to hide just how much A.J. Soltare material they published. Thus, assembling his entire bibliography publicly only recently occurred. All told, whether under house names or his own, A.J. Soltare published nearly 200 novels, over 700 short stories, and nearly 500 articles or essays between 1935 and 2000.
Mr. Soltare’s most recently published work was the “Introduction” for KHARNDAM Collected #1 (TWELVELANDS Volume One; Bulwark/Prospect 2000). For those worried about the man’s longevity into his 90’s, A.J. promised in recent interviews that he’d already written new material (introductions, afterwords, or anecdotal sidebars) for every volume of the promised 14 book collection of his long-lived fantasy collaboration.
</p>“I write to relax, to be honest. For me, it’s never the first thing I do in the morning but the last thing I do at night after conquering my day and its errands. More often than not, my process of unwinding and spooling my experiences and feelings and thoughts out in fictions leads me to watch the dawn before I get some sleep. Even now, in my so-called ‘golden years,’ I’m finding the only way I can get to sleep is to rattle off a little story or article on my trusty Underwood.”
—A.J. Soltare, “Introduction” excerpt, Bold as Brass: The Collected A.J. Soltare (Volume 3) Bulwark/Prospect 1995
</p> </p>© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
[Continued from posts on June 30, 2009 & July 5, 2009]
Appleton: The smallest borough of Fairgeth is Appleton, tucked in between the Village and Sawgeth. Once the home of many farmers’ markets, the neighborhood mysteriously attracted many spiritualists and psychics (and, according to some, many ghosts along with them) in the 19th century. More inexplicable happenings occur within Appleton than any other borough. Some claim that the curses that envelop Fairgeth originate from this area, which used to also house the slaughterhouses and tanneries in the late 18th century. Appleton’s most famous sons were the monster hunter Matthew Slate and his ghost- and hoax-busting descendant Max Medium.
First Appearance/Mention: “Homecoming,” by Craig Nordoff (4th MATTHEW SLATE™ story, first appearance of Barton Village (1789)), OCCULT THRILLS #169 (December 1927); “Hunting Blind,” by Paul Nordoff & Roger Ashwood (9th MATTHEW SLATE story/20th Max Medium story; brings Slate & Appleton into “modern” Fairgeth), OCCULT THRILLS #322 (September 1940)
Upton: The northeastern sector of Fairgeth, “Up-town” has steep streets to rival hilly San Francisco as the land rises to meet the eastern bluffs and mountains. Settled on these hills were the once-secluded Catholic boarding schools associated with Three Saints Cathedral—Saint Benedict’s School, the Academy (of Saint Brendan), and the Paduan School of Saint Anthony. This neighborhood also plays host to many art galleries, museums, parks, and the Druidica, gardens famous as much for their rare plants and statuary as the group of druids that built the stone circle at its center (and a few secretive cults rumored to dwell in the vicinity).
First Appearance/Mention: “Dread of the Drugged Druids,” by A.J. Soltare (2nd ACE BARRIGAN story), OCCULT THRILLS #269 (April 1936); “Mastromwood,” by Carson Cullen (links Upton schools and a woods to Fairgeth; look at a cult from the inside), OCCULT THRILLS #285 (August 1937)
Marcus Heights: Built as the exclusive domain of the leaders and richest citizens of Fairgeth, Marcus Heights rests upon a bluff overlooking the city to its west. Home to numerous expansive walled estates, there are allegedly more secrets among the cultivated woods and brambles on the Heights than among the shady alleyways in the city below.
First Appearance/Mention: “The Blue Haze Blues,” by Stan Plymouth (2nd THE CHANTEUSE story), OCCULT THRILLS #263 (October 1935); “Return of the Terror Tarot,” by Roger Ashwood (18th Max Medium story; Marcus Heights in Fairgeth), OCCULT THRILLS #315 (February 1940);
The Skirts: The Skirts stand either for what were once the outskirts of the city in the 1920’s or for the two prominent private schools for girls within it. A patchwork of bedroom communities and suburbs, the Skirts has become a web of highways among the many small businesses dominated by its longtime Mediterranean- and Balkan-American citizens.
First Appearance/Mention: “Missing Maidens & Medusas,” by A.J. Soltare (3rd ACE BARRIGAN story), OCCULT THRILLS #275 (October 1936); “Mysteries Matriculate, Immaculate, and Immolate,” by Steve Mark (15th MAX MEDIUM story, links Saint Theresa’s School for Wayward Girls to Fairgeth), OCCULT THRILLS #295 (June 1938)
Eastmore: The most recently built of the sections of Fairgeth, Eastmore grew from the “east moors” or swamps that used to make southeastern Fairgeth a bug-infested summer hell. This area is primarily residential, since the draining and redirecting of the Poole allowed development of the land. The continued growth of the city threatens to move the city through this borough and adding another neighborhood east along the Pierce Highway around Marcus Heights and into the surrounding mountains.
First Appearance/Mention: “Out of the Smoke, Into the Fire,” by A.J. Soltare (32nd ACE BARRIGAN story; 1st mention of Eastmore), OCCULT THRILLS #370 (September 1944)
</p>Editors’ Note: All material above excerpted from Fairgeth on File: Travelogue of a City without Shame (Bulwark/Prospect, 1988) by Norman Crenshaw, Charles Pherris, and Edward Ullers.
</p> </p>© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
[Continued from Blog Post 06/30/09]
</p>The Pipes: While now the manufacturing and industrial area in which Fairgeth’s water treatment plants reside, the Pipes got their name in the 19th century for the opium dens and tobacconists among the Oriental and Dutch settlers prevalent in this area. The neighborhood remains a crime-riddled area known for wars (over drugs, money, turf, or respect) among the smaller crime lords in this region.
First Appearance/Mention: “The Pipes Play Hokus Pokus,” by Carson Cullen, OCCULT THRILLS #188 (July 1929); “The Scarlet Pearls of Siam,” by A.J. Soltare (4th ACE BARRIGAN story, links the Pipes to Fairgeth), OCCULT THRILLS #279 (February 1937)
Sawgeth: “South Fairgeth” is the first part of the city not hemmed by the Poole River or Algeth Bay. Modern highways and tollways mark its boundaries now, though their erratic paths trace the former walls around this once-autonomous town. Now the city’s theater and restaurant district, Sawgeth only remains relatively safe due to the diligence and control of the Dinetti Mob.
First Appearance/Mention: “Seven Roses for Mother,” by Carson Cullen (1st DINO STILETTO story), GANGLAND THRILLS #30 (January 1928); “Skeletons Make a Racket,” by A.J. Soltare (8th ACE BARRIGAN story (short novel); puts DINO STILETTO and the Dinetti Mob in South Fairgeth or Sawgeth), OCCULT THRILLS #300 (November 1938)
Newfields: The “new fields” that gave this borough its name grew from settlers who chafed under the leadership of the Algeths in the 18th century. Founding a new colony with their own protestant religious community, “New Fields” farmers eventually saw their lands subsumed by graveyards for the larger communities to the west and south. Newfield University is a top-ranked college that rivals the best Ivy League schools, and its campus defines Newton on the west as do the many graveyards and cemeteries on its east.
First Appearance/Mention: “Adrift on a Melody,” by Stan Plymouth (3rd THE CHANTEUSE story), OCCULT THRILLS #269 (April 1936); “Green Tablets & Goldbricks,” by Carson Cullen (Professor Hermegist of Newfield University’s only appearance, linked to Fairgeth), OCCULT THRILLS #300 (November 1938);
The Spires: Like other boroughs, the Spires is the historical name for this borough, so named for the bell towers of First Church built in late 1737. While the church grew in size as did the neighborhood, many of Fairgeth’s buildings collapsed during the April 1906 earthquake. The area name remained and now refers to the abundance of skyscrapers in the city’s heart and its financial district. The Venture Towers (built in 1932) were once the tallest buildings on the west coast and remain the tallest in Fairgeth at 99 floors.
First Appearance/Mention: “The View from Above,” by Stan Plymouth (8th THE CHANTEUSE story, 1st appearance of the Spires), OCCULT THRILLS #312 (November 1939)
Barton Village: Nestled between the skyscrapers of midtown and the Post Tollway is Barton Village, the bohemian sector of Fairgeth. Once an extension of the warehouse district, it became home in the 1920’s for many English, Irish, and Americans who fit uncomfortably in other boroughs. There are more taverns per capita in this borough than in any other city west of the Rockies. Bowman Investigations (and its owner ACE BARRIGAN) nestles three stories above the ground-floor “Spate of Aces” saloon in the Archer Building.
First Appearance/Mention: “Six-Spell-Shooter,” by A.J. Soltare (the first ACE BARRIGAN story), OCCULT THRILLS #264 (November 1935); “One Night Only!,” by Stan Plymouth & A.J. Soltare (6th THE CHANTEUSE story/6th ACE BARRIGAN story), OCCULT THRILLS #290 (January 1938)
</p>Editors’ Note: All material above excerpted from Fairgeth on File: Travelogue of a City without Shame (Bulwark/Prospect, 1988) by Norman Crenshaw, Charles Pherris, and Edward Ullers.
</p>© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
The fame of Fairgeth spread through the pages of GANGLAND THRILLS™ and OCCULT THRILLS™ magazine and the exploits of heroes like ACE BARRIGAN™, THE CHANTEUSE™, and MAX MEDIUM™ or villains like BOSS MACKAY™, DINO STILETTO™, and MATTHEW SLATE™. In all fairness, the city grew as a random patchwork of background details, buildings, street names, and gangs or supernatural menaces. It was editor Victor Northrup who pieced it together and demanded the generic cityscapes of his authors become one singular city in 1937. After that, a one-upsmanship game among Northrop’s stable of authors filled the city backstreets with so many dangers it had to be cursed (even though such was not mentioned specifically until 1941).
The so-called “thirteen boroughs” of Fairgeth are more a play on superstitions and words than true boroughs. The original seven boroughs, founded between 1736 and 1768, encompassed only one-third of its eventual cityscape. The seven true boroughs each had their own individual fortifications around their homes and even acted at times as self-governing settlements. Across eight decades, an additional six communities grew among and around them as either outlying neighborhoods or politically independent towns. Only local custom and habit labeled these areas as boroughs while the city came together almost despite itself. By 1846, when Commodore John D. Sloat and his navy entered Algeth Bay to keep California territory out of Mexican hands, all thirteen had long since merged to become the city of Fairgeth.
Ilgeth: The larger island where the Poole River meets the Pacific in Algeth Bay is the oldest section of Fairgeth by virtue of its location farthest west. “Old Town” and the original town hall still stand as historical markers, as does the Carter Bridge connecting Ilgeth to Seven Bells, though it is younger by a century or more.
First Appearance/Mention: “A Canary Sings at Midnight,” by Stan Plymouth (1st THE CHANTEUSE story), OCCULT THRILLS #255 (February 1935); “Song on a Bridge’s Edge,” by Stan Plymouth (5th THE CHANTEUSE story; places Carter Bridge in Fairgeth), OCCULT THRILLS #288 (November 1937)
Seven Bells: This smaller island borough connects with the mainland by Minster Bridge. Named for the bells that toll the seven canonical hours, Seven Bells Island holds Three Saints Cathedral and its sprawling abbey complex at its heart. The second oldest church (and by far the grandest) in Fairgeth was dedicated in 1749 in honor of Saints Benedict, Brendan, and Anthony of Padua. The other site of interest here is Algethope, the mansion of the founding Algeth clan.
First Appearance/Mention: “Six-Spell-Shooter,” by A.J. Soltare (the first ACE BARRIGAN story), OCCULT THRILLS #264 (November 1935); “Possessed by Prior Penitents,” by Roger Ashwood, (16th MAX MEDIUM story; places Three Saints Cathedral into Fairgeth); OCCULT THRILLS #306 (May 1939)
</p>River Row: Also called “the Docks,” River Row comprises the northwestern corner and much of the western riverfront of Fairgeth. Shipping yards, warehouses, and docks dominate all corners here. The Mackay Mob controls this borough with a fist that opens only to roll the dice at many of its hidden gambling dens. Little remains here of historical interest, since all such sites have long been sacrificed for commerce’s sake.
First Appearance/Mention: “His Teeth Made a Racket Under My Fist,” by Carson Cullen (1st BOSS MACKAY story), GANGLAND THRILLS #28 (July 1927); “Aces and Hates,” by A.J. Soltare (5th ACE BARRIGAN story, first meeting between BOSS MACKAY and ACE BARRIGAN), OCCULT THRILLS #282 (May 1937)
</p>Editors’ Note: All material above excerpted from Fairgeth on File: Travelogue of a City without Shame (Bulwark/Prospect, 1988) by Norman Crenshaw, Charles Pherris, and Edward Ullers.
http://www.amazon.com/Gamer-Fantastic-M
There's also a link on my www.steveneschend.com site down on the right column, if you'd like to buy it via Amazon and my own links therein.
'
Just wanted to let folks know in advance and to thank you ahead of time for picking up a great anthology with work from Ed Greenwood, Margaret Weis, and (sadly) Brian Thomsen's last published work. I know I'm looking forward to reading this antho of gaming related stories ASAP, and I hope you are too.
Steven
I have all but 3 volumes of the Time Frame series (very helpful in lining up parallel historical events across the continents--a tack not normally done in histories), so I can finish that one via alibris or whatnot.
I'd love to have easily used and stored copies of the Old West, WWII, and perhaps one or two others. I could have sworn there was one specifically on the American Revolution, but they do have three or more series on the Civil War. Hm.
Well, found this nifty site at the least:
http://www.volumelists.com/series.p
Steven
who knows the old TSR reference library had at least four or five complete series (Seafarers, Old West, etc.) but those are long gone
Very amusing graphic story answering "The Dreaded Question" ("Where Do You Get Your Ideas?")
I'm very glad I've been reading the tor.com site via RSS feeds or I'd have missed this one. Just wanted to make sure folks didn't miss this one (and take the hint to watch for more).
Now, if you'll excuse me, I've a head full of ideas that needs emptying onto another computer. The above plus watching The Mindscape of Alan Moore DVD last night has jogged a few thoughts into motion that have been stuck a long time. With some luck, I'll be able to finish that novel or at least hammer out a short story or two that might later become more fully fledged works. We'll see. Later.
Steven
- Mood:
excited
Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
Guardian Comics (Part 2)
[For the complete history of Guardian Comics, start with the Guardian Comics post from May 31, 2009.]
</p>Electri-Comics (April 1940 to October 1958; 223 issues);
Since her premiere in Best Comics #35 (December 1938), FULMI-NANCY THE ELECTRI-GAL proved to be one of the biggest hits ever produced by Guardian Comics. In fact, nearly any and every character in her supporting cast likewise proved popular with fans; thus Electri-Comics began as a showcase book solely for the ELECTRI-GAL and her growing family of fellow heroes and evil opponents. Set in the fictional Canadian city of Port Thunder, Nancy had many American, British, and Canadian relatives and friends, and her adventures took her across the world and the galaxy. (Nancy and the FULMINTRIO proved so inspirational that an energy-based alien race renamed their planet FULMINIA in her honor in Electri-Comics #158.) By the end of the series, creators had revealed many ancestors and descendants of the FULMINTRIO, making their power one of the most dominant forces of the universe across time. They even had multiversal duplicates, including Nancy’s evil twin FULMI-NASTY THE ELECTRIXEN™.
Characters/Features of Note: THE FULMENTOR™; FULMIN-ANDY THE ELECTRI-KID™; THE FULMI-KNIGHTS™; FULMI-NANCY THE ELECTRI-GAL™; THE FULMINTRIO™; LT. FULMINANT™; SIR FULMINUS, LORD OF LIGHTNING™; SPARKY THE FULMENTIGER™;
Fantasticomics (August 1938 to March 1955; 200 issues);
Like Blast Comics before it, Fantasticomics featured a cast that had already appeared and proven popular in Best Comics. Between 1938 and 1942, there was little difference between this book and Best Comics as a showcase of rotating ideas and characters. After December 1942, this book only supported Guardian’s most popular features and acted as a second book for the most popular characters from Best Comics, Electri-Comics, and Giant Comics.
Characters/Features of Note: BIG BEN TATE™; THE FULMENTOR™; FULMIN-ANDY THE ELECTRI-KID™; THE FULMI-KNIGHTS™; FULMI-NANCY THE ELECTRI-GAL™; THE FULMINTRIO™; GOLIATH GIRL™; THE HUMAN SWORD™; LT. FULMINANT™; THE MANTICORN™; SPARKY THE FULMENTIGER™;
Giant Comics (June 1943 to January 1955; 126 issues);
Since three of its principal characters all had the ability to grow to titanic size (BIG BEN TATE, CLIFF DOVER, and GOLIATH GIRL), Giant Comics was launched in 1943. The five prominent features in this book all began in Fantasticomics between 1940 and 1942 and remained relatively popular. Despite the title, Giant Comics never produced any other oversized successes (despite tries like TEN-FOOT TAYLOR, JEANNIE DJINNI, or POLLY BUNYAN). The book also proved the dumping ground for many forgettable third-stringers like DANGEROUS DANIEL, MAJOR MEGALITH, or SWORDIANE. Only FIREFIST and FLINT FAIRMOUNT proved to be heroes equal to their larger cousins and resulted in more than five appearances.
Characters/Features of Note: BIG BEN TATE™; CLIFF DOVER™; FIREFIST™; FLINT FAIRMOUNT™; GOLIATH GIRL™;
</p>
Rocket Comics (May 1946 to September 1958; 144 issues);
Another single-theme-comic, Rocket Comics was the science fiction dominated comic book for its entirety. While six of its continuing features were popular, at least one-third of each issue contained comic book adaptations of short stories culled from Science Thrills, Space Thrills, and other Bulwark pulp magazines.
Characters/Features of Note: COMET CORPS™; JACQUES ROCKET™; JANICE MARSHALL, UNDERCOVER MARTIAN™; MOON-BASE MAX™; REX RACER, 28TH CENTURY BOY™; STAR SOLDIERS™;
Savage Comics (March 1936 to June 1939; (Vol. 1; 40 issues);
Savage Comics (April 1949 to July 1955; (Vol. 2; 62 issues);
The strangest of Guardian Comics was this book focused on lost world exploration, jungle heroes, and the standard caveman-vs-dinosaur stories. Its early cancellation came more from paper shortages than a lack of interest. Even so, when it was revived in its second volume, the stories took on a more science fiction bent than before, focusing on Atlantis, time travel, and the exploits of DOC HUNTER more than jungle-trained heroes and heroines.
Characters/Features of Note: THE ATLANTISCROLLS™; CAVEMAN CARTER™; DOC HUNTER, EXPLORER™; NITA, JUNGLE QUEEN ™; TARA OF THE TROPICS™; TIME-TRAPPED TALES™; TOR-KAN THE JUNGLE LORD™;
Secret Comics (May 1943 to October 1958; 169 issues);
Like Giant Comics that premiered the following month, Secret Comics had a simple theme to match up popular characters that premiered in in Best Comics or Blast Comics. All the features and characters of Secret Comics were mystical or magical in nature. As the series continued, elements of horror also crept into the stories and characters, and many now-prominent horror and thriller writers and artists got their initial starts with Secret Comics.
Characters/Features of Note: DONNELLA™; DRUID THE DRACADIAN™; DAWES™; HANDORR THE SORCERER™; M.P. OF MAGIC™; THE SHANGRI-LADY™; TRANCE TAMMETT™; THE TUNDRAGON™; THE UNDERNAUTS™;
Victory Comics (February 1941 to August 1952; 131 issues);
Victory Comics was never a great homefront sales hit for Guardian Comics, although an overseas distribution deal made this one of the easiest books for Allied troops to find and read. Quite simply, this was the patriotic war comic book from Guardian Comics (to answer demands by its owners, Bulwark Publishing). Every feature in this comic had direct links to World War II (or, sometimes, World War I). Due to the nature of the book, the subhuman depictions of Japanese, Italian, or German foes (especially in the AIRBURN and STEEL STAG strips) are far from politically correct today. While it featured many powered heroes, this book (and Arrow Comics) had more stories with normal human characters and stories than the other comics.
Characters/Features of Note: AIRBURN™; BLITZCRAIG™; BLITZ BAILEY™; COLONEL LIBERTY & THE REBELS™; ECHO COMPANY™; FRONTLINE FRANK™; PRIVATE BRACE OF DANGER COMPANY™; THE STEEL STAG™; THE TERROR TANK™;
Wondrous Comics (March 1936 to November 1940; (Vol. 1; 57 issues);
Wondrous Comics (August 1947 to October 1958; (Vol. 2; 135 issues);
Often a random fantasy or faerie tale book with pages retelling classic faerie stories, the first volume of this comic focused on the Lang and Grimm fairy tales or tall tales of other cultures including 1,001 Arabian Nights. Cancelled during the war, Wondrous Comics came back with a focus on WISHLAND™ and its inhabitants and environs. These were overseen by the Ventesch family that controlled the WISHLAND copyrights but were not solely written by them. In fact, this comic was the source of most expansions and changes to the WISHLAND properties until D.J. Ventesch’s books in the 1980’s.
Characters/Features of Note: BARNEY THE CLOCKWORKER™; CARBUNCLE CARMICHAEL™; FOE OF FIGMENTS™; IN THE GLASSTLE OF GLORA™; THE LANDS BEYONDREAMS™; THE MATHESON FAMILY™; NEIGHBORS OF WISHLAND™; TALES OF WISHLAND™; TONY THE IRON-PONY™; THE WHYLAND GUARD™;
</p>© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
Guardian Comics started in 1936 Toronto, Ontario solely as a medium that collected and republished comic strips in book form, like most early comic books. Terry Zuller, Guardian’s editor in chief, wanted to oversee a creative stable like the one he’d once marshaled on American pulps like Scarab Stories. Zuller commissioned six writers and artists to adapt six stories of his from the pulps and he interspersed these 6- to 8-page stories among the comic strip reprints. Two months later, he had the same twelve creators produce new material to suit the themes of his four 1936 comics—Arrow Comics (American & Candian historical adventures, mainly exploration or Wild Westerns), Best Comics (British heroes & legends, Robin Hood), Savage Comics (jungle heroes & world exploration), and Wondrous Comics (fantasy tales & comics adaptations of faerie tales).
By 1937, Zuller’s gambit had paid off and his “new story comics” were a hit. Guardian Comics was running full swing with an editorial staff and numerous Bulwark Publications’ authors trying their hands at writing for “the funny-books.” Zuller’s assistant E.C. Buckner worked to keep everyone on schedule, while Terry Zuller recruited well-known pulp artists to create comic book covers or interior art. Thus, for at least the years 1937 through 1940, Guardian Comics had pulp-style painted art on its covers, though Bulwark Publications ended that practice in a cost-saving measure. Until his dying day (all too soon in 1950), Zuller believed the change came as “my comics outsold Knight’s down at BC!” While both Zuller and Charles Knight worked for Bulwark Publications, their rivalry and one-upsmanship led to brisk comics sales in both Canada and the States.
Guardian Comics launched twelve books between February 1936 and March 1949, seven of them lasting until 1958 when the Bulwark Publishing parent corporation closed the Canadian company’s doors. Guardian Comics stood out in fans’ minds because their books carried larger stories per issue (twelve to sixteen pages as opposed to a standard six or eight page story). When they began, Guardian books had five stories per issue split among three different features. By the time they truly hit their stride in 1943, Guardian Comics rotated secondary characters in one story each while lead features got three stories per issue (or sometimes one long story in three parts).
More than two-thirds of the Guardian Comics characters and trademarks became new entities in the Silver Age Bulwark Comics lines. Like the older Golden Age BC properties, all were extensively re-imagined, only their names staying the same. Many of the properties even became villains, due to the overabundance of heroes from the combined Bulwark and Guardian lines. For example, Guardian Comics’ AIRBURN™ was a heroic paratrooper who gained fire-based powers after drifting through a glowing cloud on D-Day; in the Silver Age, Bulwark Comics’ AIRBURN (with similar powers) was the primary aide-de-camp of BRIGADIER BLACK™ in the ECHELON OF EVIL™. The ECHELON contained seven misanthropic ex-soldiers exposed to and altered by experimental weaponry, and they were a primary foe of the revamped G.U.A.R.D.™
In 1977, Guardian reemerged as part of the modern age Bulwark publishing pantheon, though this time as its subsidiary game company. Famous most for their BULWARKS & BASILISKS™ fantasy role-playing game, Guardian produced a wide variety of board, card, and role-playing games over the next few decades. The closest Guardian Games came to relaunching its comics was in having their CAPES & COWLS™ heroic role-playing game include comics art with each adventure or sourcebook. Before his death in 1994, E.C. Bruckner managed to write and produce a Guardian Comics book that highlighted the worlds of GC and gave the fans a great look back at a short-lived but creative publisher.
</p>Arrow Comics (February 1936 to October 1943 (Vol. 1; 92 issues));
Arrow Comics (March 1951 to July 1958 (Vol. 2; 68 issues));
This was Terry Zuller’s favorite book due to his yen for historical adventures, especially those of the Wild West and the Canadian frontier. This comic, more than any other, provided solid, well-researched history lessons for comics readers of the Golden Age (in its “Bulls-eye on History” and “Wanted!” features). Another benchmark for this book was its use of Native Americans in non-stereotypical ways; RED ROBINSON was the mixed-race son of a Native woman and a Caucasian mountain man, and THOMAS TWO-EAGLES was a Harvard-trained lawyer fighting for justice for his people.
Characters/Features of Note: THE BRAVES FOUR™; COACHWHIP HAMMOND™; THE HANGING JUDGE™; JIM ADAMS, SHARPSHOOTER™; MIKE HARRIGAN, BOUNTY HUNTER™; RED ROBINSON™; SECRET SHAMAN™; TALL TRAILS™; THOMAS TWO-EAGLES™; THE TRAIL-BLAZERS™; WILD WEST TRAIL TALES™;
</p>Best Comics (February 1936 to October 1958; 273 issues);
This was Guardian Comics’ premiere book and the initial forum for every lead feature from 1936 in 1940; thus, the characters listed below are only those featured prominently in this book after June 1940. Zuller’s editorial fiat made Best Comics the showcase for chiefly British characters and stories. Its early features on Robin Hood and the Knights of the Round Table remain in people’s minds due to the early work of later-famous creators like Marshall Ranheart, Richard West, and Clive Horrach. By late 1940, newer British superhumans (including Australian, Indian, and Canadian subjects) took over the book for the majority of its run. More characters first saw print through this comic than any other, though only DOC DRAGON, the HUMAN SWORD, KID SPITFIRE, and the MANTICORN proved to be long-term crowd-pleasers (and featured in Fantasticomics as well).
Characters/Features of Note: CORPORAL KANGAROO™; DOC DRAGON™; THE FOUR FAKIRS™; GIRISH™; THE HUMAN SWORD™; KID SPITFIRE™; THE MANTICORN™; THE THAMESERPENT™;
</p>Blast Comics (August 1937 to January 1949; 81 issues);
The first comic after Guardian’s initial four-book launch, Blast Comics featured the six most popular heroes out of the previous year’s Best Comics, including BOB BLAST, after whom the title was named. Ironically, Bob got ejected from his own book by 1946 when team features grew in prominence. By 1949, the editors decided to cancel the mildly-selling book in favor of a new book focusing on more popular characters.
Characters/Features of Note: BOB BLAST™; DONNELLA™; DRUID DAWES™; THE EVERGLADIATOR™; HUMANTA™; SIR FALCON & PEREGRINE™; SUB-MARIE™; THE WIDOW & VEIL™;
</p>Clash Comics (March 1949 to August 1958; 114 issues);
This book replaced Blast Comics in Guardian’s lineup. From #1 until its 114th issue, Clash Comics had the same structure—four features (noted below) of 14 pages each with a 2-4 filler story or special backup. While popular, these nine heroes were always considered second-tier characters (compared to the leads of Electri-Comics and Fantasticomics) until they were all revived in new ways in the Silver Age.
Characters/Features of Note: BLITZ BROTHERS ™; SIR FALCON & PEREGRINE™; THE TRINITEAM™; THE WIDOW & VEIL™;
</p>To Be Continued
</p>© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
And no, that's not when and why I covered many of these states--count it as 20+ summers of car trips with the family.
Still, it's odd that there's those pesky few states I never seem to get to....
visited 41 states (82%)
Create your own visited map of The United States or jurisdische veraling duits?
Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
The Von Baur Family: An Occult History
The Von Baurs rose along the Haldenaab in northeastern Bavaria. The tiny village of Baur came under attack in 1483 by “forces dark and overwhelming,” long postulated to be brigands or barbarians (though hidden histories mark the attackers as diabolic and certainly of fell origins). Only the defenses mustered by the brothers Baldric (a shepherd) and Corrado (a blacksmith) saved the village, albeit at the cost of Baldric’s life. In gratitude, the Holy Roman Emperor Frederick III made Corrado Von Baur the local baron and gave him control over these lands.
</p>Noble titles and family fortunes waxed and waned through the 16th and 17th centuries, and this holds true for the Von Baurs as well. For the first two generations, the nobility mocked the Von Baurs for their common name of “farmer” raised to noble status, but soon, very few dared question the Von Baurs’ influence. Depending on whose accounts one believes, the Von Baurs had connections with every major German or Austrian in history. Family lore links the pious Axel Von Baur with Martin Luther and more than a few Von Baurs claimed to have fought at the right hand of many a powerful king or emperor. They never proved their greatest claim—that the Von Baur bloodline descended from both the Hohenstaufens (through a daughter of Frederick II) and the Habsburgs (via an illegitimate son of Rudolf I). Even so, various members of the family laid claim to much political power through these tenuous claims to the throne of the Holy Roman Empire up until the late 17th century. For a time, the Von Baurs were among the more powerful families in southern Germany and northern Austria.
</p>The Von Baurs become of interest to esoteric societies (and the Vanguard in particular) by 1708. Idette Von Baur, the eldest child of Baron Arndt Von Baur, became the lover of Kolya Nashivev, the infamous Russian sorcerer. Nashivev’s notoriety of being “too brutal and ruthless” even for the likes of Czar Peter I, proved irresistible to the spoiled noblewoman, much to her family’s dismay. She fled Bavaria, taking with her many riches (and secrets she used for later blackmail of many a German noble family for generations) to fund her and Nashivev’s activities. For decades, the pair spawned both children and evils on the world, the worst being their youngest offspring, Vasily Baurovitch Nashivev—“the Butcher of Slavuta.”
</p>Between 1715 and 1738, at least seventeen Von Baurs of both genders learned magic and took vows to fight the evils “the Betrayer” unleashed. Idette’s apparent death in St. Petersburg in 1736 ended the family’s personal connection to fighting magical evils, but the tradition continued beyond its initial impetus. This bloodline (regardless of the actual surname) dominated the esoteric battlefields and conflicts of Europe for the 18th and 19th centuries. At the height of their influence, those of Von Baur blood or name controlled or led the Cabal of the Seven Mysteries, the Domini Reattaria, the Jadeatici, and the Annulusi Order. They also held major positions in at least nine other secret magical sects across Asia, the Americas, and Australia.
</p>One of the more notable Von Baurs was Baron Wolfgang Von Baur (1757-1822), founder of the Rhinevulfen. A small, nigh-ineffectual group of monster hunters that existed from 1784 until 1806, the “Wolves of the Rhine” would barely register a footnote in arcane histories if not for their leader. In his lifetime, Wolfgang wrote more than three dozen treatises, monographs, studies, and a dozen books about various and sundry occult threats in the world. While his works on lycanthropy and faeries are error-riddled and disproved, his two seminal volumes on ghosts and how to both detect and fight them remain the gold standards of esoteric lore and paranormal studies since their writing. He wrote the more famous Von Bessenheit durch Fremde und Ungehere Geister (“On the Matter of Hostile and Possessive Spirits”) in 1797, though it did not see print for nearly ten years. By 1803, he had also penned Ein Werk Bezüglich des Kämpfens und des Ausrottens von Geistern, Besitzende Entitäten, und Feindliche Gespenste (“Regarding the Combating and Eradicating Ghosts, Possessive Entities, and Hostile Spirits”). A small printer in Bonn published both books in 1805 and Bulwark Publications translated and published them in English by 1842. Neither book has been in print in any language since 1943.
</p>By 1894, Baron Frederick Von Baur buried his fifth child and final heir after having to behead the young man-turned-vampire (having lost his other children in vendettas with the Condottieri Cosini in Venice and Club Thirteen in London). A widower for more than two decades, Frederick had no heirs and no blood ties he wished to acknowledge. He sold off his real estate holdings to local gentry and disappeared. Rumors of his whereabouts spread as “the Bleak Baron” cut a swathe across all measures of secret societies for more than 40 years. Many say he funded some of the greatest secret societies still extant in the modern world. Some say Frederick’s interference in machinations of the powerful helped foment or prolong the chaos of the First World War. Others say his activities kept the death toll far lower than might have occurred. Without exception, no one ever recorded more lore about vampires and how to hunt and kill them than the last Baron Von Baur. His marshalling the Seers’ Society and the Vanguard against more than four clans of vampires in Italy, France, and Belgium led to the destruction of more than 200 vampires between 1911 and 1919. Frederick died peacefully in his sleep at the age of 89, a lay worshiper among the Brethren of Saint Donnait. On February 15, 1940, they buried his body in secret to prevent any vampiric foes from desecrating Frederick’s grave.
</p>Little of any note can be found in modern Germany of the Von Baurs, despite all their former works and wealth. All traces of the last identifiable Von Baur estates vanished with the firebombing of Dresden and surrounding areas during the latter half of World War II. The only place one may find them is in esoteric and occult histories and their own works spread across at least seven generations. The major works and esoterica authored by the Von Baurs number in scores, though many have since been forgotten by all but the most learned of modern arcane scholars and occultists. Unless a member of the Vanguard or the Scarlet Scholars (both groups paying attention to what most consider obscure and nigh-useless knowledge), even most paranormal agents active today have only heard of the Bleak Baron Frederick or his granduncle Wolfgang and their works on fighting monsters.
</p>© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
Kharndam: The Ages of Reason
Consider how the day is long to a child awaiting a parent and that is how long history truly reveals a world. Consider how the day is short to a child reveling in play, and that too is how short history spans a world. To view a world through only the prism of one’s own race is a child’s view of life—one perspective, one view, one eye. Always look to every race to understand what has come before and what may yet occur—and look again, for life has as many perspectives as a child has questions.
—Surrhis-Tarn Iliir, author of one of the few surviving fragments from The Great Annals of Vros
</p>When the world came into being, its name was Dharual, though no race would know that name for an Age. Four lands dotted the seas of Dharual, and their names—likewise unsaid but known nonetheless, at least by those who listened to stone or sky—were Rokhal and Orpak, Lammok and Shael. Each land had things to call its own, including smaller cousin-islets and skerries.
</p>Before the Ages—Time of Origins
Recorded history on Dharual stretches longer than the memory of all but a goblin’s handful of gods. Even so, it has nurtured life for longer than the memory of gods, for life existed here even before many deities manifested. In this dawn time rose the Erltra and Primaltra—triads of male, female, and neutral incarnations that spawned every plant and animal on the Four Lands of Dharual. For how long the world hosted only these six beings and their offspring alone, only they know…and they deign not to share that knowledge.
Circa -25,000+ OD (Unknown years)
</p>First Age—Age of Birthing
The Age of Birthing was the First Age of Reason, the Creation Times lasting approximately 8,000 years. From this primordium came the Progenitors, the First Races of Reason—Dragon and Giant and Goblin and Shay.
Circa -24,000- -16,000 OD (8,000 years)
</p>Second Age—Age of War
The Second Age lasted five millenaries and was the Age of War when Dragons fought to dominate all life and briefly did. While death dominated this era, life too occurred and birthed all the Fey, Humans, Prigams, and Dwarves to combat Dragon-born Monsters.
Circa -16,000- -11,000 OD (5,000 years)
</p>Third Age—Golden Age of Alliance
Dragons, Goblins, and monsters fell from power, eclipsed and shunned for their greed. All other races banded together in peace and this age welcomed visitors from afar called Elves to Dharual. The Golden Age of Alliance lasted 7,000 years before falling again to strife and greed.
-11,000- -4,000 OD (7,000 years)
</p>Fourth Age—Age of Stones/“Dwarfruin”
The Fourth Age saw 2,000 years of conflict between Elf and Dwarf; the Age of Stones marked the end of dwarves as a power (and extinction on at least two of Dharual’s continents). Many great civilizations rose and fell in this time, though none rose higher or fell farther than the Dwarves.
-4,000- -2,100 OD (1,900 years)
</p>Fifth Age—Age of Stars/“Elfrage”
The Fifth Age saw Elves rise in power and grasp at supremacy and revenge against all other races for 15 centuries. The invading scourge ended when nearly all other races bonded together to banish Elves from Dharual forevermore.
-2,100- -675 OD (1,425 years)
</p>Sixth Age—Age of Claws/ “Drakereign”
The Dragons took the magic used to banish the Elves and corrupted that power. In turn, they corrupted themselves and their servitor Goblins in order to dominate the world for another millenary. The fall of the Scaled Ones took three centuries, but started when Ornaoth slew his first dragon and built the city of Drakesfall from its bones.
-675-311 OD (986 years)
</p>Seventh Age—Age of Flight/“Pegasusreign”
Draconian rule eventually gave way to the birth of the Pegasus Sovereignty—the largest human civilization ever seen on Dharual. The Seventh Age gave Dharual five short centuries of near-peace akin to the days of the Aurum Alliance, until Kharndam and the Sovereignty fell among taenistry, tragedy, and treachery.
311-802 OD (491 years)
</p>Eighth Age—Age of Might/“Impereign”
The current Age of Might marks the domination of the Imperam over Rokhal’s lands, and for over eight hundred years, they have ruled from sea to sea. The Imperam’s reach extends to other lands, though Orpak, Shael, and Lammok each has its powers mighty and miniscule attempting to spread beyond its own continental borders.
803-1652 OD (849 years; present)
</p>(C) Copyright 2009 by Steven E. Schend
Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
“Wassat? You ain’t never been here before? Dis is a town like no other, pal! Ya say yer prayers, don’tcha?”
—“Hack Harry” (cabbie played by Albert Sonarm) in ACE BARRIGAN™ and the Fairgeth Phantom (1941)
</p>“From the first, Fairgeth was accursed, for Bartram Algeth’s founding of the town came from blood and hate and gold and greed. Over time, the settlement spread, almost despite itself. Its dark heart beat everywhere but in its now-ironic name of Fairgeth. Its citizens have seen its share of dark days, evil nights, and horrors undreamt in other conurbations. But a bloody dawn now heralds the worst day ever visited upon this blighted burg. ”
—DOCTOR ENIGMA™ in “Fairgeth on Fire,” Hero Thrills #3 (July 1941)
</p>I’m told that the city of Fairgeth has existed since 1927 when the horrid character of BOSS MACKAY™ came to life in “His Teeth Made a Racket under My Fist!” (Gangland Thrills #28, July 1927). Apparently, the story was written by a far younger Carson Cullen than the man who wrote my first movie role in 1941. It wasn’t named in that story; the city first got clearly identified in “Aces and Hates,” an ACE BARRIGAN™ story in Occult Thrills #282 (May 1937).
As for me, I’d never heard of this town before until I got a chance for an audition at Luxury Pictures. I walked into Sidney Masters’ office and was handed script pages for the climax of ACE BARRIGAN™ and the Fairgeth Phantom (1941). Reading the details of the demonic altar, the cultists’ robes, and seeing the sketches of some of the exterior sets—that’s when the “city cursed from flagstone to flagpole” (one of my favorite lines of a writer describing Fairgeth) first became something real to me.
I was a young ingénue—never you mind exactly how old—and I was simply thrilled to have a role alongside rising star Max Dawes. (Now there was a man who indeed knew how to treat a lady correctly.) I played the unfortunate kidnap victim and eventual love interest of Max’s ACE BARRIGAN, who had to save me again and again in the course of the movie. I had a ball dressing up in lovely evening gowns, but let me advise any young actress to insist on flats rather than heels if you’re having to run down the streets when being chased by thugs.
When the actors weren’t in shots, the crew had many Bulwark pulps at hand for us to read for inspiration about the city and its characters. I confess to enjoying A.J. Soltare’s magical P.I. stories the best. While my character of “Mary Stevens” had not appeared in stories before Fairgeth Phantom, Mr. Soltare was an absolute dear and he wrote her into two stories in 1942. I know this as he delivered them to me personally in Morocco. I was shooting Daisy of the Desert (1943) and he said he ran across me by total accident as he was there traveling for research purposes. Such a dear, and I’m so heartened by his success as an author in the years since.
That “Mary Stevens” role spurred interest in me as an actress (and Max’s patronage was no small part in that either). Therefore, I’m beholden to Fairgeth for a rewarding career that has lasted more than a few decades. I might truly be among the few who can say that the curses of Fairgeth have never darkened my door.
Oh dear. Have I just doomed myself there?
</p>Mona Davidson
Hollywood, August 1987
</p>Editors’ Note: The above was the original introduction to Fairgeth on File: Travelogue of a City without Shame (Bulwark/Prospect, 1988). While attributed to Oscar-winning actress Mona Davidson, the piece was ghost-written by assistant editor Dinah Pierce from a terse phone interview and later approved by Ms. Davidson’s agents.
</p>© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
Thanks to Chris Roberson for pointing me at this memoriam for PJF. Like him, I'm very much in tune with what Kim Newman had to say re: inter-related fictions and PJF. If I weren't so wiped by a cold, I'd be scribbling stuff down madly for an upcoming revamp of my website.
That's all. Luck of the Irish to ye all today. Here's hoping for better (and healthier) tomorrows.
Steven
Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
They’ll have to wait until after the current deadline and a business trip, but expect big changes here in the next months. I’m planning a major overhaul herein (to make it more accessible and understandable). I’ll take great pains to make sure the blog remains linkable et al. but I’m going to start adding more direct commentary and input as “myself the author,” not just writing direct content and/or background materials for my worlds.
If anyone’s got suggestions or comments on things they expect or like to see in an author’s blog, drop a comment here or over in the forums (http://www.steveneschend.com/forums). I’d love to hear what people like (or dislike) in the vein of following an author online or looking for news on upcoming releases and/or the struggles of writing.
Steven
Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
This blog hasn’t been as active as I’d like it to be. Chalk it up to a confluence of life and miscellanei that conspired against my setting up a few posts to automatically download. I’ll try and get some short posts up in the next week, but I suspect I’ll have to shoot for creating a post-Saint Patrick’s Day pot-of-gold for folks after mid-month.
Thanks for all who’ve inquired as to the delays or lack of material. I’m hoping to have some exciting stuff up again soon. And perhaps an announcement or two that’ll change things for the better….
I've got more of his books on my shelves than I realized (and anyone who's read his biographies of Tarzan and Doc Savage understand where some of my own works' inspirations come from), and he'll be missed.
Here's the link to his home town newspaper obit:
http://www.pjstar.com/entertainment/x17
- Mood:
sad
Been nearly 30 years and I can remember watching that game with my family.
And hey--it's Ted Kennedy's 77th birthday too. For people of my generation, it's also Julius Erving's (Dr. J) birthday. For the geeks among us (inlcuding me), it's Jeri Ryan's (Seven of Nine) birthday.
Yes, folks, Steven can't sleep and he's trolling the Internets for pointless factoids this morning. Well, not pointless so much as trivial.
And the word of the day is Fecund.
That is all. Now for coffee....
Steven
who thinks the word of the day ought to be callipygian because it's much more fun
- Mood:
blah
In other news, my blankety-blank-blank-blank snowblower has decided it cannot be expected to be a reliable and trusty aide to my snow-removal plans. For the 4th time since we bought it less than 2 years ago, it's decided to not function when I need it.
Insert appropriate Yosemite Sam(TM) swear-word-analogues here as you see fit, for the gods know I have....
At least a few words are flowing and I may have another chapter of the spec novel done soon (and a few blog posts, which I've neglected for nearly 10 days due to deadlines).
I cannot wait for the Indian food dinner tonight and a relaxing silly evening of watching/ignoring/mocking the Oscars tomorrow night....
Steven
who has to go run some laundry now
- Mood:
accomplished
American Revolution with clockwork armor? Lemme try that......
Steven
who doesn't know why WordPress didn't copy over the post from 2/12/09 to this blog, but it's there for those who're interested....
Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
The Phendarm Protectorates became a monarchy in the Sixth Age when Phendarm the First drove all his enemies from these lands and received the crown as his divinely-inspired reward. He built his royal castle Lantor by 207 OD upon the Connarin Plateau and ruled from on high, his capitol of Mervan growing around him over the decades. Within short decades, though, the realm of Ptarlantan (after King Phendarm’s surname of Ptarlant) became the Protectorates of Phendarm in 281 OD. The reason was succession.
While the country’s borders remained stable, its interior was anything but. King Phendarm could hold his family in line in life, but he could not after his death in 228 OD. Greedy relatives demanded much of the weak prince and thus Rham replaced the primogeniture he inherited with parcenary for those of immediate royal blood. To appease his uncles, cousins, and younger siblings, King Rham crafted five different duchies instead of the original three set by Phendarm (for Rham’s four brothers and a royal duchy around the capitol) and more than a score of earldoms among them. Henceforth, each consecutive generation reparsed and redistricted the county as an equal number of duchies split among all recognized sons or designated heirs on the dawn after a king’s funeral. Upon Rham’s death in 237 OD, the five duchies became three again, though yet more earldoms and baronies propagated with each generation. By King Garild’s death in 249 OD, his seven sons shattered Ptarlantan into seven small warring states until Llahdan (the fourth son) ruthlessly slew every other sibling in 250 OD and took the throne in 251 OD.
In his time on the throne, King Llahdan fathered at least fifteen children, seven of them sons. Perhaps predicting the chaos to come, the king took steps to rein in his willful children. He renamed the country the Phendarm Protectorates, “to protect and temper what Phendarm hath wrought and forged in his life.” He also brought Ptarlantan into alliances with Kharndam to its west in hopes its strength might curb his children’s excessive ambitions. Alas, open warfare again broke out upon the death of King Llahdan in 285 OD.
Eleven princes and dukes descended from Llahdan battled over his throne. Rumors say the eldest son, Crown Prince Narr (Duke of the Gny Rising) poisoned his father, and while few historians ever proved this, they did even less to dispute it. So began the Black Blade Wars, so named for the many poisoned blades involved among the principal players. The covert war of politics and armed forces divided the Protectorates as three men claimed the kingship—Narr, the fourth son Bhek, and their nephew Duke Armaz, son of Llahdan’s eldest child (the Princess Garsela). Control of the capitol of Mervan split among the forces of Armaz (who held the castle of Lantor) and Bhek, who held the city and the duchy surrounding it. Narr controlled more than half the remaining country, while the remaining dukes, earls, and barons fought among themselves for the outer territories. The Black Blade Wars lasted nine years, during which time Kharndam kept the madness from spreading outside of the Protectorates by refusing to recognize any of the self-proclaimed kings of that land and resisting any overbold attempts to conquer additional lands from their crown.
The Black Blade Wars ended more by a lack of effort and enemies than a resolution of the hatreds. By 294 OD, only two dukes remained among those of recognized royal blood, more than seven score nobles having died since Llahdan. The pair of young men negotiated a truce through the aid of Kharndam’s Court and agreed to split the Protectorates in two and share the ruler’s crown between them. These two were Llahdan’s grand-nephew Xhonor and Narr’s youngest son Kesh. Both showed wisdom far beyond their years, as neither had yet reached his fifteenth birthday. The two Protectorate Lands have held their names in honor ever since as Xhonoril and Pralkesh.
What keeps the peace among the two rulers and their lands are two measures. Primogeniture is the law of both lands again, and only one elder son inherits his father’s mantle and lands. A second pact mandates that the heirs and elder children marry noble scions of the opposite realm, reinforcing peaceful relations between them by blood. Two kings ruled—one in Lantor and another at Jyurras Castle—and for 34 years the peace held among the Protectorates.
With the death of King Xhonor in 328 OD, there was a brief dustup as Prince Raldan of Pralkesh tried to reclaim both lands under his father King Kesh (and, rumor says, himself immediately after). The Raldan Uprising lasted only seven months as an equal amount of Protectorate nobles sought an outside agency to end this latest war. The heirs of Xhonor and a majority of Pralkeshi nobles supported a move to absorb the Protectorates into the Pegasus Sovereignty. Once treaties were signed, King Kesh acquiesced and the Treaty of Darlas became law. Under this treaty, one Overlord ruled the Protectorates of Phendarm, and he would be chosen by the Pegasus Throne, alternating control of the territory between the two unified realms. As punishment for the deaths and destruction, Prince Raldan was executed in Drakesfall in 89 IF (330 OD) by the Sovereign’s command after a lengthy trial. (To certain folk in Pralkesh, to be “raldanned” is to be given a show trial and found guilty without any chance of acquittal.)
For the next three centuries, the Protectorates thrived among the Sovereignty’s benign rule. Pralkesh helped feed the Flightlands with its grains and Xhonoril’s coastlands aided in trade and fishing. The Protectorates were the first to feel the bite of the Imperam’s Dragonforces, and while they resisted attacks and invasions for 17 years, Pralkesh fell to invasion and surrendered to Impral control in 395 IF. Xhonoril and Kharndam fought longer and harder against the rise of the Imperam though to no avail. Xhonoril eventually fell due to internal politics and betrayals, allowing the Imperam to usurp control of that realm in 468 IF.
The Imperam’s long wars of attrition against Old Kharndam continued for over two decades. The skirmishes and escalations eventually led to the assassinations and deaths of the royals in 492 IF and the end of the Pegasus Throne (though many questions yet remain on how the royal family died and if all were indeed slain). Lluranal’s fall to Impral Dragonforces came a few short years later in 4 AF, and Kharndam became but a memory. Many mourn it and the Sovereignty yet today, though they take pride in the fact that little sustained westward progress has been made by the Imperam in the eight centuries since they conquered Lluranal.
Xhonoril and Pralkesh survive extant, though they exist only as subject territories, not kingdoms in their own rights. Both lands are subject to the Imprator, though their Impralnors rule with little interference from the far-away Great Throne. The two regions share some military forces and trade relations, though the personal politics between the two leaders have grown more tense over time. Since control of Lluranal fell into ogrish hands in 42/953 IM (in part due to maneuvers by the Impralnor of Pralkesh), both Pralkesh and Xhonoril have been watched carefully by powerful eyes in the Impral Court, “lest those western lands fall even more deeply into the barbarism that has always sullied them in our eyes.”
</p>© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
Twelvelands
The Twelvelands, while founded in 1,360 OD, have only the most tenuous of political foundations as a state. Still, the military might and independence of its people are well marked by the Dragonforces in Lluranal to their south. The bowl-shaped depression of the area creates a large freshwater lake at the heart of the Twelvelands, and Parhim the City of Sceptres lies on that lake as the sole major settlement among a large number of villages and hamlets. Self-reliant by nature and by their geographic isolation, very few trade goods enter or leave the Twelvelands, though their alliances with the folk of Drakesfall has increased communication among the people in the past decades. Luckily, the land once avoided for its “haunting by great spirits, ghosts, and curses upon all those who trod its fields” welcomed the settlers and has provided nearly all they need for nearly 300 years.
The people of the Twelvelands are, like all in the lands of Old Kharndam, chiefly humans of dark hair and tanned skin. However, on the plateau that encompasses most of the Twelvelands are a wider and wilder variety of races than found anywhere else on Rokhal (mainly due to their decimation and hunting by Impral nobles and soldiers). Rhamathi exist in at least one whole tribe here, as do a number of shay, prigam, and fey races (mainly arshay, washay, satyrs, harpies, and dryads). The ogres that once ruled the mountains to the north and east tried to conquer the Twelvelands three decades ago and were, by and large, forced south off the plateau (As a result, the remaining ogres conquered Lluranal instead, though they plan their revenge and eventual domination of their former homes in the future). There are more free kelshay living in the Twelvelands than in any other place on Rokhal as this is their land of deliverance from slavery.
While this area lies among the lands of Old Khardnam, it was a place avoided by most humans and sentients until the former slaves of the Twelverisings settled here. The shay speak of ancient sorceries still rampant in the woods and lands yet today, tied to the Aethworking that happened more than two millenaries ago. Legends claim that elvish disruption of that great feat of magic thrust this entire section of the continent upward, clearing it of life for an age. None of those who live here today know the exact truth, though many claim that wild magics yet haunt the northern reaches of the Twelvelands and few survive them to report on them accurately.
- Official Name: The United Clanholds (present political term on rise in use); “Twelvelands” (common colloquial); The Wildlands, the Erllands, the Dograan Tablelands (Kharndam/Sovereignty).
- Flag/Mark: No official Twelvelands flag; the closest there is to a unifying symbol for this area is the flag of Parhim, City of Sceptres—a pair of crossed gold sceptres atop a circle with equal-sized wedges of white, black, and red in each quarter made by the sceptres (for the 12 clans and Twelvelands).
- Geography/Location: The Cairngloom swamps and the River Saroth mark the southern borders and the Sharhim Peaks hem the Twelvelands in on the east (though like the Imperam, the clans lay claim to territories through the mountain range to its eastern slopes). The northern borders lie an indeterminate distance inside the Great Hoarwoods but do not extend as far north as the Coldstar Mountains save in the most ambitious clanlord’s claims. The western border remains the western ocean and the high cliffs from which the Twelvelanders look down upon its waves.
- Territories: The Twelvelands is a loose political confederation of clan leaders rather than a central government. Still, those leaders (and most in the Kharndam regions, save Impralnors and military leaders) consider the floodplains of the River Saroth and the Dograan Cliffs to be the southernmost reaches of the Twelvelands. The Tablelands atop the cliffs are nestled among the western cliffs, the eastern mountains, and the northern mountain forests.
- Ethnic Divisions: Humans (60%), Goblins (17%), Kelshay (11%), Other races (12%)
© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
Categories
World, Kharndam; Genre, Fantasy Fiction; Format/Medium, Magazines & Pulps; Role-Playing Games;
TAGS
</p>Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
Tsarnus
</p>Once called “Kharndam’s Katar” due to its pointed shape, the Lartharn Peninsula was home to very few crowns until Tsarn the Patient took control of the land from Naak-Ost-Chyl-Nyit the “Sablewyrm” in 89 OD. Tsarnus became a state in 93 OD, and it took over a century before Tsarnus became the ruling authority for the whole peninsula. The lands were part of Kharndam and the Pegasus Sovereignty for more than five centuries but became their own country again when Lluranal fell to the Imperam in 805 OD. For 85 decades, Tsarnus has used its geography and its people’s tenacity to remain free from Impral control, much to the irritation of countless Impralnors of Lluranal and their Imprators. However, many natives attribute their monotheistic religion—the Eagle’s Path—and its importance all across Tsarniot society as the reason for their apparent imperviousness.
The trades and goods that make Tsarnus one of the richest lands on Rokhal are their ships, their pearls, and their wine. Nowhere on Dharual can one find better-crafted ships than in Covar, a truth held for more than a millenary now (though the Shokunate shows promise in their newest designs, despite Tsarniot attempts to sabotage their development). The multitudinous bays and ports along the peninsular coasts allow easy fishing and pearl diving, both trades jealously guarded from raiders and spies. The wines come from the many varieties of grapes grown on the hills and mountains in the south. The many lands bordering the Straits of Chamuk welcome Tsarniot goods and ships, though they are rarest in far-away Lammok.
The people of Tsarnus, like Lluranal, are almost exclusively Kharndamite humans (tanned skin, dark hair). There are rhamathi populations up in the Drass Highlands and their own villages, but very few venture downslope among the human towns and rarer still to the cities save in the southlands. Rumors place a small giant population somewhere among the Hriak Peaks, though the everpresent goblins in that region prevent any expeditions from finding out the truth. Not unexpectedly, the more cosmopolitan populations and the widest range of races can be found on the eastern side of the peninsula and often comprise escaped Impral slaves.
- Official Name: The Divine Commonwealth of Tsarnus; the Prinicipality of Tsarnus (Kharndam); “the Eaglelands” (colloquial).
- Flag/Mark: Red field with a gold eagle displayed (current Tsarniot flag); black triangle (point up) atop a red field with blue base (original flag).
- Geography/Location: Tsarnus lies on the Lartharn Peninsula (the westernmost explored and settled stretch of land on the continent of Rokhal). The peninsula defines its major borders and the country’s eastern reach extends only to the mouth of the River Elting. (It cedes control of the river to Drakesfall and supplements that city militarily to help keep it free of Impral control.) The northernmost Tsarniot territories are the Grynall Skerries more than 30 miles beyond the peninsula’s northern shores. The southern reaches of the Tsarniot crown are the Xral Archipelago 25 miles due west of Huntersrise and the Aronan Shoals on the Straits of Chamuk 29 miles south of the town of Plaevcrag.
- Territories: The whole of the Lartharn Peninsula and the coastal island chains to its north, south, and west (at least those within 40 miles) are the entirety of lands claimed by this state. Tsarniot ships ply the waters across the globe, but their navy only officially patrols and protects the waters within 20 miles of any claimed territories. Their iron-clad control of the Knife’s Edge fjord that borders Lluranal and Xhonoril has kept Tsarnus free of Impral clutches for centuries.
- Ethnic Divisions: Humans (89%), Rhamathi (6%), Goblins (4%), Other races (less than 1%)
© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>
Well, only because he sent me to this site. I think my "Uber cool nerd god" smites his "Nerd King" status, yea verily. ;)
- Mood: amused
Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
This is the standard title for stories revolving around multiple Earths among Bulwark Comics publications. BC saw the benefit of the multiple Earths concept from some of its pulp stories and played with it first in 1944, having characters meet from the Guardians comic line in Bulwark comics (“Crossroads of Reality,” Best Comics #48, August 1944) and vice-versa (“Crisis at the Crossroads,” Super Thrills #39, August 1944). This was the only CROSSROADS story in the 1940s or 1950s for either company.
Bulwark editors Charles Knight and E.C. Buckner and writers Michael Joseph and Rob Sullivan crafted the fictional conceit forever after labeled “the Crossroads.” In the two comics, the CROSSROADS was merely portrayed as the center hub of twelve white unending pathways against a starfield. The text of the piece simply described the CROSSROADS as “the centerpoint where all realities cross each other and from where you can enter anywhere, anywhen, anywhy, anyhow.”
When Bulwark Comics started up again in 1964, they had absorbed the Guardian Comics line and put both companies’ combined properties within one universe, apparently negating the multiple worlds shown in 1944. Still, the CROSSROADS concept was important to them and in the plans for future use. Editors John Farnsworth and Thomas Roy crafted a strict in-house bible for the CROSSROADS™ in 1965. They used the original concept and expanded it in accord to the standards of both fantasy and science fiction genres at that time. In short, the “Crossroads” was a multiversal intersection that could appear as the center of a spoked wheel, the floor or wall of an enormous hall of doors, or a random variety of images that made the most sense to the central point of view character (or a mix of imagery with as many dimensions and details as visible characters). The singularity point where all universes intersected was now a polyhedral globe and characters could be standing inside, outside, or anywhere and that would be the “floor” of the CROSSROADS for him or her. Regardless of how it is depicted, the CROSSROADS has these rules:
- Portals to the CROSSROADS can be found on any planet that supports life (even if the biosphere is incompatible with other forms of life).
- There is a Portal at the center of the Milky Way galaxy at the heart of a systems-wide black hole.
- There is at least one guardian for each Portal in each reality (whether the character fully understands and acknowledges this role or not) who can allow or bar entrance to the CROSSROADS. He or she intuitively knows/senses where the Portal lies, regardless of any attempts to hide it.
- Every being at the CROSSROADS can communicate with each other while there, regardless of language or physical limitations (ending problems of alien telepaths talking with aging sorcerers from Atlantis, etc.)
Due to the exacting strictures held by its two editors, the CROSSROADS was not used much as a story feature other than as a backdrop in some of the mystical or magical comics from 1965 until almost three years after John Farnsworth’s death. Under Thomas Roy’s editorial hand, writer Michael Joseph and artists Richard Corbett and Stanley Mantel produced the three-part “Crossroads of the Mind” (Bulwark Mega-Action #55 (Part 1) and Bulwark Mega-Action Annual #3 (Parts 2&3), August 1973), which established that the previous Bulwark and Guardian Comics universes still existed in separate dimensions, complete with the original versions of many characters. In fact, the story laid the groundwork to introduce many alternate worlds new (like an anti-matter universe, an anthropomorphic animal universe, etc.) and old (the original pulp universe versions of many Bulwark heroes).
CROSSROADS™ stories proved very popular and became a frequent event in a number of titles. Between 1973 and 1982, there were 30 CROSSROADS™-labeled Bulwark Comics stories with little editorial control among them (leading to countless continuity contradictions). Finally, Thomas Roy (now Editor-in-Chief) ended the overexposure of the concept while still using it to its best advantage. He launched Bulwark’s first mini-series in 1982—CROSSROADS™. Hereafter, the multiple worlds were only used in annual mini-series, all edited (if not co-written) by Troy Beck. There were ten CROSSROADS™ mini-series from 1982 until 1991.
- CROSSROADS™ (1982)
- CROSSROADS™ of Crime (1983)
- CROSSROADS™ of Chaos (1984)
- Contest at the CROSSROADS™ (1985)
- Clash at the CROSSROADS™ (1986)
- CROSSROADS™ & Crises (1987)
- CROSSROADS™ Cases (1988)
- CROSSROADS™: Legacies (1989)
- CROSSROADS™: Timestorm (1990)
- CROSSROADS™: Ragnarok (1991)
The Ragnarok mini-series started in August 1991 and its sixth issue was the final comic book produced by the “Silver Age” Bulwark Comics that December. While the CROSSROADS™ concept once opened up the BC multiverse, it also served to close it down. BC’s Ragnarok was far worse than mythology ever warned, as a score of evil gods and their allies destroyed more than nineteen universes. The evil ANTIPANTHEON and LOKI the NULLFATHER were ultimately defeated at the cost of every hero and god of three universes sacrificing their lives and energies to contain or end their evils and prevent their destruction and evil from spreading beyond the BC universe.
From 1992 through 1997, Bulwark Publications only published reprints or spin-off materials from their comics properties. The most notable were four popular cartoon series and their attendant merchandising (MISTER ENIGMA™ (1990-1993); CLIFF COMET & THE COSMICORPS™ (1995-1997); THE BULWARK BLAST HOUR™ (1993-1995); BROOKLYON ADVENTURES™ (1994-1999)). Guardian Games expanded beyond their fantasy games with its 4-COLOR THRILLS™ system, keeping many of the characters in print and under trademark. The best selling product for that game line was its CROSSROADS™: RAGNAROK™ boxed adventure supplement in April 1997.
When Bulwark revived its comics lines in 1998 amid great fanfare, the company editors used the CROSSROADS™ concept and mini-series to create yet another universe and Earth and recreate all their properties for another generation. While the possibility of revisiting the old worlds and universes existed, the current Bulwark properties did not do so directly. Instead, they established (specifically, the new T.H.R.E.A.T. discovered) another alternate Earth where the two previous generations of comics characters existed on one world along with the original pulp characters; many of these characters are retired, aged, or dead. Despite their age or infirmity, these old heroes proved effective and teamed up with T.H.R.E.A.T. to stop a mystical threat with origins in both universes. The second mini-series in 1999 drew the new G.U.A.R.D. through the CROSSROADS™ to prevent the NIGHTMARINER from conquering the ISLA MYSTERIA and through them numerous adjacent universes.
- Hanged at the CROSSROADS™ (1998)
- Fear at the CROSSROADS™ (1999)
[Additional material redacted for various legal reasons as per Bulwark Publications Legal representatives.]
</p>© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
Between 1480 and 1510, Venetian book printer Teobaldo Manucci and Yannis Gregoropoulos crafted 24 books (later knownas the volumeternals) by commission and with the aid of a mysterious but never-identified client. These books had special properties in their enchanted pages: Volumeternals contain an unknown number of pages, though all of the books only appeared to physically be about 90 pages long. A reader with the key words in contact with the volumeternal can unlock the hidden potential of the pages and access the hidden magical pages and the knowledge on them. Readers ignorant of the true nature of the book would only see a well-made book of prayers or papal edicts.
Seven volumeternals were destroyed over the years either by accident or design. The Inquisition and other agents (most notably the Florentine zealot Girolamo Savonarola) fed five volumeternals to bonfires between 1513 and 1596. The last two believed destroyed were the Codex Armarnus and the Libramankriarta, both lost at sea after the Bella Torchia (the ship on which their keepers traveled) sank off the coast of Virginia in 1731.
There are 17 known volumeternals still extant in the world today. Five are held by the Cabal of the Seven Mysteries; the Seers’ Society and the Hosts each owns two; the and the Vanguard holds three. While two are believed to be in the Unreadable Library (sent there by the Vanguard in 1907 and by the Order of the Sacred Flame in 1839), three exist but remain in unknown hands.
- The Gyrmayn Annals, legendarily the earliest diary of the immortal St. Gyrmayn, lost since the late 16th century;
- The Accords Omniscenti, the collected knowledge of the long-fallen Brethren of the Golden Scrolls; and
- The Black Codex of Dr Dee, the true repository of what Queen Elizabeth’s court wizard saw in his black mirrors.
© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>Aliens, swords, and screaming Vikings? I'm so there....
This sounds like a movie pulled from the pulps wholesale.
Why can't we get more like this? I'm all for smart, intelligent, well-scripted fantasy and science fiction, yes.
But sometimes you just want to indulge your inner-9-year-old and see someone smack the hell out of an alien with a sword. C'mon and be honest. You want to see it too. :)
Steven
Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
Dawes, Max
Born March 15 of 1913 in Rockford Illinois, the flaxen-haired Floyd Maxwell II yearned for a life beyond dairy farms and the Midwest. At age 17, he came to Hollywood, changed his name to Max Dawes, and got his start as a bit player of thugs. Max’s star rose when he starred as the ILLUMINATED MAN™ in three 14-part serials in 1933 (The ILLUMINATED MAN™ vs. The Vampires), 1934 (The ILLUMINATED MAN™ vs. The Voodoo Queen), and 1935 (The ILLUMINATED MAN™ vs. The Seven Deadly Sirs). Despite the obvious painted-on tattoos over his chest and arms, the actor threw himself into the role and made DAVID JOSHUA™ believable and memorable. Max grew into a star thanks to his physique, his charisma, and the better-than-average scripts for these serials.
After the serials, Dawes slowly became a leading man and action star for RKO and other studios, appearing in 54 films between 1930 and 1950. The press (and the studios) publicized and fomented a friendly rivalry among him, Errol Flynn, and Tyrone Power through the 1930s and 1940s. In truth, the “Action Star Rivalry” was pure propaganda, as Flynn and Dawes were good friends, and Max never met Power at all aside from a few brief encounters at Hollywood parties.
Dawes’ only other tie to Bulwark came when he played the mystical P.I. ACE BARRIGAN™ in two films. The first movie was played straight and adapted a pulp story in ACE BARRIGAN™ and the Fairgeth Phantom (1941). That film did moderate business at the box office but today it is more notable as the first screen appearance of Mona Davidson (the future 1950’s doe-eyed screen starlet) in her role as young kidnapping victim Mary Stevens. Max’s second turn as Ace was in the near-spoof of film noir Demon Rum (1948), of which there is little worth mentioning beyond his presence in said film.
By the 1950s, Max Dawes had moved to television and starred in the long-running western “Red Mesa” as the noble Sheriff Graham. Max appeared in all but seven episodes of the series between 1954 and 1967. He died of a heart attack at age 59 in his home in Burbank, CA on October 13, 1972. There was a brief revival of interest in his portrayals of “the Psolemn Man of Mystery” due to Mary Travern’s 1975 overly-psychoanalytic study Men Illuminated and Obfuscated. Bulwark Publications released the authorized Dawes biography Max Behind the Star through its Aegis Books imprint in 1979 to much acclaim. Some did complain, though, that the book skimmed over and did not address long-standing rumors about Dawes’ experimental use of L.S.D. or allegedly conflicted sexuality.
ACE BARRIGAN™ and the Fairgeth Phantom (1941)
The title of the first ACE BARRIGAN™ movie starring Max Dawes, this originally saw print as the pulp story “The Fog Has Claws” (Books Bizarre #165 (March 1938)). Due to the limitations of time and budget, the original story became simplified in this adaptation (the Ahrmorl Cult and its occult pantheon became the O’Malley gang dabbling in magical summonings) and focused more on a tacked-on romance between Ace and the kidnapped Mary Stevens. The ancient killing spirit unleashed on Fairgeth became a large man in a white ape suit—formidable, easier to create, but hardly phantasmal and not as menacing. Still, trick photography allowed Ace’s bullets to become spells in a believable celluloid way here. Max became the cynical detective with magical guns and made the character even more credible. (Many point to this role as the origin of many aspects later used in Dawes’ TV persona of the stoic Sheriff Graham.)
Demon Rum (1948)
The title of the second ACE BARRIGAN™ movie starring Max Dawes, the plot revolved around a mobster looking to take over the city of Fairgeth. His nefarious plan was to sell people rum that made them susceptible to demonic possessions and then negotiate with those demons for the worldly goods the people no longer needed. The movie is considered nearly a spoof of the then-popular noir films, and Dawes was the only good thing in this poorly scripted and clumsily directed bomb. Rising far above the material, Dawes again made Ace as world-weary as anything conceived by Hammett or Bogart and as crafty as Merlin the Magician.
© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
The Low Race Calendars: Dwarftime (DT), Rhamathreckoning (RR), Drakereckoning (UD/OD), Sovereignty Flight Years (BF/IF/AF), Impramark (IM), and Eaglereckoning (ER)
While there have been more than nineteen major calendars or ways to mark history by the many non-progenitor races, only six have any major relevance or dominant use on Dharual today (even to scholars). While the centaurs of southwestern Rokhal do have deviations from the calendars noted here, they do not make major changes and still use the primary timekeeping methods under Aureckoning.
Dwarftime (DT) never wavered in its use across all dwarven nations and civilizations, while most races had differences and distinctions among those of different continents. The beginning of their calendar was not the start of their race—dwarven origins are noted thanks to their shay creators circa the 17th century of Elementime. Dwarftime Year One begins on what most call the 31st day of the 4th month—the date 50 days from both the Erldawning (Spring Equinox) and Highsummer (Summer Solstice). On the dawn of this day , the first and greatest dwarven hero Agmarrn slew the dragon Klath-Urus-Dhor-Solm on the sunlit slopes of Orpak’s Trogulpak to claim the mountain in the name of all dwarves. Since then, dwarves used the same 400 day year as the other races, though they named and sorted the days differently. Dwarftime divides the year into ten “Drives” of 40 days each, further dividing them into five “marches” of 8 days each. The Lastmarch and Firstmarch of each year were major religious seasons among dwarves and dwarfriends.
Dwarftime continues in use today in a fashion. The rhamathi have adopted its methods and terminologies, though they call their calendar Rhamathreckoning. This calendar’s Year One marks the fall of the last dwarf of Khiilm (12,301 DT/1RR or 15,300 ET) and first day of a rhamathi year comes on Highsummer (1st day of the 6th month). In Rhamathreckoning, the present is the year 3,840 RR.
Drakereckoning has long been the most common calendar used around the lands of Kharndam e’er since Ornaoth’s slaying of the wyrm Som-Aril-Dhar-Chrys. Marked as Year One Overdrake (OD), this calendar symbolizes the lower races’ victories over their larger oppressors. (While they bore little ill of the Aurum Alliance, its calendar’s relevance to most folk dwindled over the centuries and this event bore more weight for human timekeepers and scholars.) Once this calendar took root in people’s minds, the years living under dragon rule became the years Underdrake (UD), of which there were 676 on Rokhal before Ornaoth led humanity out of the reptilian yoke. As the common calendar, even in the Impraltories of Lluranal, Pralkesh, and Xonorhil, most refer to this when marking time. Documents use the local ruler’s official calendar (as happens within the Impramense) and Drakereckoning. The current year is 1652 OD.
The calendar of Old Kharndam measured time by Flight Years, marking Year One when Gyrthorn II tamed the first pegasus (242 OD). This primary calendar of Kharndam and the successive Pegasus Sovereignty referred to years In Flight (IF) and prehistory as Before Flight (BF). The three states of Kharndam united in 31 IF and the Sovereignty ushered in the Eighth Age of Dharual in 70 IF. The Flight Years lasted for nearly five centuries, and After Flight years (or After Fall, depending on the historian) begin in 492 IF/1 AF. The present year is 851 AF.
Though not a wide practice, some scholars refer to the years of warfare between the growing Imperam and the failing Sovereignty as Descending Flight (DF) years. They begin marking time in 351 IF when Bheddar annexes Graal and Summath to form the Imperam and secede from the Sovereignty. There are 142 DF years that end when the ruling family of the Sovereignty dies and the Imperam conquers all Rokhaln lands but the Old Kharndam core territories.
The Imperam, of course, has its own official calendar since the establishment of the Imprator’s Throne (661 DR). The Impramark calendar always notes the year of each individual Imprator’s rule and the year since Bheddar proclaimed itself the heart of the Imperam. Impral historians also use this calendar for events predating the Imperam, simply marking the dates in negatives (and thus they link Ornaoth Dragonslayer to Impral bloodlines and mark 1 OD as -583 IM. It is currently the year 1/992 IM, the 1st reigning year for the Imprator Thrax III, son of Ulach IV, and the 992nd year of the Imperam. Thrax is the 66th Imprator and the ninth ruler from the Lahaxan bloodline to ascend to the Great Throne.
Eaglereckoning is one of the few active religiously inspired calendars used on Rokhal. Its beginnings link to the First Forge Vision of Onim in 471 OD. Onim, the smith of Rarlhann, began preaching the Eagle’s Path and living a virtuous life that caused his faith to spread. Onim’s devotion to his journals and to his works gave the Eagle’s Path its first holy books, and from these came the Eaglereckoning (ER) calendar, complete with holy days and observances from Firstwing Onim. The calendar became the official and courtly calendar of Tsarnus in 407 ER when Searle the Pious rose to the Tsarniot throne. The king abdicated his secular authority and made it subservient to the Highwing of the Eagle’s Cry. The present year is 1,179 ER.
© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>Originally published at The Codex Continual. You can comment here or there.
[Continued—Calendars of Rokhal’s Progenitors]
Blazetime (BT) is the solar-calendar of the giants, started with the rise of First Kalsiddar on the continent of Shael. There is one Sunkeeper for each tribe or clan of giants whose sole job is to record history for that clan or state. Sunkeepers also map the sun’s changes and details and suffer the visions that bring the coming years’ names with them. Thus, giants name their years between five and twenty years in advance, though there is always discussion and debate among Sunkeepers as to whose vision takes precedence for years when there are conflicts in visionreads. While the standard of naming years held during the Aurum Alliance, it is a practice long abandoned by all but the giants as few races were as gifted with oracles as they.
Some giant tribes or nations have a Moonskeeper whose job entails tracking the phases of all three moons. This Moonskeeper is often less mentally stable due to overlapping or conflicting additional visions from each moon or gods tied to each moon. While there were attempts in the past to base calendars off the lunar cycles, they proved too confusing for laymen and priests alike. Thus, of all the giant or allied civilizations over history, only tragic Challomdar ever used a lunar calendar for longer than two Cycles (and many a Sunkeeper will insist such folly was what led to their awful end, though others incline more toward the savagery of the Wyrmultitude).
Blazetime and Elementime are the original bases for every calendar since the Second Age. They mapped out the 400 day year, 100 days in each season. They also established the year starts at Wintersdeep for nearly all races, marking Day One as the bottom of the Dark of the Year and growing more light. Blazetime may yet be used among the few giants remaining on Rokhal, though their lack of contact with outsiders limits current news.
Aureckoning or “Goldyears” (AR) was the calendar adopted by the Aurum Alliance long after the giants inherited rulership from the dragons after the Age of War ended. Aureckoning began in the Third Age when the Aurum Alliance ruled from the Isle of Vros and the majority of the races lived in peace across Dharual. The calendar continued long after the fall of the Alliance until subsumed by the Drakereckoning calendar. Like those above, its 400-day-year remained the standard during its 74 centuries; each year had four names for each year (one from each of the predominant Sunkeepers of the continents of Rokhal, Shael, Orpak, and Lammok ). Had the Alliance not fallen, it would be marking the current year as 9,649 AR.
Goblins, whether the foul, corrupt creatures they are today or the less reptilian version they were for the first Six Ages, have never been great historians. They relied merely on oral traditions and the memory of their skalds for much of their earliest histories. Time after time, they became the underlings of the powerful, whether dragons or other dragonspawn. They marked time by their liegelord’s pleasures and preferences, not caring a whit either way. (Mind you, individual goblins might have cared deeply of history, as did long-dead Son’rul of Islathor; twere but the broader species that cared little about building its own calendars.). Not until they became the de-facto rulers of Rokhal and the other continents in the Sixth Age did any goblins create a racial calendar, and they called it Clawreckoning, after the “True Rule of Claw and Fang and Drake and Scale!” Its years correspond to the Underdrake years of the Drakereckoning calendar, and many a goblin howls that they “came up with what humans stole from us!” The current year among goblins of Dharual, e’en though their rule ended a millenary past, is 2,327 CR.
[Continued]
</p>© 2009 by Steven E. Schend. All rights reserved.
</p>
