Robert E. Howard 29 min read

Between the sinking of Atlantis and the rise of recorded history lies the Hyborian Age, a vanished epoch of warring kingdoms, dark sorceries, and barbarian glory, mapped out to give Conan his world.

Robert E. Howard's 1936 essay is the foundational 'history' underlying the entire Conan saga. Rich, sweeping, foundational. Read it for the imaginary chronicle that made Conan's world real, Howard's sweeping pseudo-history of the Hyborian kingdoms, a landmark of fantasy world-building that shaped the whole sword-and-sorcery genre.

In its time

Published in 1936, during the 1930s, space opera soars.

Reading it

29 min read (a novelette, room for a turn or two).