Robert E. Howard's "The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian" (1932-33)

From "The Pool of the Black One": Conan tries to save Sancha before she gets put in the well.
(US edition, Mark Schultz)

In 2002, Del Rey Books began publishing the unedited fiction of Robert E. Howard. The first volume, The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian, contains stories written from 1932 to 1933 featuring the famous fantasy barbarian Conan. Below are synopses and illustrations from the original pulp magazine publications.

(REH, 1934)

Contents:

• "Cimmeria" (1965) (poem)
• "The Phoenix on the Sword" (1932)
• "The Frost-Giant's Daughter" (1976)
• "The God in the Bowl" (1952)
• "The Tower of the Elephant" (1933)
• "The Scarlet Citadel" (1931)
• "Queen of the Black Coast" (1934)
• "Black Colossus" (1933)
• "Iron Shadows in the Moon" (1934) (variant of "Shadows in the Moonlight")
• "Xuthal of the Dusk" (1933) (variant of "The Slithering Shadow")
• "The Pool of the Black One" (1933)
• "Rogues in the House" (1934)
• "The Vale of Lost Women" (1967)
• "The Devil in Iron" (1934)

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Cimmeria (poem, February, 1932)

First published in The Howard Collector, Winter 1965

The speaker recalls his life in the harsh land of Cimmeria, a gaunt, hard-scrabble northern land from the mythic past. He wonders if he will always remember his life in Cimmeria, even though he lives many more lifetimes throughout history.

The Phoenix on the Sword (Mar 1932)

King Conan faces Thoth-amon's sorcerous creature after Ascalante's demise.
(Jayem Wilcox)

First published in Weird Tales, December 1932

(J. Allen St. John)

An Aquilonian outlaw named Ascalante schemes to overthrow King Conan and take the throne of Aquilonia for himself. Ascalante also holds power over a pitiful Stygian wizard named Thoth-amon, who mourns the loss of a stolen Serpent Ring of Set (the source of his former power). Thoth-amon later learns that Dion, one of Ascalante’s allies, has by chance come into possession of the long-lost Ring. He promptly slays Dion and uses the Ring of Set to summon a baboon-like demon on a mission to kill Ascalante.

Meanwhile in the palace, King Conan suspects hidden danger brewing in his kingdom. In a dream, he is visited by the ancient Aquilonian sage Epimitreus. Aware of the reawakening of his old adversary Set, Epimitreus offers to help Conan. He carves a magic rune in the shape of a phoenix into Conan’s sword. Conan wakes to find that his sword has indeed been newly engraved with a phoenix insignia.

When Ascalante and his co-conspirators sneak into the palace and break into Conan’s bedroom, the barbarian king manages to kill several of the conspirators with his Cimmerian-born natural strength. When Ascalante himself moves to take advantage of a momentarily-distracted Conan, he is suddenly attacked by Thoth-amon's baboon-demon and dies of fright. The seemingly invulnerable demon then tries to mesmerize Conan with its supernatural gaze, but Conan's sword (emblazoned with the Epimitreus' phoenix) is able to mortally injure the creature.After the creature fades away, Conan's priests gaze in amazement at the phoenix in the sword.

The Frost-Giant’s Daughter (Mar 1932)

(Frank Frazetta)

Original version first published in Rogues in the House, Donald M. Grant, 1976
Conan confronts the last warrior of an opposing army after a pitched battle in the north. After Conan eventually kills him, a pale, orange-haired seductress appears and lures Conan into pursuit of her. She leads him to her two giant brothers who try to capture Conan to make him their sacrifice to the Frost-Giant Ymir. After Conan manages to kill the giant brothers, the girl flees. When Conan catches up with her, she calls out to Ymir and a great flash knocks Conan into unconsciousness. Later found by his allies, he is told that the ethereal woman was Atali, Ymir's daughter.

The God in the Bowl (Mar 1932)

Original version first published in The Tower of the Elephant, Donald M. Grant, 1975

An official named Kallian Publico is discovered strangled to death in his museum-temple in Numalia. The guardsmen also discover Conan skulking around. Conan denies murdering Publico, and maintains that he had only entered the museum on a mission of thievery. When Conan's patron Aztrias arrives, he denies hiring Conan and condemns him. Realizing that he is being thrown to the wolves, Conan kills Aztrias and wounds several of the guardsmen interrogating him. Meanwhile, a dark slithering shape roams the museum premises. When it’s horrid appearance causes one of the servants to die of fright, the guards flee the building in a panic. Alone, Conan investigates the back room holding Publico’s recently-acquired Stygian bowl (intercepted in transit from Thoth-amon to one of his enemies abroad). A beautiful head rises above a screen and beckons Conan towards it. Conan beheads it, and sees that the head had been attached to the body of a giant serpent.

The Tower of the Elephant (Mar 1932)

First published in Weird Tales, March 1933

(Margaret Brundage)

In Zamora, a Kothian slave-trader brags about the Tower of the Elephant and its prize jewel. When Conan is mocked by the man for asking about its impregnability, he kills the Kothian for his disrespect. Later, while attempting to pierce the defenses of this Tower, Conan runs into another thief named Taurus. Taurus uses poison gas to dispatch lions guarding the base of the tower. One surviving lion is killed by Conan’s blade. However, after climbing to the top of the Tower, Taurus is killed by a giant venomous spider. Conan kills the spider by crushing it under a treasure chest.

Conan then enters the inner chamber of the Tower and discovers Yag-kosha, a creature with the body of a man and the head of an elephant. The pitiful, blind alien explains that his race is an ancient one and had come from the planet Yag. However, after arriving on Earth his people had eventually died out, and he was the last of his race. The sorceror Yara had tricked Yag-kosha into revealing his secrets and then enslaved him. Wishing for an end, Yag-kosha instructs Conan to kill him and then drip blood from his heart over a large mounted jewel. After doing this, he is to give the gem to his captor/torturer, a man named Yara. After slaying Yag-kosha and preparing the jewel, he visits Yara's chamber. When Yara is exposed to the gem the evil sorceror shrinks, and is eventually consumed by the gem. Conan briefly sees the image of a reinvigorated Yag-kosha preying on Yara inside the crystal before it disappears from view. Soon after Conan departs the tower it collapses behind him.

Conan satisfies Yag-kosha's death wish.
(Jayem Wilcox)

The Scarlet Citadel (Spring 1932)

(Frank Frazetta)

First published in Weird Tales, January 1933

(J. Allen St. John)

After an ambush at the border, Aquilonia's King Conan is captured by the Kothian wizard Tsotha-lanti and taken to Korshemish, where Tsotha-lanti’s "Scarlet Citadel" lies. With Conan imprisoned in his dungeon, Tsotha-lanti prepares to lead an army to conquer the Aquilonian capitol in Tamar. Locked in and chained in the dungeon, Conan realizes that a gigantic snake prowls the area. When an old enemy comes to assassinate Conan, the snake kills the visitor, allowing Conan to gain the keys to his chains. Still locked in, he explores the tunnels and comes across Tsotha-Lanti’s mutated monstrosities. When he discovers a man being held in the grip of a monstrous animated plant (from the planet Yag), Conan slashes at the giant plant’s stem, allowing the wizard Pelias to regain his senses. Pelias agrees to help Conan against his longtime captor Tsotha-lanti. He summonses a flying reptile so that Conan can be transported to Tamar in time to raise an army against Tsotha-lanti's approaching forces.

When Conan eventually arrives in Tamar on the back of his flying mount, he removes a puppet leader and immediately reorganizes his forces. After recruiting aid from neighboring allied provinces, Conan eventually rides down to Shamar, which is under siege from the Tsotha-lanti's Ophirian and Kothian armies. At the same time, a resistance force from inside Shamar emerges to create a vise around the enemy army. After invaders are destroyed, Tsotha-lanti tries to escape alone. Conan catches up with him and, dodging a lethal enchantment, beheads him. An eagle with Pelias’ voice flies down and carries Tsotha-lanti’s head away, as his body wanders around the wilderness in search of it.

Pelias' eagle flies off with Tsotha-lanti's decapitated head.
(Jayem Wilcox)

Queen of the Black Coast (Aug 1932)

The guardian of the forbidden isle threatens Conan and Bêlit.
Margaret Brundage)

First published in Weird Tales, May 1934

• I. Conan Joins The Pirates: Fleeing the pursuit of law enforcement in Argos, Conan boards a galley heading south. Near Cush, the pirate queen Bêlit attacks and kills the crew of the galley, leaving Conan alone continues to fight. Intrigues by the northman, Bêlit decides to make Conan her mate on board her ship The Tigress.
• II. The Black Lotus: After telling Conan that even were she to die that she would still come to his aid, Bêlit has The Tigress make her way up a forbidden river in order to plunder a forbidden city. Defying giant serpents and a winged ape-demon, they reach the hidden city’s sacrificial pyramid and discover riches hidden underneath. As the treasure is collected, Conan leads some men inland to search for fresh water. However, he falls prey to the narcoleptic fumes of a nearby Black Lotus plant.
• III. The Horror In The Jungle: As if in a dream, Conan experiences a vision which describes how an advanced race of winged, god-like creatures had eventually degenerated into ape-like monstrosities, leaving only one last survivor. This red-eyed creature had then used sorcery to transform a crew of pirate looters into monstrous hyenas. Upon wakening from the vision, Conan discovers that his entire crew (including Bêlit) has been slaughtered, apparently by the winged ape and its slave hyenas.
• IV. The Attack From The Air: At the top of the ritual pyramid, Conan prepares for the attack of the creatures. The hyena-men eventually appear and Conan kills them all with his bow, sword and bare hands. After the last one has been killed, the pyramid collapses, trapping Conan beneath a pillar. The winged ape approaches, intending to finish Conan off before he can free himself from the fallen rubble. A vision of a ghostly Bêlit sudden manifests, causing the creature to pause, and allowing Conan enough time to free himself. Conan cuts the creature in half, and departs the strange city on The Tigress, alone.
• V. The Funeral Pyre: At the river-mouth, Conan sets The Tigress adrift with the funeral pyre of Bêlit burning on it's deck.

Bêlit's ghost defends Conan from the island guardian.
(Hugh Rankin)

Black Colossus (June 1933)

First published in Weird Tales, June 1933

Princess Yasmela petitions a sculpture of Mitra for help against the shadowy black colossus of Natohk.
(Margaret Brundage)

A master thief named Shevatas penetrates the mythical domed tomb of Thugra Khotan, an evil sorcerer from 3000 years in the past. After slaying a giant guardian snake he enters the tomb, but soon encounters some kind of horror.

In Khoraja, Princess Yasmela is threatened by the evil black spirit (a “shadowy colossus”) of Natohk, a newly-risen sorceror from the south, intent on invading the north and making Yasmela his unwilling bride. When Yasmela asks her god Mitra for help, Mitra tells her to seek out assistance from the first man she meets outside the palace. This man turns out to be the mercenary captain Conan. She immediately makes Conan her new army commander and asks him to arrange a force to set forth and counter Natohk’s. Conan’s army heads out of Khoraja, with Yasmela accompanying the force. She asks Conan to stay with her in the night so that she will not have to fear another visitation from Natohk. One of Conan’s old comrades tells Conan that he had found Shevatas’ dead and shrivelled corpse at the tomb of the legendary sorcerer Thugra Khotan. He claims that Natohk is actually the 3000 year old sorcerer returned.

Conan is threatened by one of Natohk's generals, Kutamun.
(Jayem Wilcox)

The next day Conan’s forces take a defensive position above a mountain pass. A mist descends on the mouth of the valley, but it soon lifts, revealing the advance of Natohk’s horde, which outnumbers Conan’s own army. When the horde seems to experience some confusion amongst its front ranks, one of Yasmela’s haughtier generals disobeys Conan’s orders to wait and rushes forward, only to be decimated by the explosive powder of Natohk. Conan’s defensive forces are hard-pressed by the massive horde, but he sends a smaller force to attack the horde from the rear. The surprise of this rear attack demoralizes Natohk’s horde, allowing Conan’s forces to advance and destroy them. Natohk suddenly sweeps in to Conan's camp on a demon-driven chariot and kidnaps Yasmela. Conan pursues them into some ruins and eventually comes across Natohk standing above Yasmela, about to be sacrificed on an altar. While Natohk/Khotan raves, Conan simply hurls his sword like a javelin and impales the sorcerer. Yasmela and Conan embrace in a moment of passion.

(Frank Frazetta)

Iron Shadows in the Moon (Nov-Dec 1933)

First published in Weird Tales, April 1934 (as "Shadows in the Moonlight")

(Margaret Brundage)

After freeing a slave girl named Olivia from her Turanian master, Conan heads out on a small boat onto the Vilayet Sea, and allows the girl to accompany him. They arrive on an island where they discover strange ruins filled with iron sculptures of men. Conan fears something in the forest but will not explain what it is. In a dream, Olivia learns that the iron sculptures are men who had been cursed to immobility by an angry god for a crime which they had committed against the god’s son. However, moonlight seems to allow them movement. As Conan prepares to leave the island, pirates arrive. Meeting them at the shoreline, Conan kills their leader but is then taken captive when knocked out by a hidden slingshot. The pirates get drunk amongst the ruins of the iron statues.

Olivia later sneaks in and frees Conan just as moonlight begins to pour in. Heading towards the shore a giant grey man-ape attacks out of the forest. Conan barely manages to kill it. As Conan and Olivia head towards the pirates’ ship they hear the screams of the ship's crew as they are attacked by the cursed iron men in the ruins. At dawn, the battered pirates appear at the shore and try to swim out to their ship, but find Conan in control of it. After they pledge allegiance to him he allows them aboard. Olivia decides to remain with Conan and his new corsairs.

Conan struggles against the prodigiously strong man-ape of the forest.
(Hugh Rankin)

Xuthal of the Dusk (Nov-Dec 1933)

First published in Weird Tales, September 1933 (as "The Slithering Shadow")

The Stygian harlot Thalis brutalizes Conan's friend Natala.
(Margaret Brundage)

In the desert, Conan and a young female Brythunian named Natala flee from a Stygian army to the north. They discover a city but no living people are seen. When a corpse reanimates and attacks, Conan beheads it. In another room they discover another corpse. A dark shadow appears and spirits the body away. A third, living person appears, who believes Conan and Natalia to be dream figures. He identifies the city as Xuthal. When Conan tells him of the shadow he had just seen, the figure flees screaming.

They next encounter a beautiful Stygian woman named Thalis who explains that all of the people in the city enjoy the dream-visions of the Black Lotus (the "corpses" Conan had seen had only been dreaming men). She explains that the "dark shadow" is the god Thog which lurks in the city, sometimes taking sacrifice victims. Thalis tries to tempt Conan into remaining with her but he decides to stay with Natala. On the way out of the city, the two women suddenly disappear, and Conan hears Natala’s scream. When Thalis drags Natala through a hidden passage towards a ritual sacrifice room, Natala grabs her captor's dagger and injures her. Thalis retaliates by stringing Natale up and whipping her. However, the toad-like Thog appears and devours Thalis.

When Conan comes across a nude, bejeweled woman, the alarmed noble triggers a trapdoor.
(Jayem Wilcox)

Meanwhile, Conan is attacked by a squad of Xuthal soldiers. He kills several of them and escapes. When he comes across a nude, bejeweled woman, the alarmed woman triggers a trapdoor which leads Conan to an underground chamber where Natala is being attacked by Thog. Conan attacks Thog and drives his sword into the frog-demon’s neck. The creature flees down a well. Although Conan is seriously injured, he and Natala decide to try and escape the city. After Natala uses a Xuthal elixir to restore Conan’s strength, they head towards an oasis in the desert. Natala blames their misfortune on Thalis, but Conan cannot blame the Stygian girl for falling in love with him.

The Pool of the Black One (Nov-Dec 1933)

One of the black giants carries Conan's admirer Sancha back to towards the deadly ritual pool.
(Jayem Wilcox)

First published in Weird Tales, October 1933

Conan boards a Zingaran "freebooter" (pirate) ship named The Wastrel, although its moody captain, Zaporavo, is suspicious of him. The captain’s woman, Sancha, however is intrigued by the rash barbarian.

(Margaret Brundage)

Zaporavo soon takes his ship to an uncharted island in search of the mysterious Book of Skelos. As the crew become drunk on the island's shoreline fruits, Zaporavo heads inland. Conan follows him. Once far away enough from the ship's crew, Conan challenges Zaporavo to a duel for leadership of the Freebooters. Conan slays the pirate, but then sees a giant black figure with a white captive. He follows it to a green castle, where he sees it and other black figures perform a strange ritual over their captive, which Conan realizes is one of the young Freebooters. The black leader uses a strange flute to force the youngster to enact an obscene dance, after which he dips the sailor into a green pool. The giants then head back into the forest in search of more victims.

Conan finds that the green water had turned the sailor into a small statue, which had then been mounted on a wall of such statues. When one of the black giants returns with Sancha as its prisoner, Conan attacks and kills it. Soon, more of the black devils return, this time carrying drugged Freebooters. Conan orders Sancha to try and rouse their drugged companions while he distracts the demons. Conan leaps into their midst and kills a few, hoping to lead the remainder into the forest. Unfortunately he finds himself in a cul-de-sac. As the creatures prepare to take Conan by numbers, the other pirates suddenly appear and a full battle begins. The buccaneers gain the upper hand, but the leader of the demons summonses a great pillar of liquid from the green pool. Conan urges everyone to retreat, as the green wave pursues them out to sea. They finally get to their ship and escape the island.

Rogues in the House (Jan 1933)

Conan throws the harlot who had earlier betrayed him into a cesspool.
(Hugh Rankin)

First published in Weird Tales, January 1934

(Margaret Brundage)

When an aristocrat of Corinthia named Murilo feels that he is being blackmailed by the Red Priest Nabonidus, he decides to have the priest assassinated. Looking for an agent, he finds Conan in prison (betrayed by a harlot after he had killed a city informer) and provides a plan for his escape in return for accepting the assassination mission. Murilo later hears that his arrangements to break Conan out of jail have failed and decides that he must kill Nabonidus himself. When he arrives at Nabonidus’ house, he is horrified to see a demonic ape-creature wearing the Red Priest’s cowl and sitting in Nabonidus’ chair.

Meanwhile, Conan has managed to escape prison on his own, even without the completion of Murilo’s plan. After throwing the harlot who had earlier betrayed him into a cesspool, he eventually arrives at Nabonidus’ home to fulfill his mission. In the chambers below the house, he discovers Murilo and then Nabonidus himself. Nabonidus explains that the apelike creature (named Thak) is of a race of degenerate creatures from the far east which he had tried to enslave. However Thak had eventually rebelled and thrown him into the underground chambers. When a band of Nabonidus’ political rivals arrive on a mission of murder, Conan and his “rogue” friends use a mirrored viewing device to see Thak trap and kill them in a gas-filled room. While trying to escape, Murilo lures Thak into a corridor in order to give Conan an opportunity to attack Thak from behind. After a long battle Thak is killed. When the untrustworthy Nabonidus tries to lure Conan and Murilo into a death trap, Conan kills the priest by hurling a stool at him.

(Frank Frazetta)

The Vale of Lost Women (Feb 1933)

First published in Magazine of Horror, Spring 1967

(Virgil Finlay)

In the southern village of Bakalah, a white Ophirian woman is held captive by black savages led by a large man named Bajujh. Conan, war-chief of the neighboring tribe of the Bamulas, arrives at Bajujh’s invitation. Bajujh wants to form an alliance with Conan’s Bamulas in order to organize a joint raid on the city of Jihiji. When Livia asks Conan for his help (offering her body to him), he agrees to kill Bajujh, as he had been planning to anyways.

The next day, Conan makes good his promise and signals his Bamulas to surprise and massacre the unsuspecting Bakala warriors. When Conan throws Bajujh’s head into Livia’s prison room, she flees in terror at the prospect of becoming Conan’s slave. Leaping on to a horse, she makes her way to a cursed valley where flowers transformed from native humans supposedly dwell. She is captured by these small natives and laid on an altar. A bat-like monster descends from the stars, but before it can reach her Conan suddenly appears and kills it. Conan tells her that she is not qualified to be his queen and will arrange for her return home to Ophir.

The Devil in Iron (Oct-Nov 1933)

Conan defeats the giant snake guarding the meteorite-sword of the Yuetshi.
(Margaret Brundage)

First published in Weird Tales, August 1934

On the island of Xapur, a primitive Yuetshi fisherman enters a city of ruins and discovers a domed building which has recently been torn open by a lightning bolt. Inside, he finds a frozen, god-like figure. When he removes the strange sword lying on its breast, the figure comes to life and kills him.

On the mainland, Jehungir Agha, lord of Khawarizm, devises a plan to capture Conan, the leader of an army of kozaks which has been harassing his nation. He orders his concubine Octavia to catch Conan’s attention and eventually lure him to the island of Xapur so that Jehungir’s men can corner him alone there. Conan takes the bait and heads to Xapur alone, but when he arrives he is stunned to see that the famous ruins of Xapur have been restored into a great city. Inside he encounters confused beings which had lived thousands of years ago when the ruins had thrived as the city of Dagon. He has a vision of a monstrous creature of the Abyss arriving on Earth and then taking the form of an invulnerable giant, and then naming himself Khosatral Khel. However, Khosatral had eventually been captured and imprisoned in a domed structure by the Yuetshi, with the help of a strange sword made out of a meteorite.

Conan later finds Octavia in the city but Khosatral attacks they find that Khosatral is invulnerable to Conan’s sword. They try to barricade themselves but Khosatral slowly destroys the barrier. Just as Khosatral is about to get through, the “iron devil” is called to another part of the city, as Jehungir has arrived on Xapur in search of Conan. While Jehungir’s men are being slaughtered by Khosatral, Conan defeats a giant snake in order to obtain the meteorite-borne sword of the Yuetshi. Afterwards he and Octavia make their way to the cliffside escape stairs of the island. When Jehungir bars their way, Conan kills him, but is soon faced with Khosatral. Conan uses the Yuetshi blade to mortally injure the iron-skinned god. When the god finally expires, it reverts into a bizarre alien shape. The city reverts back into ruins, as Conan safely departs with Octavia.

After Conan mortally wounds the iron devil with the Yuetshi sword, it reverts back into a primordial alien shape.
(Hugh Rankin)