ramos
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Post by ramos on Aug 7, 2019 11:03:48 GMT -5
I always imagined Conan to be 188 cm or 6 f2. Because he is tall, heavily muscular and agile but not too tall to be lacking in agility. REH does mention people taller than conan like the black guy from Maneater of Zambula story but none stronger. I know that in the past people were shorter but lets disregard that because these are novels after all. What do you think?
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Post by Deleted on Aug 7, 2019 13:54:16 GMT -5
Hello Ramos. I think this has led to a little bit of confusion over the years. Here's an extract from Robert E. Howard's letter to P. Schuyler Miller and Dr. John D. Clark (March 10, 1936) Conan was about seventeen when he was introduced to the public in "The Tower of the Elephant." While not fully matured, he was riper than the average civilized youth at that age. He was born on a battle field, during a fight between his tribe and a horde of raiding Vanir. The country claimed by and roved over by his clan lay in the northwest of Cimmerian, but Conan was of mixed blood, although a pure-bred Cimmerian. His grandfather was a member of a southern tribe who had fled from his own people because of a blood-feud and after long wanderings, eventually taken refuge with the people of the north. He had taken part in many raids into the Hyborian nations in his youth, before his flight, and perhaps it was the tales he told of those softer countries which roused in Conan, as a child, a desire to see them. There are many things concerning Conan's life of which I am not certain myself. I do not know, for instance, when he got his first sight of civilized people. It might have been at Vanarium, or he might have made a peaceable visit to some frontier town before that. At Vanarium he was already a formidable antagonist, though only fifteen. He stood six feet and weighed 180 pounds, though he lacked much of having his full growth.
Here's the description of Conan (admittedly no mention of his height, but a fairly good idea concerning his build) from Tower of the Elephant: A touch on his tunic sleeve made him turn his head, scowling at the interruption. He saw a tall, strongly made youth standing beside him. This person was as much out of place in that den as a gray wolf among mangy rats of the gutters. His cheap tunic could not conceal the hard, rangy lines of his powerful frame, the broad heavy shoulders, the massive chest, lean waist, and heavy arms. His skin was brown from outland suns, his eyes blue and smoldering; a shock of tousled black hair crowned his broad forehead. From his girdle hung a sword in a worn leather scabbard. p.62, Conan of Cimmeria, volume 1, Wandering Star/Del Rey, 2002. Here's a helpful link: rehguide.wordpress.com/2010/12/22/conan-and-the-cormac-fitzgeoffrey-fallacy/Hope that helps.
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Post by Deleted on Aug 7, 2019 14:01:31 GMT -5
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Post by deuce on Aug 7, 2019 14:06:18 GMT -5
I always imagined Conan to be 188 cm or 6 f2. Because he is tall, heavily muscular and agile but not too tall to be lacking in agility. REH does mention people taller than conan like the black guy from Maneater of Zambula story but none stronger. I know that in the past people were shorter but lets disregard that because these are novels after all. What do you think? We know Kull was barely over 6ft. There were people just as tall OR TALLER than Conan in almost every one of Howard's Conan yarns. De Camp is the one who got the "Conan is 6ft6in tall" thing going. Al Harron worked up a list of all the "giants" mentioned in the REH Conan yarns (spoiler: there were a LOT), but I can't find it online at the moment. Maybe something for Amra_the_Lion to work up? My estimate is 6ft2in-6ft4in.
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Post by stubbs on Aug 7, 2019 15:12:03 GMT -5
In the Steve Costigan tales Big John Clancy is described as a giant at 6' 1 3/4" and 230lbs, so 6'2" would qualify.
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ramos
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Post by ramos on Aug 7, 2019 17:06:43 GMT -5
Thanks, Hun I will look at the old forum posts. If Howard referred to Big John Clancy as giant and Kull was almost 6 feet then maybe it is safe to assume that Conan was around 6'2".
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ramos
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Post by ramos on Aug 7, 2019 17:23:17 GMT -5
I dug this up from old Conan forum. This guest post sums it up I guess
Posted 18 December 2003 - 05:43 PM
Conan is 6'2 and 210 pounds. How do we know this? Because REH himself said that Cormac Fitzgeoffrey, the Norman-Irish knight he wrote about in 2 crusade stories was 6'2 and 210 pounds, in a letter to a friend. When you read the Cormac Fitgeoffrey stories it mentions that Cormac was a little over six feet in height and" had the build of a giant." In one of the tales, it mentions that even though some of the characters in a room were taller than Cormac, in the breadth of shoulder and size of his limbs he was the biggest man in the room. That should settle the arguments. All these WWF size guesses are way off. Remember, up till the steroid era, you seldom saw a man over 6'4 with a large build, simply because the mechanics involved vis a vis the length of bones to joints, etc. was against it. That is why when you look at pro bodybuilders the most massive are usually the guys under six feet. When I was in college taking advanced conditioning classes, our textbooks mentioned that 5'8 to 5'11 was the optimum heights for strength athletes. This began changing as new protein supplements and steroids hit the scene. I can still remember when Sid Vicious popped up in Wrestling, as at about 6'8 and 270 pounds he was roughly the size of Doc Savage. Nowadays it is common to see really tall guys with massive builds like that in some sports, including Worlds Strongest Man, and of course in pro wrestling. But in Howard's day, you seldom saw a man over six 2 or so with a massive build. John Grimek, a contemporary physique athlete back then was under six feet, and he had the build we think of as being "modern.
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Post by theironshadow on Aug 7, 2019 17:29:46 GMT -5
As someone himself is 6' 2" i've never given a great deal of consideration to height, but to think of Conan as a 'Giant Cimmerian' would suggest to me he would be approaching 6'4"+ height, and thus Jason Momoa's portrayal at about 6' 5" is spot on.
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Post by sorcerer on Aug 7, 2019 19:37:42 GMT -5
At Vanarium he was already a formidable antagonist, though only fifteen. He stood six feet and weighed 180 pounds, though he lacked much of having his full growth.
Yep. How much more is a man going to grow after age fifteen? Six inches?
Conan is 6'2".
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Post by stubbs on Aug 9, 2019 3:37:29 GMT -5
I dug this up from old Conan forum. This guest post sums it up I guess Posted 18 December 2003 - 05:43 PM Conan is 6'2 and 210 pounds. How do we know this? Because REH himself said that Cormac Fitzgeoffrey, the Norman-Irish knight he wrote about in 2 crusade stories was 6'2 and 210 pounds, in a letter to a friend. When you read the Cormac Fitgeoffrey stories it mentions that Cormac was a little over six feet in height and" had the build of a giant." In one of the tales, it mentions that even though some of the characters in a room were taller than Cormac, in the breadth of shoulder and size of his limbs he was the biggest man in the room. That should settle the arguments. All these WWF size guesses are way off. Remember, up till the steroid era, you seldom saw a man over 6'4 with a large build, simply because the mechanics involved vis a vis the length of bones to joints, etc. was against it. That is why when you look at pro bodybuilders the most massive are usually the guys under six feet. When I was in college taking advanced conditioning classes, our textbooks mentioned that 5'8 to 5'11 was the optimum heights for strength athletes. This began changing as new protein supplements and steroids hit the scene. I can still remember when Sid Vicious popped up in Wrestling, as at about 6'8 and 270 pounds he was roughly the size of Doc Savage. Nowadays it is common to see really tall guys with massive builds like that in some sports, including Worlds Strongest Man, and of course in pro wrestling. But in Howard's day, you seldom saw a man over six 2 or so with a massive build. John Grimek, a contemporary physique athlete back then was under six feet, and he had the build we think of as being "modern. I'm not sure what the origin of Cormac being 6'2" and 210lbs and being the same size as Conan but my understanding is that it's not actually mentioned in any of Howard's letters. Cormac is described as being “a fraction of an inch above six feet” and “two hundred pounds of iron muscle” in Hawks of Outremer so it doesn't fit for him anyway. 6'2" is still a reasonable height for Conan of course based on REH's writing.
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ramos
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Post by ramos on Aug 9, 2019 7:59:09 GMT -5
Hm, it leaves the question why did Howard only mention his height one time when Conan was a boy. Maybe he wanted to leave the correct measurements to our imagination. When you read a book the parts not mentioned are filled with your imagination so that is why the movie can never replace books. Maybe that is what Robert was aiming for
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Post by Deleted on Aug 9, 2019 9:26:31 GMT -5
I always imagined Conan to be 188 cm or 6 f2. Because he is tall, heavily muscular and agile but not too tall to be lacking in agility. REH does mention people taller than conan like the black guy from Maneater of Zambula story but none stronger. I know that in the past people were shorter but lets disregard that because these are novels after all. What do you think? We know Kull was barely over 6ft. There were people just as tall OR TALLER than Conan in almost every one of Howard's Conan yarns. De Camp is the one who got the "Conan is 6ft6in tall" thing going. Al Harron worked up a list of all the "giants" mentioned in the REH Conan yarns (spoiler: there were a LOT), but I can't find it online at the moment. Maybe something for Amra_the_Lion to work up? My estimate is 6ft2in-6ft4in. I managed to find The Filmgoer's Guide to Conan the Barbarian (1982): The Cimmerians by Al Harron. I can't seem to find the list of Giants post/article yet. I think this'll prove interesting. Here's a description of the Cimmerian's by REH: Cimmerians. These people were descendants of the ancient Atlanteans, though they themselves were unaware of their descent, having evolved by their own efforts from the ape-men to which their ancient ancestors had sunk. They were a tall powerful race, averaging six feet in height. They were black haired, and grey or blue eyed. They were dolichocephalic, and dark skinned, though not so dark as either the Zingarans, Zamorians or Picts - "Notes on Various Peoples," The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian, p348-349 ..and further similarities found in other REH characters of Irish descent: This man was nearly a head taller than the stocky fisherman, and he had the bearing of a fighting man. No single glance would suffice, but any man or woman whose eyes fell on Turlogh Dubh would look long. Six feet and one inch he stood, and the first impression of slimness faded on closer inspection. He was big but trimly molded; a magnificent sweep of shoulder and depth of chest. Rangy he was, but compact, combining the strength of a bull with the lithe quickness of a panther. The slightest movement he made showed that steel-trap coordination that makes the super-fighter. Turlogh Dubh--Black Turlogh, once of the Clan na O'Brien. And black he was as to hair, and dark of complexion. From under heavy black brows gleamed eyes of a hot volcanic blue. And in his clean-shaven face there was something of the somberness of dark mountains, of the ocean at midnight. Like the fisherman, he was a part of this fierce land.- Turlogh Dubh na O'Brien, "The Dark Man" This was a tall, rangily built man, deep-chested and strong, whose square-cut black hair and dark, smooth face contrasted with the yellow manes and beards about him. This man’s eyes were narrow slits and of a cold-steel grey, and they, with a number of scars that marred his face, lent him a peculiarly sinister aspect. He wore no gold ornaments of any kind and his mail was of chain mesh instead of the scale type worn by the men about him.- Cormac Mac Art, "Swords of the Northern Sea" FitzGeoffrey was clean-shaven and the various scars that showed on his dark, grim face lent his already formidable features a truly sinister aspect. When he took off his plain visorless helmet and thrust back his mail coif, his square-cut, black hair that topped his low broad forehead contrasted strongly with his cold blue eyes. A true son of the most indomitable and savage race that ever trod the bloodstained fields of battle, Cormac FitzGeoffrey looked to be what he was--a ruthless fighter, born to the game of war, to whom the ways of violence and bloodshed were as natural as the ways of peace are to the average man.- Cormac Fitzgeoffrey, "Hawks of Outremer" Here's a link to Al Harron's (Taranaich) post: theblogthattimeforgot.blogspot.com/2011/01/filmgoers-guide-to-conan-barbarian-1982_23.html
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Post by sorcerer on Aug 9, 2019 12:57:31 GMT -5
Cimmerians. These people were descendants of the ancient Atlanteans, though they themselves were unaware of their descent, having evolved by their own efforts from the ape-men to which their ancient ancestors had sunk. They were a tall powerful race, averaging six feet in height. They were black haired, and grey or blue eyed. They were dolichocephalic, and dark skinned, though not so dark as either the Zingarans, Zamorians or Picts - "Notes on Various Peoples," The Coming of Conan the Cimmerian, p348-349
I've never seen this before; thanks for posting it.
I always thought it odd that an ancestor of the notoriously fair-skinned Irish would be described with brown skin, particularly when Cimmeria itself was meant to be gloomy and dim. I suppose this is a holdover of the Cimmerians' Atlanean origin. But it's even stranger that Cimmerians would be narrow-skulled; Conan is never depicted this way, and modern Celts are meso- or brachycephalic, aren't they? Can you even imagine a dolichocephalic Conan?
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Post by theironshadow on Aug 11, 2019 4:14:01 GMT -5
I'm a celt myself (Scotland) and have always envisioned Conan as being modern day massive, in the sense that he was at least 6'4" with huge broad shoulders. Sure, we can visualise Conan as being just over 6 foot and having massive stature (Ron Perlman comes to mind, as i was watching Hellboy II last night) but Conan has always struck me as being effectively the biggest guy in the room. As for Conan's skin being bronzed, have you ever seen someone who is scottish or irish with a tan? You can STILL see the fair skin under the tan! A very distinct look!
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Post by sorcerer on Aug 11, 2019 16:18:06 GMT -5
It's a ruddier look that they'll show, yes. Cimmerians being brown skinned and narrow skulled, they are clearly not straightforward Scots or Irish. However, it's now understood that, before the Mediterranean farmers brought lighter skin North, Mesolithic Europeans had blue eyes and dark skin, just as Robert Howard imagined of the Cimmerians.
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