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Post by deuce on Apr 19, 2016 0:24:03 GMT -5
Mu and Lemuria figure into some of Howard's earliest yarns, like Men of the Shadows, The Shadow Kingdom and "The Isle of Eons" fragment. "IoE" is quite interesting because REH kept coming back to it, rewriting it over a span of several years (something he very rarely did). In that fragment we encounter "facts" about Howard's Thurian Age that we find nowhere else. We can also see Howard's evolving views regarding Mu and Lemuria (the histories of which are major concerns in that story). As I'll show in future posts, "Mu", as REH used the concept, was a very new thing when he began using the "lost Pacific continent" as a background/setting within his yarns. The "Lemuria" concept had been around for about a century, but Howard radically redefined it for his stories. It would appear his concepts of both landmasses evolved somewhat over the 1925-1932 time-period. Howard, in his "The Hyborian Age" guideline, had this to say about the Lemurian Isles: The barbarians of the [Thurian] age were the Picts, who lived on islands far out on the Western Ocean, the Atlanteans, who dwelt on a small continent between the Pictish islands and the Thurian continent, and the Lemurians, who inhabited a chain of large islands in the Eastern Hemisphere.Sorry Lin Carter (and Helena Blavatsky). No "Lemurian continent". Churchward's map from 1930:  |
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Post by kullagain on Apr 24, 2016 16:19:52 GMT -5
Hey just gonna repost some of the theory I postulated in the Thurian Age thread with respect to the elder race and Mu. Just to preface though, I do equip some of Marek's more sounder sounding arguments here: www.angelfire.com/tx3/robertehoward/kull1.htmlI had proposed that the Mu pantheon aside from Xultha the ape-god became embedded in the roots of Valusian civilization due to Mu peoples furtively spreading such worship while escaping the religious persecution of Nyulah's polity. I did not deny the theory of serpent men worship balking Xultha worship before Mu sank. After Mu's sinking and the overthrow of serpent men tyranny, I think these Mu refugees became free to spread their beliefs liberally and caused this pantheon to be passed down. I also felt this explained the presence of an elder race in shrinking populous found in some Kull tales. I think " elder race=Mu refugees" equation is supported by the elder race possessing such unique features compared to the rest of the humans in the Thurian age (eg violet eyes). Also, Mu in this lore was isolated by water like Atlantis, except to greater lengths I believe ( Atlantis scholars usually placed it in and Europe while Mu is placed much farther from Europe between Asia and North America, which likely provided REH his base for his own versions). A very isolated continent would impede interracial breeding, probably to an intensity of taboo, and foster the preservation and perhaps even the creation of such unique human features. Perhaps that’s also the cause for the elder race becoming so scant to extinct—their genes were phasing out through interbreeding and seed too weak to pass on in procreation. This would be analogous to Brule’s forecast in TSK of the serpent men dying out due to breeding with snakes. Also, Mu was a land that sank before it was cool, and clearly a race so old to precede Thurian civilization would befit the name elder race. |
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Post by deuce on Apr 24, 2016 16:56:36 GMT -5
Also, Mu was a land that sank before it was cool... Hey KA! From whence did you derive that Muvian fact? |
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Post by kullagain on Apr 24, 2016 18:20:00 GMT -5
Also, Mu was a land that sank before it was cool... Hey KA! From whence did you derive that Muvian fact? You know, I thought I saw this in Men of the Shadows, Mirrors--, or even TSK, but it seems I confused it with Lemuria when it was still a continent, before the mountain peaks became isles. I did also see it in Marek's article, but again I thought this item was corroborated by passages in the aforementioned stories.  Reexamining TSK, I can see "men of Mu and Lemuria" are clearly at Kull's royal welcome. Lemuria it seems did sink before Atlantis, but not during Kull's time. Strangely Mu is not often referred at all, with not even a mention in The Hyborian Age. "Me=owned" lol.  I really need to read Isle of Eons. So curious to the source of the Thurian pantheon and this elder race. Maybe there is still some sort of link... |
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Post by deuce on Apr 24, 2016 21:26:42 GMT -5
Hey KA! From whence did you derive that Muvian fact? You know, I thought I saw this in Men of the Shadows, Mirrors--, or even TSK, but it seems I confused it with Lemuria when it was still a continent, before the mountain peaks became isles. I did also see it in Marek's article, but again I thought this item was corroborated by passages in the aforementioned stories. According to REH, Poseidon cast down Mu. See, this is one reason I was holding off commenting on the "Gods" thread.  There's really nothing in Howard's writings (other than IotE, where "Lemuria" and "Mu" go back and forth) to indicate that Lemuria was ever a "continent". A massive archipelago bigger than anything now? Yeah. |
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Post by deuce on Apr 24, 2016 21:51:05 GMT -5
Reexamining TSK, I can see "men of Mu and Lemuria" are clearly at Kull's royal welcome. Lemuria it seems did sink before Atlantis, but not during Kull's time. Strangely Mu is not often referred at all, with not even a mention in The Hyborian Age. REH stated in Marchers of Valhalla that Lemuria and Atlantis sank at the same time. He says the same in the "Hyborian Age" guideline. Mu is never mentioned in THA, but it is mentioned in MoV. Here is the quote from TSK: "Behind those proud and terrible ranks came the motley files of the
mercenaries, fierce, wild-looking warriors, men of Mu and of Kaa-u and
of the hills of the east and the isles of the west. They bore spears
and heavy swords, and a compact group that marched somewhat apart were
the bowmen of Lemuria." Some have attempted to say that Mu and Lemuria were the same thing in Howard's universe. The "men of Mu" and "the bowmen of Lemuria" are obviously two separate ethnic groups. As mercs, they would march together if they were ethnically the same. You do need to read IotE. I'm sure you'd love it (and the possibilities REH left open). As far as the "Elder Race" goes, any purported Muvian connection is so far back as to make it worthless. This from "Mirrors": "Time strides onward," said Tuzun Thune calmly. "We live today; what
care we for tomorrow--or yesterday? The Wheel turns and nations rise
and fall; the world changes, and times return to savagery to rise
again through the long age. Ere Atlantis was, Valusia was, and ere
Valusia was, the Elder Nations were. Aye, we, too, trampled the
shoulders of lost tribes in our advance. You, who have come from the
green sea hills of Atlantis to seize the ancient crown of Valusia, you
think my tribe is old, we who held these lands ere the Valusians came
out of the East, in the days before there were men in the sea lands.
But men were here when the Elder Tribes rode out of the waste lands,
and men before men, tribe before tribe.The "Elder Race" rode out of the waste lands (probably as barbarians). By all means, start an "Elder Race" thread. Way, way too much nonsense has been bandied about in their name and it should get straightened out. |
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Post by deuce on Apr 24, 2016 23:24:20 GMT -5
The first page of the Hyborian Age essay ("CoC", p.381), third paragraph:
"They (the non-Thurians/proto-Stygians) apparently came from a shadowy and nameless continent lying somewhere east of the Lemurian Islands."
Placing the Lemurian Isles is problematic, but most likely (judging from the references by REH) they were a large archipelago situated 30 degrees either side of the 180th meridian and between the 15th and 30th parallels.
From The Conquering Sword of Conan (the "Miller letter"), p.361:
"He (Conan) even visited a nameless continent in the western hemisphere and roamed among the islands adjacent to it."
Once again, a "nameless continent". Some have suggested Mu as a candidate for the "nameless continent". There are definite problems with this interpretation. First and foremost, Robert E. Howard "named" Mu several times in his yarns. That's kind of the opposite of "nameless". Secondly, every indication that we have from Howard is that Mu lay south of Lemuria and roughly on the same longitude. That rules out the "nameless continent" that lies "somewhere east of the Lemurian Islands" (and therefore, west of the western/"Thurian" coast of the Thurian continent). Also, it would definitely appear that the "nameless continent" in the Miller letter is Central/South America, so how could the "nameless continent" ALSO be (the much-named) Mu? In the yarns I mentioned above, as well as in tales like The Black Stone, The Valley of the Lost, The Thing on the Roof and the "Nekht Semerkhet" fragment, the indications are very strong that a "continent" that included TX, the Gulf Coast, the Caribbean islands as well as Central/South America was inhabited by a "pre-Indian" people (very likely related to the Stygians) from a very early date, quite probably from pre-Thurian times. Even senile old Gonar (in Men of the Shadows) mentions a "southern continent" ("southern" in relation to the Pictish Isles which were the peaks of the present west coast of North America).
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Post by bobbyderie on May 3, 2016 18:24:32 GMT -5
REH also sort of foresaw some of Phillip Jose Farmer's "Ancient Opar" mythology in "Khoda Khan's Tale" (unfinished, published in The Early El Borak), placing a remnant or colony of a lost civilization in Africa, where it became isolated and degenerated...
"Valooze" of course could be a corruption of "Valusia." H. P. Lovecraft also played with Edgar Rice Burroughs' idea of a "white" race in Africa in his tale "Facts Concerning the Late Arthur Jermyn and His Family," which in some ways is a pastiche of Burroughs' Tarzan.
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Post by deuce on May 5, 2016 0:40:02 GMT -5
To the best of my knowledge (the "Isle of Eons" fragments are a special case), the only REH yarns that mention Pacific islands that were once Lemurian mountaintops would be Men of the Shadows and The Curse of the Golden Skull. Gonar, in "MotS" seems to be talking about the Hawaiian Islands. In "Skull", the explorer/archaeologist appears to have found an uncharted tropical island. Basically, it looks like REH envisioned an archipelago stretching from the Hawaiian Islands to Micronesia. I don't see any way that Howard didn't figure in Pohnpei (Ponape) and its ruins of Nan Madol as being a remnant of Lemuria. Pohnpei was quite famous in the early 20th century due to A. Merritt's The Moon Pool, which posits it as the last bastion of "Muria". It is almost certain that REH read that novel. IMO, the Lemurian Isles would be a little closer to the Asian coast than to the Pictish Isles (the future US/Canadian "West Coast"), I still think the closeness to Asia has been exaggerated by pasticheurs, etc... In the Hyborian Age essay, REH notes that there was only occasional contact between the Lemurians and the "proto-Stygians". This doesn't really seem to imply close proximity. Meanwhile, we know that the Lemurians had serious conflicts with the Picts AND ruled colonies on what would be the "Gulf Coast" AND raided Atlantis. Probably a big reason that we hear about the Lemurians in east Asia (from REH) is because the ones who fled west during the Cataclysm died. The upheaval in the Pictish Isles seems to have wiped out the vast majority of those tough bastards (the Picts, that is), so it's hard to see how Lemurian refugees could've washed-up on those shaky lands and survived (though it's possible). If they'd fled farther west (which might've been impossible due to the ongoing uplift), I bet that their former colonial subjects in the "Lemurian Raj" gave 'em a warm, red, bloody welcome. So, the east Asian coast (which, at least, was stable, according to REH) was one of the few viable options.  |
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Post by zarono on May 5, 2016 5:36:09 GMT -5
Hey Deuce, do you think the primeval dark kingdom in the poem "The Symbol" could be a reference to the Howardian Mu or is it some older evil empire?
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Post by deuce on May 10, 2016 17:10:08 GMT -5
Hey Deuce, do you think the primeval dark kingdom in the poem "The Symbol" could be a reference to the Howardian Mu or is it some older evil empire? My instinct has always been to consider it referencing pre-human civilizations, but a case could be made for Mu. |
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Post by kullagain on May 10, 2016 22:53:24 GMT -5
Reexamining TSK, I can see "men of Mu and Lemuria" are clearly at Kull's royal welcome. Lemuria it seems did sink before Atlantis, but not during Kull's time. Strangely Mu is not often referred at all, with not even a mention in The Hyborian Age. REH stated in Marchers of Valhalla that Lemuria and Atlantis sank at the same time. He says the same in the "Hyborian Age" guideline. Mu is never mentioned in THA, but it is mentioned in MoV. Haven't read MoV yet, but the Hyborian Age has this passage on the subject: " Then the Cataclysm rocked the world. Atlantis and Lemuria sank, and
the Pictish Islands were heaved up to form the mountain peaks of a new
continent." To me this didn't really specify an order or simultaneity of sinking, but then again its highly doubtful that there would be a meaningful gap in time between sinkings. However I will say that in MotS it's implied that Lemuria did sink first. Gonar talks about the nameless tribe, then alludes to "renegades" of them having fled from the "fish-like" race to Lemuria. He then talks about "Lemurians far[ing] on the upward climb." Then Lemuria is stated to have sank. He then he speaks of the second race, the lemurians, after the sinking (possibly an early literary prototype of the elder race, but I'll expand on that in the elder race thread when it's made  ). After all this he introduces the Atlanteans, referring them as the third race. This seems to imply that the Atlanteans only started to appear after Lemuria sank, thus placing Atlantis' sinking meaningfully afterward. This is on pages 24-25 of the del rey edition of Bran Mak Morn. All the relevant passages are pretty long together, so I avoided typing it all out.  Ultimately, MotS is an earlier written tale, and it seems to be anachronistic with The Thurian Age so its canonical relevance can be superseded by the later THA and MoV, but I still think it warrants noting the earlier ideas of world building REH surveyed. |
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Post by deuce on May 11, 2016 0:10:24 GMT -5
the Hyborian Age has this passage on the subject: " Then the Cataclysm rocked the world. Atlantis and Lemuria sank, and
the Pictish Islands were heaved up to form the mountain peaks of a new
continent." To me this didn't really specify an order or simultaneity of sinking, but then again its highly doubtful that there would be a meaningful gap in time between sinkings. There is nothing to indicate a "staggered Great Cataclysm". Once again, there is nothing in "The Hyborian Age" (or REH's Conan-era tales) to indicate that. The thing to remember is that Gonar was a half-mad devil-worshipper mumbling tales from 100,000yrs ago before Bran Mak Morn got his mind right. |
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Post by kullagain on May 16, 2016 22:08:36 GMT -5
Hey hey, Gonar had his moments, he brought Kull into the future didn't he? Don't hate the ancient hate the antiquity. On a side note, Gonar feels like a different character between MoS and KotN. In the former he feels like the irritable, crazy sage archetype with a dash of shifty, while in the latter he's more just a straight Yoda type, at least to start (despite the opening sacrifice). |
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Post by deuce on May 27, 2016 22:16:07 GMT -5
Hey Deuce, do you think the primeval dark kingdom in the poem "The Symbol" could be a reference to the Howardian Mu or is it some older evil empire? My instinct has always been to consider it referencing pre-human civilizations, but a case could be made for Mu. By all means, Z, if you see things that would indicate Mu, point them out. I may not have considered an important factor. Without a doubt, the Symbol is as old as Mu. It's certainly not of Hyborian Age vintage. Every theorem needs tested. |
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). After all this he introduces the Atlanteans, referring them as the third race. This seems to imply that the Atlanteans only started to appear after Lemuria sank, thus placing Atlantis' sinking meaningfully afterward. 