"Shadows in Zamboula" is one of the original stories by Robert E. Howard about Conan the Cimmerian, first published in Weird Tales in November 1935. Its original title was "The Man-Eaters of Zamboula".
The story takes place over the course of a night in the desert city of Zamboula, with political intrigue amidst streets filled with roaming cannibals. This story also introduced a fearsome strangler named Baal-Pteor, who is one of the few humans in the Conan stories to be a physical challenge for the main character himself.
By present-day sensibilities, the story is marred by including a racial stereotype - blacks as cannibals - though Howard strove to lessen this by making it clear that the cannibals in Zamboula are only the specific blacks from Darfar, other blacks being untainted. A white character, Aram Baksh, proves to be a more sinister antagonist by facilitating, exploiting, and profiting from the cannibalism of the Dafari slaves.
Plot summary
Despite the warning he received in a suq by an elderly nomad, Conan spends the night at a cheap tavern in Zamboula, owned by Aram Baksh. As night falls, a black cannibal from Dafar enters his chamber, by means of a trick lock, to drag Conan away and feast on him. All of the Darfarian slaves in the city are cannibals who roam the streets at night. Since the cannibals only prey on travelers, the inhabitants of the city tolerate this and stay locked securely in their homes, while nomads and beggars make sure to spend the night at a comfortable distance from Zamboula. Even worse, Aram Baksh has made a deal with the cannibals - he provides them with "fresh meat" and profits from the belongings of his ill-fated guests at the inn. This night, however, the unfortunate cannibal attempts to prey on a fully aware Conan and pays with his life. Realizing his room is actually a trap, Conan escapes into the Zamboulan streets where he encounters a naked woman being attacked by the roaming cannibals. Conan rescues her, and the woman tells him how she tried to secure her fiancé's affection with a love potion, which instead made a raving lunatic of him, and he chased her out of their home. After promising Conan "a reward" for his assistance, the two capture the mad lover, and then attempt to murder the high priest responsible for the lover's insanity.
The woman is captured in their attempt, and forced - via hypnotism - to dance before the high priest until she is exhausted. Conan, after defeating a strangler named Baal-Pteor at his own game, rescues the woman and kills the corrupt priest. Right before Conan could claim his payment, the woman reveals herself as Nafertari, mistress of the satrap of Zamboula, Jungir Khan (the insane lover). Taking the antidote to Jungir, Nafertari promises Conan a position in her council and vast wealth.
Conan, however, leaves the city and reveals to the reader how he had recognized the two almost immediately. He takes his revenge on Aram Baksh by cutting out Baksh's tongue and slicing off his beard. Soon, Conan renders him both mute and unrecognizable. Eventually, he turns Baksh over to the hungry cannibals so they can devour him (one of the most profound displays of Conan's ironic sense of humor). After dealing with Aram Baksh, Conan leaves the city with a bag of gold and a magic ring which started the night's intrigues (Conan had stolen it from the insane Jungir during their first encounter), with the intent of selling his prize to another interested party.
Reprint history
The story was republished in the collections Conan the Barbarian (Gnome Press, 1954), Conan the Wanderer (Lancer Books, 1968), and The Devil in Iron (Grant, 1976). It has more recently been published in the collections The Conan Chronicles Volume 1: The People of the Black Circle (Gollancz, 2000) as "Shadows in Zamboula" and in Conan of Cimmeria: Volume Three (1935–1936) (Del Rey, 2005) under its original title, "The Man-Eaters of Zamboula." The story was also published in Karl Edward Wagner's Berkley Medallion Editions (Red nails, People of the Black Circle and Hour of the Dragon), published by Berkley Books in 1977. The story is also found in 'The Essential Conan' published in 1998 by the Science Fiction Book Club. This collection contains the Conan stories as edited back to their original form by Karl Edward Wagner in 1977 Berkley editions.
Adaptation
The story was adapted by Roy Thomas and Neal Adams in Savage Sword of Conan #14. The story has also been adapted by publishing company Ablaze in their "Cimmerian" series of comics.
External links
Wikisource has original text related to this article:
Conan the Barbarian is a fictional sword and sorcery hero who originated in pulp magazines and has since been adapted to books, comics, films, television programs, video games, and role-playing games. Robert E. Howard created the character in 1932 for a series of fantasy stories published in Weird Tales magazine.
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"The Devil in Iron" is one of the original stories by American writer Robert E. Howard about sword and sorcery hero Conan the Cimmerian, first published in Weird Tales in August 1934. Howard earned $115 for the publication of this story.
"The Vale of Lost Women" is a fantasy short story by American author Robert E. Howard. It is one of his original short stories about Conan the Cimmerian that was not published during his lifetime. The Magazine of Horror first published the story in its Spring, 1967 issue. Set in the fictional Hyborian Age, "The Vale of Lost Women" details Conan's rescue of a female Ophirean captive from the Bakalah tribe, on the (apparent) condition that he will receive sexual favors in return for his generosity.
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"The Hyborian Age" is an essay by Robert E. Howard pertaining to the Hyborian Age, the fictional setting of his stories about Conan the Cimmerian. It was written in the 1930s but not published during Howard's lifetime. Its purpose was to maintain consistency within his fictional setting. Howard opens the essay stating "When I began writing the Conan stories a few years ago, I prepared this 'history' of his age and the peoples of that age, in order to lend him and his sagas a greater aspect of realness."
Conan of the Isles is a fantasy novel by American writers L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter, featuring Robert E. Howard's sword and sorcery hero Conan the Barbarian. It was first published October 1968 in paperback by Lancer Books, and reprinted in July 1970, 1972, and May 1973; publication was then taken over by Ace Books, which reprinted the novel in May 1977, May 1979, April 1980, July 1981, April 1982, November 1982, November 1983, June 1984, September 1986, February 1991, and May 1994. The first British edition was published in paperback by Sphere Books in December 1974 a number of times since by various publishers. It has also been translated into French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Spanish, Russian and (supposedly) Japanese.
Conan the Wanderer is a 1968 collection of four fantasy short stories by American writers Robert E. Howard, L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter, featuring Howard's sword and sorcery hero Conan the Barbarian. Most of the stories were originally published in various fantasy magazines. The book has been reprinted a number of times since by various publishers, and has also been translated into German, Japanese, Spanish, Dutch, Swedish and Italian. It was later gathered together with Conan the Adventurer and Conan the Buccaneer into the omnibus collection The Conan Chronicles 2 (1990).
Bêlit is a character appearing in the fictional universe of Robert E. Howard's Conan the Barbarian. She is a pirate queen who has a romantic relationship with Conan. She appears in Howard's Conan short story "Queen of the Black Coast", first published in Weird Tales #23. She is the first substantial female character to appear in Howard's Conan stories. Partly thanks to her substantial appearance in the Marvel Comics' Conan series, the character is recognized as being Conan's "true love".
Conan the Barbarian is a collection of five fantasy short stories by American writer Robert E. Howard, featuring his sword and sorcery hero Conan the Barbarian, first published in hardcover by Gnome Press in 1955. The stories originally appeared in the 1930s in the fantasy magazine Weird Tales. This collection never saw publication in paperback; instead, its component stories were divided and distributed among other "Conan" collections. A later collection with the same title but different contents was issued in paperback by Del Rey/Ballantine Books in 2011.
The Conan books are sword and sorcery fantasies featuring the character of Conan the Cimmerian originally created by Robert E. Howard. Written by numerous authors and issued by numerous publishers, they include both novels and short stories, the latter assembled in various combinations over the years by the several publishers. The character has proven durably popular, resulting in Conan stories being produced after Howard's death by such later writers as Poul Anderson, Leonard Carpenter, Lin Carter, L. Sprague de Camp, Roland J. Green, John C. Hocking, Robert Jordan, Sean A. Moore, Björn Nyberg, Andrew J. Offutt, Steve Perry, John Maddox Roberts, Harry Turtledove, and Karl Edward Wagner. Some of these writers finished incomplete Conan manuscripts by Howard, or rewrote Howard stories which originally featured different characters. Most post-Howard Conan stories, however, are completely original works. In total, more than fifty novels and dozens of short stories featuring the Conan character have been written by authors other than Howard. This article describes and discusses notable book editions of the Conan stories.
Red Nails is a 1977 collection of three fantasy short stories and one essay by American writer Robert E. Howard, featuring his sword and sorcery hero Conan the Barbarian. The collection was edited by Karl Edward Wagner. It was first published in hardcover by Berkley/Putnam in 1977, and in paperback by Berkley Books the same year. It was reprinted in hardcover for the Science Fiction Book Club, also in 1977, and combined with the Wagner-edited The Hour of the Dragon and The People of the Black Circle in the book club's omnibus edition The Essential Conan in 1998. The stories originally appeared in the fantasy magazine Weird Tales in the 1930s.
The Essential Conan is a collection of fantasy short stories written by Robert E. Howard featuring his sword and sorcery hero Conan the Barbarian. The book was published in 1998 by the Science Fiction Book Club. It collects the editions of the Conan books, edited by Karl Edward Wagner and published by Berkley Books in 1977. Most of the stories originally appeared in the magazines Weird Tales, The Phantagraph and The Howard Collector. The Wagner editions were the first to virtually reproduce Howard's original stories without any editorial changes other than typo fixes.
Conan the Invincible is a fantasy novel by American writer Robert Jordan, featuring Robert E. Howard's sword and sorcery hero Conan the Barbarian. It was first published in paperback by Tor Books in June 1982 and reprinted in July 1990; a trade paperback edition followed by the same publisher in 1998. The first British edition was published in paperback by Sphere Books in September 1989; a later British edition was published in paperback by Legend Books in August 1996. It was later gathered together with Conan the Defender and Conan the Unconquered into the hardcover omnibus collection The Conan Chronicles.
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