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LifeMaiden

LifeMaiden

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If Aslan created Narnia then who created the lands that are in The Horse and His Boy? And the Calomels, those dark-skinned people who resembled Turks or Tartars...if they were not sons and daughters of Adam and Eve, who were they and where did they come from?
 
I've always speculated that there was some unmentioned portal through which slipped some middle Asians into the Narnian universe. There's a timeline kicking around somewhere, putatively written by Lewis but first published by Walter Hooper in his book Past Watchful Dragons. The timeline claims that Calormen was founded by renegade Archenlanders early in Narnian history. That's one of the reasons I doubt the timeline's authenticity. Hooper was strongly suspected of publishing works not written by Lewis under Lewis' name posthumously (this is known as the Dark Tower controversy), and since nobody had seen this timeline before Hooper published it, I've got my questions.

My thoughts are that Calormen is just too alien a culture to be founded by a few renegade Archenlanders. The whole social structure seems too completely middle Asian to have been created that way - and then there's the racial question. There are some threads discussing whether the Calormenes are Muslim (my contention: they're not - Muslims wouldn't have an idol like Tash.) It's an interesting speculation for some fan fiction - the origins of the Calormenes. I seriously wonder what Lewis was thinking.

Even more important was the role the Calormenes played in the Narnian universe. They're first mentioned in Caspian and play at least bit parts in three of the remaining books, and are ultimately the worldly cause of the end of Narnia. They're a cruel, power-driven culture (Law of the Fist, as I mention in the Abortion thread), and seem both more populous and more militarily powerful than Narnia. How that relates to the small, peaceful land of Narnia is a fascinating thing to consider.
 
Hi Potw,

As usual your replies are very interesting and informative :)

I don't know where I am going to find the time to read as much as I want to between working full time ( though I do set my own schedule with personal training, I am trying to pay off my house here LOL so I am working much more than usual) and trying to read the seven books as well as other CS Lewis readings and studies. I don't think one can fully appreciate a story if they don't know anything about the author.

I was curious because Tolkien was a lot more clearer in terms of the origins of all his characters...the elves, dwarves, and men, as well as the Istari and the Valar, etc, etc.

I had read on another forum where both Tolkien and CS Lewis were accused of being racist ( by today's standards, let's not forget what era they wrote in, because if one were to accuse authors of the past of being racist there'd be a lot more than a handful) because of their depictions of darker-skinned people as savage and evil. ( note that Tolkien's descriptions of the Harad and the Easterlings somewhat resemble Turks/Tartars and Mongols as well, as did his race of the Dark Men). I thought it was an interesting observation, but I never let things like that obscure the value of the reading material for myself.

I thought the Calormel and the little map that was in the Horse and His Boy very much reminded me of Turkish people. The man who wants to buy Shasta as his slave was like a Turkish Janissary to me.
 
Good post! Thanks for the info re: Hooper

I hadn't yet heard or read of the controversy over Hooper. I took the time line at face value, thinking that it was plausible, especially if you toss in (how many years?) from the time the renagades founded Calormen till the time of H&HB, and also add in Aslan's judgement upon them by turning the land into a desert (did that idea also come from Hooper?).

QUESTION, PotW--what's your opinion overall of "Past Watchful Dragons"? Until now, it was on my must read list. In your opinion, is it a worth while read?


Good point as to why the Calormen are in the Chronicles. They are quite a contrast to the Narnians. And, most importantly, we see people like Aravis being called "daughter" by Aslan, showing that the contrast, at its root, is not cultural but spiritual.
 
good point about Aravis, and of course the discourse with Emeth beyond the Stable Door.

I haven't read Watchful Dragons, and by the time I wanted to, it was out of print. My exposure to the Dark Tower controversy was second hand, through my friend Sheldon Vanauken (a student of Lewis). He knew the late Lewis scholar Kay Lindskoog, author of The Lion of Judah in Never-Never Land (http://www.lindentree.org/), and was aware of her research into the questioned stories. It's impossible to know, of course, but Van gave Lindskoog lots of credit for scholarship and believability. Unfortunately, the discussion seemed to deteriorate into a "Lindskoog vs. Hooper" personality dispute, with people taking sides, etc., while the actual questions got lost.

I do know this: I agree with Lindskoog and Vanauken that Dark Tower doesn't seem like Lewis' style, and the fact that he hadn't mentioned the work to anyone else but Hooper seems odd, considering how open he was with his other works. That plus the embarrassment that Hooper put everyone through after Lewis' death, popping up and claiming to be his intimate personal secretary and bosom friend for years, only to have to backtrack under sharp criticism and admit that he barely knew Lewis and had only worked with him for a few months - in my book that makes Hooper a Suspicious Character.
 
Emeth, that was his name! Hard to remember while still sitting in an office ....

... and thanks for the link re: Mrs. Lindskoog. I did do some searching around in her site, as well as "all the web" (I don't like google) search around for the contraversy.

My concern so far is this: she seems to be the only one that promoted the idea that Hooper was exagerating his relationship with Lewis.

Take this article from Christianity Today, for example: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/012/9.28.html

They didn't seem to have any issues with quoting Hooper. Not an overwhelmingly convincing bit of evidence, I admit. But add to it this:

https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2001/129/22.0.html

Again, Christianity Today doesn't seem to convinced.

But I admit, I just learned of this topic today, thanks to your post. There may be quite a bit more out there that supports Mrs. Lindskoog's claim, but at the moment she is the only one I can find.

I will give her credit for this, rushing through her site as I did, I got the impression that she ws someone who loved the Chronicles for their reflection of Christ's truth, and she had a passion for digging into and exposing fraud.

Pretty impressive passions, but I'm not ready to believe her conclusions just yet.
 
I think that originally, when Lewis wrote the LWW, Narnia was the name of the world that the children entered. Eventually, we realise that Narnia is a country with other countries around it. Thus, the word "Narnia" is used two ways. First, as the country, and second, as the whole world. For example, at the beginning of the world, Aslan created everything, not simply one country. At the end of the world when they reach the "New Narnia" it is not merely the country of Narnia but also Calormen (though with no one living there)

So I think that Aslan created Calormen. It is also part of the "world" of Narnia, just not the country
 
The Calormens,the people you call turks, came from the line of King Frank & Queen Helen,the cab driver and his wife who came into Narnia with Digory,Polly,Digory's Uncle & Jadis the witch, They[Frank & Helen] were Crowned the first King & Queen of Narnia by Aslan; later on some of their Descendents ran away & became the Rulers of Archenland & Calormen.
 
If you read The Last Battle-I'm not super sure but I know it's somewhere in 1 of the 7 Chronicles...-It states that the Calormenes descended from Telmarines. Not the Telmarines of Prince Caspian, but wicked men who inhabited Telmar before Caspian's Telmarines' coming.(The latter were descendants of Pirates who were shipwreaked on an island n' intermarried w/ the natives. These came through a portal to Narnia) The ORIGINAL Telmarines wouldn't obey Aslan and ultimately were judged. He turned most into rabbits, but some fled South to Calormene and populated there. :)
 
sirpeterWBfan said:
The Calormens,the people you call turks, came from the line of King Frank & Queen Helen,the cab driver and his wife who came into Narnia with Digory,Polly,Digory's Uncle & Jadis the witch, They[Frank & Helen] were Crowned the first King & Queen of Narnia by Aslan; later on some of their Descendents ran away & became the Rulers of Archenland & Calormen.
Click to expand...


Whoaaa....that didn't even occur to me so much time had gone by but of course when Narnia was first created...yes, that time goes by differently in that world than in ours. Ahhh...but how funny that these people became so distinctive looking and culturally varied.


Which book of the Chronicles talked about the descendants of the first King and Queen of Narnia?
 
Don't forget that in Prince Caspian when Aslan is explaining to the Telmarines how they came to Narnian he says that there were formerly "chinks or chasms" between Narnia and Earth. That plus the non-linear relationship between Narnian and Earth time allows plenty of scope for some humans of Turkish or Moorish extraction to have slipped through into Narnia at some time - and I think this is more plausible than making them the descendents of King Frank and Queen Helen.
 
In Magician's Nephew, both Aslan and the narrative speak of the descendants of Frank and Helen becoming kings of Narnia and Archenland.

Also, in Caspian, when Aslan mentions the "chinks and chasms", He specially notes that though the one through which the Telmarine's ancestors came was "one of the last ones", it was not "the last one".
 
I remember the part in the Magician's Nephew about the first king and the queen, but it just seems so unlikely that their descendants would take on the appearance of Turkish or people of Tartar descent. Hmm...must be evolution from living in the desert :D ...I think you're right, Malacandra, about those people slipping through into Narnia.

I love this book the Horse and His Boy. That guy in there, the Tisroc, reminds me of a sultan from Arabian Nights or something.
 
I do not think the Calormenes were descended from Frank and Helen; Im with IM, no matter how much time had passed, they wouldn't start looking racially unlike.

And I remember that bit about the door the Telmarines came through being one of the last; so it makes sense, some Turks pr Persians (or Parthians) could have dropped through and stayed in Narnia. That makes way more sense to me than having them descend from the Telmarines or from Frank and Helen.
 
Well, 1stly, Alsan created the whole world, not just Narnia
Whnen it came to the oragins of the people of Calorman, there seen to be 2 theroes 1. They are decended from Frank and Helen or 2. they came from our world at a later date. They both have some evidence to suport them. C.S.Lweis ourline of NArnian history dose say that there decendecnt of F and H,. However, I agree that its unkikely, givin there ethical background. Maybe both? Some decendendes of F and H intermared with some other humans who came by magic from our world. But as Lewis never seens to have said, its one of those thing well never know.
 
Well it would certainly make for some interesting fanfic...maybe that's why sometimes authors often leave a few loose ends...questions which they never answer can be answered in turn by other writers :D
 
I think in this case, Lewis was just being lazy. Tolkien chided him for not being more careful about establishing these kind of details, but then I think Tolkien went overboard establlishing these kind of details!
 
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