Robert E. Howard had his eyes set on the novel form when he published "The People of the Black Circle." Around the time he began working on an attempt at Almuric and The Hour of the Dragon, he wrote what would become the longest Conan story to date, at about 31,000 words which earned him $250 (about six grand in today's dollars). "The People of the Black Circle" was written in January and February 1934 and since Weird Tales editor Farnsworth Wright liked it so much, it was published quickly, appearing in the serial in the September, October, and November '34 issues of WT.

"Black Circle" is one of Howard's absolute best, and is rather unique in how it places itself in chronology. There are few references to other stories outside of when Conan literally tells other characters about his life.

Toward the end of the story, the real chronological markers begin to show up as Conan begins mentioning previous life periods.

• "Black Circle" must come after his days with the Free Companions shown or referenced in "Iron Shadows in the Moon" and "The Devil in Iron:" "There is a chief of the Khurakzai who will keep you safely while I bicker with the Afghulis. If they will have none of me, by Crom! I will ride northward with you to the steppes of the kozaki. I was a hetman among the Free Companions before I rode southward. I'll make you a queen on the Zaporoska River!"
  • That line about being a hetman among the Free Companions before he rode southward is the most telling aspect of this speech. This seems to place the three most eastern stories together in the timeline. Conan likely heads east to the Vilayet Sea where he experiences the events of "Iron Shadows in the Moon," then "The Devil in Iron," and afterward rides south to Vendhya where he ingratiates himself to the Afghulis in this story.
• At the very end of the story, Conan lists to Yasmina Devi many of the things he has done in his life: "Listen: I was born in the Cimmerian hills where the people are all barbarians. I have been a mercenary soldier, a corsair, a kozak, and a hundred other things. What king has roamed the countries, fought the battles, loved the women, and won the plunder that I have?" There's a lot going on in this paragraph!
  • We've seen Conan be a mercenary soldier in "Xuthal of the Dusk" and "Black Colossus."
  • We've seen him be a corsair in "Queen of the Black Coast" and we'll see him be one again in "The Pool of the Black One."
  • We've seen his kozak days in "The Devil in Iron" and "Iron Shadows in the Moon," likely immediately preceding this narrative.
  • Conan's "hundred other things" is fun to speculate about. I suppose it would need to encompass his thief days and his early wanderings with the Aesir too. But we haven't actually gotten to that story yet. It leaves the door open for a lot of options.
  • Conan has "roamed the countries" of at least Cimmeria, Zamora, Nemedia, Argos, Kush, Stygia, Turan, Hyrkania, Shem, Afghulistan, and Vendhya.
  • He's "fought the battles" which are too numerous to count.
  • He's "loved the women:" Bêlit, for sure. Is he including Natala? Thalis? Probably Olivia.
  • Funnily enough, most of the plunder Conan wins must be off the page. Most of the time, the treasure he's jonesing for in each story either ends up out of reach. He very frequently ends stories empty-handed, fleeing with just his life.
  • Conan makes an off-hand comment about how kings haven't lived the life he has, so it must be prior to his kingship.

Based on the other aspects of this chronology, grouping the eastern stories together, I think it makes the most sense to place "The People of the Black Circle" before Conan journeys back westward to become a captain of spearmen in "Black Colossus." This solves the "mad dash" issue and is internally consistent with Conan's "riding southward" line.

I find it interesting that "Black Colossus" is so much further back now than many other chronologies place it. I'm not against it, I just didn't really expect it.

When Robert E. Howard sat down to write "The Devil in Iron," the tenth Conan story to reach publication, it was after a period of nine months during which he didn't write anything for his sword-and-sorcery series character. He had been experiencing bouts of burnout, taking a few months between Conan stories and trying out different genres. He did the same thing right before "Queen of the Black Coast." Perhaps this long gap is why this story is so devoid of other connections to the Hyborian world.

"The Devil in Iron" was published in the August 1934 issue of Weird Tales and followed a very similar plot to the previous story Howard had written, "Iron Shadows in the Moon." Both feature islands in the Vilayet Sea, pirates, iron golem enemies, and fairly forgettable one-off companions. "Devil in Iron" was voted the best story of the issue despite how it re-tread earlier subjects and earned Howard $115.

There is very little mooring this to one single place in Conan's life.

• Conan is a new chief to the kozaks: "'That is because of the new chief who has risen among them,' answered Ghaznavi. 'You know whom I mean.' 'Aye!' replied Jehungir feelingly. 'It is that devil Conan; he is even wilder than the kozaks, yet he is crafty as a mountain lion.'
  • As a side note, I wondered in my Chronologically Speaking entry about "Iron Shadows in the Moon," why Conan bristles at the term "kozak." Seeing as this story tells us it means "wastrel," I get the sense that it's sort of a slur.
  • Conan evidently met the kozaks with nothing but the clothes on his back and quickly rose through the ranks: "This was Conan, who had wandered into the armed camps of the kozaks with no other possession than his wits and his sword, and who had carved his way to leadership among them."
• Conan refers to the black lotus of Xuthal, which places this story after "Xuthal of the Dusk:" "Her sleep was too deep to be natural. He decided that she must be an addict of some drug, perhaps like the black lotus of Xuthal." This line has vexed many previous chronologizers, because the general consensus seems to be that Conan should be a little older in "Xuthal," but since I've placed it early, this isn't a problem for me right now.
• Has Conan seen a copy of the Book of Skelos? This story seems to imply that he has: "Conan had seen rude images of them, in miniature, among the idol huts of the Yuetshi, and there was a description of them in the Book of Skelos, which drew on prehistoric sources." But where would he have seen a Book of Skelos? The copies seem to be exclusively in the hands of powerful wizards, who Conan is famously not a fan of. Or is this a strangely-worded sentence that just means that there are pictures in the Book of Skelos of the snake creatures he's looking at?
• Conan evidently understands Nemedian: "There was no door in that wall, but he leaned close and heard distinctly. And an icy chill crawled slowly along his spine. The tongue was Nemedian, but the voice was not human." This makes sense based on the placement of "Rogues in the House" well before this.

Here's the really tricky question about placing this story: Are the Free Companions / kozaks essentially the same group as the pirates of the Red Brotherhood? Consider this line about the kozaks.

If the barriers between the kozaks and the pirates are permeable, which this line seems to imply they are, then when we see Conan "carving" out leadership in the group, perhaps this is the same event we see at the end of "Iron Shadows in the Moon," when Conan meets the Red Brotherhood and immediately starts rising in the ranks. In the previous stories in which Conan is a mercenary, he's apparently just of the rank-and-file members, not in leadership, so those stories would go before this.

Some fellow Conan chronology nerds like Dale Rippke have hypothesized that Conan is younger in "Iron Shadows" because of how he approaches the Red Brotherhood (they would argue he does so naively), but that's not an impression I agree with.

Other timelines place this story chronologically right before "The People of the Black Circle," in which Conan is the hetman of the Afghuli hillpeople. That's possible, but I'm inclined right now to place it right after "Iron Shadows in the Moon." That way, he isn't traipsing back all over the world and spends some time on the Vilayet before going anywhere else. I'm not opposed to changing its placement if that makes more sense in the future, but right now, I think it works best immediately after its twin "iron" story.

Appearing in Weird Tales in May 1934, "Queen of the Black Coast" is the ninth Conan of Cimmeria story published and appeared just one month after "Iron Shadows in the Moon." In the last four stories published, three of them are pirate stories, and this is the third time in nine that Howard's made use of the black lotus powder as a plot device. However, these are more quirks of publishing rather than a throughline in Howard's writing. "Queen of the Black Coast" had been written and set to Farnsworth Wright at Weird Tales by August 1932, but wouldn't be published for almost another two years. Howard was paid $115 for it.

There are lots of interesting chronological markers in this story!

So what do we know for sure?

• This story must take place after his thieving days. The places it firmly after "Rogues" and "Tower."
• This story takes place after he is a mercenary for Turan, where he learned archery.

What events are probable, but not 100% clear?

• Conan has been to Nordheim and Nemedia.
• Conan doesn't seem to have ever been a pirate before.
• Conan probably hasn't come across the "Xuthal" version of the black lotus.

What is possible?

• Conan has been to Aquilonia, to get his sword.
• Conan has been to Koth, to get his armor.
• Conan has been to Ophir, to get his cloak.

Here's the thing: I don't think we should give that much weight to his clothing. Argos is a city that is usually portrayed as a hub of commerce. The mercenary bands which Conan has been with are universally described as extremely diverse, motley crews. I find it far more likely that he's simply bought these clothes or picked items off dead bodies on the battlefield. In later stories, he's frequently clad in just a loincloth, which means that he's probably rapidly gaining and losing articles of clothing anyway. 

Therefore, we should focus on Conan's characterization and other clues. He's after his thieving days, during his mercenary days, but probably before "Xuthal of the Dusk." Additionally, if we look back to "Iron Shadows in the Moon," Conan smiles enigmatically about pirates and makes a crack at the end by calling Olivia "the Queen of the Blue Sea," which might be a reference to his time with Bêlit. So this story is probably set before "Iron Shadows" as well.

"Iron Shadows in the Moon" was published as "Shadows in the Moonlight" in Weird Tales' April 1934 issue. Published three months after "Rogues in the House" and just one month prior to "Queen of the Black Coast," I'm realizing the Robert E. Howard was in a bit of a pirate phase. "Pool of the Black One," "Iron Shadows," and "Black Coast" are all samplings of Conan's different pirate periods (Barachan, Red Brotherhood, and Black Coast, presented ironically in reverse-chronological order), and I've never realized they were all published pretty close to one another.

This is far from my favorite Conan story, but it's pretty brief and has some interesting chronological clues in it which are more fun to deal with than the times he straight-up says he's been somewhere or done something.

​It's actually really fun to try to place!

Revisiting this story has helped me appreciate it a little more in terms of how it calls forward (though, chronologically, back) to "Queen of the Black Coast" in a few interesting ways. 

Since he starts the story as the seeming last surviving Free Companion and ends the story with the pirates, this is functionally a bridge between his kozaki period and his Red Brotherhood pirate period.

Here's one thing that I think is key to this story's chronological placement: Conan seems to be describing similar events in both a passage from "Xuthal of the Dusk" and "Iron Shadows:"

If Conan is describing the same rebel prince of Koth and same mercenary bands, which I think he probably is, the Free Companions went south through Shem to outlands of Stygia, then through Kush. From there, they became independent of Almuric's command and apparently went back up through Koth, Zamora, and then to Turan where "Iron Shadows in the Moon" picks up. You'll have to tell me in the comments if you think this makes sense. The thing is, if I do actually look at other chronologies, pretty much everyone else has "Iron Shadows" come before "Xuthal," sometimes waaay before it, so I feel like I may be missing something.

I'm kind of starting to doubt myself with this story... did I miss any other connections?

​Without this connection to "Xuthal of the Dusk," "Iron Shadows" could land pretty much anywhere between "Rogues in the House" and "The Pool of the Black One."

"Rogues in the House" was first published in the January 1934 issue of Weird Tales, about three months after readers had been treated to their previous Conan story, "The Pool of the Black One." The story appeared seventh in the mag and didn't make the cover, suggesting perhaps a lack of confidence in this entry in the Conan saga. If that's what they felt, it was certainly misguided, as "Rogues" is a through-and-through banger.

All of the above leads me to conclude that within our chronology so far, "Rogues" should be only the second in the timeline. I think the elements that put it after "The Tower of the Elephant" are a little weak, though. It's mostly my interpretation of how Conan's thieving and combat skills are described. There's nothing that's a smoking gun, so it could go first.

September and October 1933 in Weird Tales were a one-two punch of short Conan stories, with "The Pool of the Black One" coming just one month after "Xuthal of the Dusk." Both of them are a bit of a downturn from the highs of "The Tower of the Elephant" and "Black Colossus," but things would bounce back soon enough with "Rogues in the House" in January of '34. Unlike the last two stories explored in this series, "Pool" didn't make the cover and it wasn't the lead story in the October issue; instead, it appeared third.

"Pool" was the first pirate Conan story to be published, but it wouldn't be the last. It features one of the coolest entrances Conan ever makes, swimming up and onto a boat out of seeming nowhere.

Honestly, I think the thing that is most illustrative about the placement of this story along the timeline is Conan's characterization himself. He is so eminently controlled, so smooth and unbothered. He keeps his mouth shut and is content to just smile and leave comments unremarked upon. We see some of his fabled "gigantic mirth" when he's gambling with the rest of the sailors. It's a Conan much more similar to the King Conan of "The Phoenix on the Sword" and "The Scarlet Citadel" to the brutish outlander of "The Tower of the Elephant" or "Xuthal of the Dusk." He seems to be even more smooth than in his considerable growth shown in "Black Colossus."

​For now, I'm placing this before the King Conan stories.

It's Cimmerian September, so it's appropriate that the next story in publication order first appeared in the September 1933 issue of Weird Tales. Appearing a few months after "Black Colossus," "Xuthal of the Dusk" was published under the title "The Slithering Shadow." Most people that I know prefer to use Howard's original and (in my opinion, at least) more unique title. Like "Black Colossus," it was the cover story, with the Margaret Brundage illustration on the front showing the characters Natala and Thalis.

So far, our entries in this series have been pretty simple to order: Conan is very mature or very young, or right in between the two. "Xuthal" is going to require a lot more interpretation than the King Conan stories or some of his first.

Here are the contextual timeline clues we have.

• Conan is primarily acting as a mercenary. "He and the girl were, so far as he knew, the sole survivors of Prince Almuric's army."
  • Conan is enlisted in Prince Almuric's army, of which he and his companion Natala are the last survivors. Almuric sounds very similar to Amalric, the general in the previous story. I had to wonder if Almuric and Amalric were intended to be the same person- after all, the former king of Aquilonia is known as both Numedides and Namedides, and the capitol of Aquilonia changes names from Tamar to Tarantia, so he's made similar spelling and name changes. However, because Amalric is stated in "Black Colossus" to be a general and Almuric is a prince, they're likely different men.
  • It's never stated exactly who Conan is fighting for in this story. Almuric's army is stated to be fighting the "defeated rebel prince of Koth," and sweeps through Shem and then the outskirts of Stygia, but we're not exactly sure where they're coming from. Ophir? Khoraja? 
  • Conan and Natala are have been pursued by Stygian horsemen, but managed to shake off the pursuit and Conan isn't recognized by anybody or implied to be in any special position in the army. If Conan was a highly-ranked commander in Almuric's army like he is in "Black Colossus," I don't think he would've abandoned the rest of the army.
• Conan is clad very simply. "Though his only garment was a silk loin-cloth, girdled by a wide gold-buckled belt from which hung a saber and a broad-bladed poniard." With only a loin-cloth (though a silk one! A gentrified loin-cloth!) and gold-buckled belt, Conan is lacking the more elaborate outfits he has in some stories. He does seem to be much better outfitted than in "The Tower of the Elephant," though.
• Conan has learned Stygian. "On a venture Conan replied in Stygian, and the stranger answered in the same tongue." In "Black Colossus," Conan had learned Kothic, spoken in a "barbarous" accent. While Natala's limited Stygian language skills are noted, Conan's are not, suggesting perhaps a proficiency at the language. 
• Conan is always a competent fighter and survivalist, but Conan doesn't seem as confident or sophisticated in this story to me as he does in "Black Colossus." He's a little more brutish. The fact that he seems like just a regular enlister in the military leads me to believe that this story probably take place prior to "Black Colossus." 
• The black lotus is seen again after making its first appearance in "The Tower of the Elephant." Natala asks Conan if he recognizes it, but doesn't wait for an answer. Perhaps it's clear to her that he does recognize it, though this lotus is a different strain than regular lotus powder, which apparently causes instant death, as Taurus of Nemedia has said. "You have heard of the black lotus? In certain pits of the city it grows. Through the ages they have cultivated it, until, instead of death, its juice induces dreams, gorgeous and fantastic. In these dreams they spend most of their time."

This is my first sort of big shakeup to my original chronology. I originally had "Xuthal" much later, based on what I would now consider a misreading of the original story. A year or so ago, I called Conan an officer in Shem's military, but I was making assumptions there that aren't really that supported by the text. It never explicitly says he's an officer. I'll be placing this one earlier in Conan's mercenary days and prior to "Black Colossus."

A lot of stories put this one much further on in Conan's life, usually just before his pirate period with the Barachans as seen in "Red Nails." I wonder if there's something I'm missing. Shoot me a comment if you think there is!

"Black Colossus" is the fourth Conan story to reach publication, hitting magazine racks in the July 1933 issue of Weird Tales. Howard earned $130 from Farnsworth Wright and came three months after the previous publication, "The Tower of the Elephant." As a first for Howard, the story graced the cover and was the first story in the issue's contents.

"Black Colossus" features one of the best openings in any Robert E. Howard story but Conan isn't even seen until well into chapter 2, at which point, his physical description is made clear immediately.

• Conan is clad as a captain of mercenaries, including a scarlet cloak: "He stood facing her, his hand on the long hilt that jutted forward from beneath the scarlet cloak which flowed carelessly from his mailed shoulders. The torchlight glinted dully on the polished blue steel of his greaves and basinet. A more baleful fire glittered bluely in his eyes. At first glance she saw he was no Kothian; when he spoke she knew he was no Hyborian. He was clad like a captain of the mercenaries, and in that desperate command there were men of many lands, barbarians as well as civilized foreigners. There was a wolfishness about this warrior that marked the barbarian."
  • In "The Tower of the Elephant," Conan was a young wanderer with just a worn tunic and a hand-me-down scabbard, so he has clearly made lots of progress in his career. 
  • The scarlet cloak Conan wears in this story is sometimes considered a chronological marker for Conan readers as he is noted as wearing a scarlet cloak in other stories, possibly placing them next to one another. However, they could be different red cloaks.
• Conan now understands not only social conventions of taverns, but local politics as well: "I've but come from the last wine-shop open. Ishtar's curse on these white-livered reformers who close the grog-houses! 'Let men sleep rather than guzzle,' they say—aye, so they can work and fight better for their masters! Soft-gutted eunuchs, I call them."
  • In "The Tower of the Elephant," Conan failed to understand several social cues in his interactions with others. He apparently now has a grasp of reform politics. He also understands the diplomatic relations between Ophir, Koth, and Khoraja, mentioned later in the story.
• Conan mentions having served with mercenaries of Corinthia: "When I served with the mercenaries of Corinthia, we swilled and wenched all night and fought all day; aye, blood ran down the channels of our swords." This time period in Conan's life is never explicitly shown in Howard stories.
• Conan identifies himself as a captain of mercenaries: "'Who are you?' she asked abruptly. 'Conan, a captain of the mercenary spearmen,' he answered, emptying the wine-cup at a gulp and holding it out for more. 'I was born in Cimmeria.'" He has evidently had enough time to rise in the ranks for the Khorajan army.
• Conan's kingship is previewed: "'By my fingerbones, Conan, I have seen kings who wore their harness less regally than you!' Conan was silent. A vague shadow crossed his mind like a prophecy. In years to come he was to remember Amalric's words, when the dream became the reality." 
  • "Black Colossus" must obviously take place prior to Conan's kingship in "The Phoenix on the Sword" and "The Scarlet Citadel."
• Conan's Zamorian thieving days are mentioned by a Shemite thief as a thing of the past: "By Derketo, Conan, I am a prince of liars, but I do not lie to an old comrade. I swear by the days when we were thieves together in the land of Zamora, before you donned hauberk!" This obviously places "Black Colossus" after "The Tower of the Elephant."

"Black Colossus" is not just very easy to place in our timeline so far, but it may be the most geographically-focused of all Howard's stories. Perhaps the "Hyborian Age" essay was helping him keep things straight, because the geography of the central Hyborian Age kingdoms is extremely well-crafted.

Also, Conan's birth on a battlefield is mentioned for the first time, an oft-cited characteristic of his youth. 

"The Tower of the Elephant" was the third Conan story published, appearing in the March 1933 issue of Weird Tales, which followed two months after "The Scarlet Citadel's" publication in January. According to biographers like Willard Oliver, it was not the third story written. By the time Howard banged out "The Tower of the Elephant," sitting at his computer late at night and reading his words aloud as he typed them, he had already written "The Phoenix on the Sword," "The Frost-Giant's Daughter," "The God in the Bowl," and his "The Hyborian Age" essay. Unfortunately, two of those would be rejected by Farnsworth Wright at Weird Tales and the essay wasn't intended for publication. 

Though Howard sent WT "The Tower of the Elephant" before "The Scarlet Citadel," it would ultimately be published third, netting Howard $95 and the votes from the readership as the best story of the issue. If you put a gun to my head and told me to pick a favorite Conan story, it would probably be this one.

Whereas the first two published stories are at the end of Conan's life during his kingship, "Tower" zooms way back to the start, when Conan is a penniless thief who's new to civilization. Most of the chronological clues happen at the very beginning of the story.

• Conan is described as a tall, "strongly made" youth in a cheap tunic: "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." He's clearly lived his whole life outside of civilization, like a wild predator compared to city bottom-feeders.
• His equipment is sub-par: "From his girdle hung a sword in a worn leather scabbard." Seeing as Conan is just a "youth," this scabbard is likely not of worn leather because Conan has used it so much, but because it's either a hand-me-down or something scavenged. He evidently hasn't had the time, money, or ability to replace it.
• Conan can speak the local Zamorian language, but he does so with the accent of a foreigner: "'You spoke of the Elephant Tower,' said the stranger, speaking Zamorian with an alien accent. 'I've heard much of this tower; what is its secret?'" He must have been in Zamora for enough time to pick up the language. Future Conan stories will imply that Conan has an innate gift for language.
• Conan is too much of an outsider to understand the social trappings of the tavern in the Maul, and becomes embarrassed about it: "The Cimmerian glared about, embarrassed at the roar of mocking laughter that greeted this remark. He saw no particular humor in it, and was too new to civilization to understand its discourtesies. Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing. He was bewildered and chagrined, and doubtless would have slunk away, abashed, but the Kothian chose to goad him further." Not only does this contain one of the most famous lines in the Conan canon (the head-splitting part) but it shows that Conan is really young and really green. He simply doesn't understand why he's being laughed at.
• The Black Lotus powder is mentioned for the first time: "'They died without a sound!' muttered the Cimmerian. 'Taurus, what was that powder?' 'It was made from the black lotus, whose blossoms wave in the lost jungles of Khitai, where only the yellow-skulled priests of Yun dwell. Those blossoms strike dead any who smell of them.'" For chronologizers like myself, the Black Lotus is a bit of a conundrum, as we'll get to in later entries. While he comes across it here, it's not entirely clear if he recognizes it in "Xuthal of the Dusk," where it is a central plot point. Perhaps it's because the lotus he encounters in "Xuthal" is a different, cultivated strain.
• Yag-Kosha hints at Conan's Atlantean ancestry: "I know your people from of old, whom I knew by another name in the long, long ago when another world lifted its jeweled spires to the stars." This is likely referring to the city of Valusia, where Kull was king in the pre-Cataclysmic Thurian Age. In Jim Zub's Conan the Barbarian run, an older Conan travels back to Valusia where he meets Yag-Kosha again.

The temporal relationship between "The Phoenix on the Sword" and "The Scarlet Citadel" is not as clear as some would like you to think it is.

Appearing in the December 1932 issue of Weird Tales, "The Phoenix on the Sword" was the first Conan story published. It's well-documented that this story didn't spring to Howard in fully original form, but that he had a few warm-ups to creating Conan. His "Cimmeria" poem written earlier that year (though not published until 1956) introduced Conan's homeland.  "People of the Dark," published in June 1932 in Strange Tales had introduced a barbarian character named Conan (the Reaver, not the Cimmerian). And "Phoenix on the Sword was cribbed from the unsold King Kull story "By This Axe I Rule!"

Though it's dead simple to know where this story takes place in Conan's life, the narrative gives us tons of interesting chronological notes. Conan is obviously older, having lived his barbarian life and is now king of Aquilonia.

• Conan seized the crown of Aquilonia: "Yes. The fat fool claims it by reason of a trace of royal blood. Conan makes a bad mistake in letting men live who still boast descent from the old dynasty, from which he tore the crown of Aquilonia."
• The previous king was named Numedides: "I did not dream far enough, Prospero. When King Numedides lay dead at my feet and I tore the crown from his gory head and set it on my own, I had reached the ultimate border of my dreams."
• Conan is established as having come from the barbarian north: "Alone of us all, Rinaldo has no personal ambition. He sees in Conan a red- handed, rough-footed barbarian who came out of the north to plunder a civilized land. He idealizes the king whom Conan killed to get the crown, remembering only that he occasionally patronized the arts, and forgetting the evils of his reign, and he is making the people forget. Already they openly sing The Lament for the King in which Rinaldo lauds the sainted villain and denounces Conan as 'that black-hearted savage from the abyss'. Conan laughs, but the people snarl."
• Enough time has passed between Conan overthrowing Numedides and the opening of the narrative for people to have erected a statue to the former king in the Temple of Mitra: "When I overthrew Numedides, then I was the Liberator—now they spit at my shadow. They have put a statue of that swine in the temple of Mitra, and people go and wail before it, hailing it as the holy effigy of a saintly monarch who was done to death by a red-handed barbarian." The conventional wisdom that you may hear on the internet is that "Phoenix" takes place during the first year of his kingship, but there's nothing in the text to get that exact. It has been a minimum of a few months, but could be a year, or even several.
• Conan notes to his advisor Prospero that he has been to Asgard and Vanaheim, which Prospero believes may have been myths. It becomes well-established in the Hyborian Age that faraway countries are usually believed to be legend by those sufficiently distant: "The maps of the court show well the countries of south, east and west, but in the north they are vague and faulty. I am adding the northern lands myself. Here is Cimmeria, where I was born. And—" "Asgard and Vanaheim," Prospero scanned the map. "By Mitra, I had almost believed those countries to have been fabulous."

Clearly, obviously, this story is easy to place. I'm bored just sitting here writing it. So let's compare it to "The Scarlet Citadel." Despite being the second Conan story published, "The Scarlet Citadel" was not the second written, but probably the fourth.

In Robert E. Howard: The Life and Times of a Texas Author, Willard Oliver postulates that "The Frost-Giant's Daughter" and "The God in the Bowl" were written between the two King Conan stories, but neither of those tales would be published until much later. "The Scarlet Citadel," though, would be published in the January 1933 issue of Weird Tales, just a month behind its predecessor.

I was surprised in my revisiting of these two texts that their temporal placement was not as strong as I remembered. The commonly-accepted chronology is that "Citadel" takes place about a year after "Phoenix," but there's nothing quite so clear in the narratives. I find that it's most likely that "Phoenix" takes place first because there has to have been time for a "whole cycle of hero-tales" to have been written and to become famous, but the one-year difference is not really there. Gary Romeo examines a Conan chronology by P. Schuyler Miller which postulates that "Citadel" takes place right after "Phoenix," perhaps within the same year. "An Informal Biography of Conan the Cimmerian" (found in The Blade of Conan these days) also thinks "Citadel" takes place right afterword. 

If you're only looking at the texts, I don't think it's that clear.

Our final chronology for this post is as follows.