Chronologically Speaking, Part Twenty-One: The Gazal Fragment ("Drums of Tombalku")

Chronologically Speaking is a series focused solely on placing the Conan of Cimmeria stories in timeline order. It's an analysis of only the text of Robert E. Howard's original Conan tales. I'm examining the stories one at a time, in publication order, to show explicit chronological notes to order the stories.

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"Drums of Tombalku" is a title given to an untitled synopsis and fragment left behind by Robert E. Howard, first published in 1986 as the fragment and then in 1988 as its synopsis. The untitled work, set near and in an ancient city named Gazal, was given its "Drums of Tombalku" title by L. Sprague de Camp when he heavily edited the work and prepared it for publishing in 1966's Conan the Adventurer.

Patrice Louinet notes in "Hyborian Genesis" that Howard's 29-page draft originated as his attempt at a novel, probably written in mid-March 1934 after he wrote "The People of the Black Circle." While the novel ultimately didn't come to fruition in this form, Louinet notes that one line  about an invasion of Aquilonia from Nemedia would become the framing device for Howard's successful novel attempt: The Hour of the Dragon. 

The Gazal fragment is a little peculiar in that Conan is really only a supporting character who shows up toward the end of the fragment. I will defend this fragmentary narrative insofar that it has one near-great horror sequence within the red tower of Gazal.

And I wonder how many copies of The Complete Chronicles of Conan have the same typo mine has: Amalric is referred to as "Almaric" on page 827. Was that Howard's typo, or just the book's?

​Let's see what sort of chronological markers this thing has:

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• Without question, the fragment must take place after "Queen of the Black Coast." There are three ties to that story:
  • 1. Conan is recognized as Amra by a member of the Tombalku tribe: "Then he rose and shouted: ‘Amra!’ and I knew him – Sakumbe, a Suba from the Black Coast, a fat adventurer I had known well in the days when I was a corsair along the coast." Neither the name "Sakumbe" or the tribe name "Suba" actually appear in "Black Coast," though. 
  • 2. Conan is able to communicate with the tribe because their dialect is similar to a dialect he apparently picked up when aboard the Tigress on the Black Coast: "They spoke a dialect I could understand a little, it being much like that of the western Mandingo who dwell on the coast."
  • 3. Amalric notes Conan's familiarity with the jungles south of Stygia: "Conan had been in this part of the world before, and he believed we had a chance to survive."
• The Gazal fragment is one of three stories which all seem to reference the same event: Conan riding alongside a "rebel prince of Koth." Originally, I had read the accounts of this event as Conan seemingly fighting against the prince of Koth, but a very insightful commenter named "TheLibraryClerk" changed my mind here- I think Conan was fighting for that prince, under Almuric.
  • Here is the segment from "Xuthal of the Dusk:" "He and the girl were, so far as he knew, the sole survivors of Prince Almuric's army, that mad motley horde which, following the defeated rebel prince of Koth, swept through the Lands of Shem like a devastating sandstorm and drenched the outlands of Stygia with blood. With a Stygian host on its heels, it had cut its way through the black kingdom of Kush, only to be annihilated on the edge of the southern desert. Conan likened it in his mind to a great torrent, dwindling gradually as it rushed southward, to run dry at last in the sands of the naked desert. The bones of its members—mercenaries, outcasts, broken men, outlaws—lay strewn from the Kothic uplands to the dunes of the wilderness. From that final slaughter, when the Stygians and the Kushites closed in on the trapped remnants, Conan had cut his way clear and fled on a camel with the girl. Behind them the land swarmed with enemies; the only way open to them was the desert to the south. Into those menacing depths they had plunged."
  • Here's a similar segment from "Iron Shadows in the Moon:" "I was one of those dissolute rogues, the Free Companions, who burned and looted along the borders. There were five thousand of us, from a score of races and tribes. We had been serving as mercenaries for a rebel prince in eastern Koth, most of us, and when he made peace with his cursed sovereign, we were out of employment; so we took to plundering the outlying dominions of Koth, Zamora and Turan impartially."
  • And in the Gazal fragment, the setup is largely the same. There's far too much for me to include like the quotes above, though. Amalric describes a Kothian defeat and a scattering of the survivors, which he does not realize includes Conan. These accounts are all so similar, it seems to suggest that the stories happen within quick succession. There are difference between the accounts, like some specifics of the fights (was Koth fighting with or against Stygia?) and the names (is Amalric and Almuric the same character?) but they're largely in parallel.

Due to Howard's penchant for making subtle changes to things like names (in all likelihood, just forgetting what he had done the first time), I believe all the above accounts are of the same time in Conan's life. It seems like after Conan left the Black Corsairs at the end of "Queen of the Black Coast," on his way north he became part of the Free Companions who were working in service of Koth's army. Or perhaps the Free Companions tenure grew out of his time with Koth, continuing on with some of the other veterans following the dissolution of the Kothian army.

Since the story must follow "Queen of the Black Coast" and is in conversation with "Xuthal" and "Iron Shadows," it seems to be the eighth or ninth story in our chronology right now. Actually though, I think this story is so close in premise and structure that I would probably consider it non-canonical. It rhymes far too much with "Xuthal of the Dusk" to ignore - "Xuthal" is clearly the completed version of this fragment. But if it goes anywhere on the chronology, it goes adjacent to it. 

These stories are not traditionally grouped very close together. The chronologies from Miller/Clark/de Camp, Robert Jordan, Dale Rippke, and William Galen Gray all have them fairly spread out. Only the Joe Marek chronology really groups them very closely.

1. The Frost-Giant's Daughter
2. The God in the Bowl
3. Rogues in the House
4. The Tower of the Elephant
5. The Nestor synopsis ("The Hall of the Dead")
6. Queen of the Black Coast
7. The Shumballa fragment ("The Snout in the Dark")
8. Xuthal of the Dusk
9. The Gazal fragment ("Drums of Tombalku")
10. Iron Shadows in the Moon
11.  The Devil in Iron
12. The People of the Black Circle
13. A Witch Shall Be Born
14. The Man-Eaters of Zamboula
15. Black Colossus
16. The Pool of the Black One
17. The Servants of Bit-Yakin
18. Red Nails
19. Beyond the Black River
20. The Phoenix on the Sword
21. The Scarlet Citadel
22. The Hour of the Dragon