"John Norman - Telnarian Histories 01 - The Chieftain" - читать интересную книгу автора (Norman John)

norman, john - telnarian histories 01 - the chieftain v3.0.rtf

etext v3.0 based on 1st print edition, 1991, ISBN 0-446-36149-6

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Revision History:

v 1.0 spell-checked scan; saved as RTF because of extensive italics use.
v 3.0 proofread against DT, complies w/ ABEB versioning standard 3.0
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The Telnarian Histories

The Chieftain

John Norman

***

This book is dedicated
to all who disapprove of blacklisting.

***

PROLOGUE

"In this year war was carried on with the Aatii."
тАФThe Annals.

The above entry is not untypical of the dark and troubled times to which I should like, in what
follows, to devote my attention.

I suppose one might distinguish between history and chronicle, though the distinction must surely
be one of grades, or shades, rather than of kinds, for there is seldom a history which does not
clearly contain chronicle, nor a chronicle which does not, at least implicitly, recount a history.

We do not know, incidentally, who kept the Annals. Quite possibly they were set down by a
succession of individuals, men who occupied remote, fortified places, places within which the
most precious of the treasures of Telnaria might be kept safe, the ability to read and write.

"In this year war was carried on with the Aatii."

This entry, with which I have begun, surely approximates to pure chronicle. There is doubtless an
explanation for this. The men of the remote, fortified places had, for most practical purposes,
turned their backs on history and the world. Such matters had little left in them to interest them.
They had little to do with their studies, and the pursuit of their personal salvation, to assure
which they may have withdrawn from the world. Also, they probably knew very little about the
world they had left, perhaps some gossip, some remarks, picked up from merchants or traders.
Yet they did keep the chronicles. Indeed, were it not for such sources we would know much less
than we do about the dark and troubled times.