When you think of literary thieves, who do you think of? Maurice Le Blanc’s sly gentleman thief Arsene Lupin? Richard Stark’s harden, professional Parker? Yet, aside from the crime genre, thievery as an occupation appears most often in sword and sorcery.

Thieves as protagonists have a long history in sword and sorcery. This trope probably began in mythology and legend. Prometheus stole fire from the gods. Robin Hood stole from the rich and gave to the poor. In High Fantasy, Bilbo Baggins was recruited to burgle a dragon. So let’s look at their fictional heritage:

Doomed Practitioners

Lord Dunsany was one of the major writers of fantasy. Many of his stories are, if not sword and sorcery, proto-sword and sorcery. His stories “The Fortress Unvanquishable, Save for Sacnoth” and “The Sword of Welleran” were influential on the genre.

Dunsany’s The Book of Wonder had three stories about thieves and magic. In “The Distressing Tale of Thangobrind the Jeweler,” the titular Thangobrind is not just a jeweler but also a thief. He is commissioned by a Merchant Priest to steal a diamond larger than a human head that lies in the lap of the idol of the spider-god, Hlo-hlo. Thangobrind journeys across many lands and, after drugging the priests of Hlo-hlo, steals the diamond. He again journeys across many lands only to find that he is being followed by the living idol of Hlo-hlo. In “Probable Adventure of Three Literary Men,” three thieves set off on the Quest of the Golden Box which contains not monetary treasures but literary ones. They two meet their doom when the Owner of the Box comes from them. Finally, “How Nuth Would Have Practised His Art Upon the Gnoles,” the master thief Nuth and his apprentice Tonker leave London to burgle the fearsome, and undescribed, gnoles. Nuth alone gets away.

One of Clark Ashton Smith’s stories, “The Tale of Satampra Zeiros,” can be compared to these tales. According to Wikipedia, Robert M. Price says it was inspired by “How Nuth Would Have Practised His Art Upon the Gnoles,” however, I believe “The Distressing Tale of Thangobrind the Jeweler” was the inspiration. In Smith’s tale, Satampra Zeiros sets out to loot the long-abandoned city of Commoriom. There he discovers a temple of Tsathoggua. He is disappointed to find there are no jewels in the idol. Worse yet, in a basin at the idol’s feet lurks a shapeshifting entity. Satampra Zeiros attempts to flee and only escapes after losing an arm. While there are differences (the first story is written in the third person, the second in the first) the plots between the two stories are very similar.

Conan the Thief

Of the myriad occupations Conan of Cimmeria has had the earliest one was that of thief. He first appeared in this role in “The God in the Bowl.” In this story, Conan robs a museum. He soon finds himself involved with the murder of the museum’s owner.

His best-known feat of thievery is the robbing of the Tower of the Elephant, in the story of the same name. This story is one of the best of the series. Conan, upon hearing of the Tower, sets off to rob it of a fabled jewel it is supposed to contain. He soon finds that another thief, Taurus of Nemedia, has set out on the same quest. They soon form an alliance, but Taurus dies at the fangs of a giant spider. Conan kills the spider and goes deeper into the tower.

There he finds Yag-kosha, a creature from another world, being held captive. Conan is moved by pity for the creature, who has been tortured for hundreds of years, and helps him gain vengeance on his captor.

It is worth noting that in most Sword and Sorcery stories, Yag-kosha would be a monster to be slain. Here Yag-Kosha is the victim. The story also shows that Conan is a more complex character than quite often credited. Though he is a rogue, a reaver, and a slayer, Conan is still capable of compassion. In fact, he shows more sympathy for Yag-kosha than his fellow men. He kills two people in the course of the story. Why then does he feel compassion for an alien creature? It is not out rightly stated, but it possibly that it is precisely because it is an alien creature. Conan is a barbarian in civilization. He too is alien to his surroundings. Is it possible that as a fellow outsider he felt kinship with the creature?

In “Rogues in the House,” Conan has been operating as thief when he is caught by the city guard. In exchange for his freedom, Conan makes an agreement with a corrupt noble to kill an equally corrupt priest. Conan goes from thief to assassin, but it is notable that the other two main characters are also thieves, preying on the citizenry of their country. As one of the characters notes, Conan is the most honest among them because he robs and murders in the open.

Conan also operated as a bandit chief and a pirate in various stories.

The Two Best Thieves in Lankhmar

Then there are Fritz Leiber’s Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser. Unlike Conan, who has many occupations in his life, they are specialists in the thievery. While they are often goaded into other adventures by their wizard patrons, Sheelba and Ningauble, they are primarily thieves.

Fafhrd is a large barbarian from the North. The Grey Mouser is a diminutive swordsman of unknown origin. They meet one night while robbing the same man as told in “Ill Met in Lankhmar.” They run afoul of Lankhmar’s Thieves’ Guild and lose the loves of their life. After reaping vengeance on the Thieves’ Guild, they leave Lankhmar.

They would return to Lankhmar and battle the Thieves’ Guild once more in “Thieves’ House.” The idea of the guild of thieves would become common in fantasy and appear in Terry Pratchett’s novels and the Dungeons and Dragons role playing game.

In “The Price of Pain-Ease,” in a brilliant bit of comedy, they steal an entire house. In “Stardock,” the duo journeys to the top of the titular mountain in search of treasure, only to have their gains stolen from them in “The Two Best Thieves in Lankhmar.”

More than any other characters Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser represent the best examples of thieves in Sword and Sorcery.

Thievery on the Dying Earth

In Jack Vance’s classic Dying Earth stories, there are at least two characters that engage in thievery. One is Liane the Wayfarer. The other is Cugel the Clever.

Liane the Wayfarer appeared in the story of the same name. In it Liane is a wanderer who enters into a compact to steal a tapestry for a witch. In turn she promises to become his lover. The being that has the tapestry is called Chun the Unavoidable. Liane finds out to his dismay that Chun really is unavoidable.

The other thief, and the most prominent character in the Dying Earth series, is Cugel the Clever. Cugel first appeared in Eyes of the Overworld. His story is continued in Cugel’s Saga. Cugel is a thief and conman who makes the mistake of burgling the home of Iucounu the Laughing Magician. When Iucounu catches Cugel in the act, he as punishment tasks the thief with stealing the Eyes of the Overworld which allow one to see into a higher plane of existence. He also uses magic to propel Cugel across the Dying Earth. The novel is a picaresque about how Cugel journeys back home after stealing the Eyes of the Overworld.

Themes

Several themes seem to run through these stories. One is a sardonic look at human nature and civilization. Lord Dunsany, Clark Ashton Smith, Fritz Leiber, and Jack Vance all have a mordant wit. They are also all masters of opulent prose. Robert E. Howard has a more spare style, but he still gets a few good lines in. In “Tower of the Elephant,” he memorably points out that “Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing.”

Another is that the thief often comes to a bad end. Thangobrind, Slithe from “Three Literary Men,” and Satampra Zeiros all pay a heavy price for their transgression. They could be seen as simple morality tales but it is more complex than that. Their transgressions go beyond mere robbery and into hubris. Each of the three in their pride attempts to do something that powerful forces do not want done. They, in other words, overreach. The Conan and the Fafhrd and the Grey Mouser stories are exceptions to this theme and even they don’t always come out with the loot in the end.

Cugel, alone, seems to have a positive ending and that is after not one but two perilous journeys.

Why Thieves?

The question is why thieves turn up as protagonists in Sword and Sorcery stories. After all, thievery is an illegal and immoral act. I think there are two reasons for this:

One, it is exciting. We love an adventure whether moral or not. The other is that though thievery itself is wrong it takes certain virtues to be successful at. A good thief has to be daring. He has to be competent and, like Cugel, clever. These are qualities that we wish to have in ourselves. Though hopefully we put these traits to better ends.