In Robert E. Howard: A Literary Biography, David C. Smith considers Conan the Barbarian’s enduring appeal:

“He is the natural man, ourselves begun again, reborn in a world as we secretly know our own world to be beneath its layers of hypocrisy and pretense.”

In the foreword of Mark Finn’s Blood and Thunder: The Art and Life of Robert E. Howard, Joe R. Lansdale writes, “Howard’s special ability was to tap into the sub-conscious, into the true and often not so polite desires of what Freud called the Id.”

I believe Smith and Lansdale are on to something here. Howard was a well-read and perceptive writer who grew up in the raw atmosphere of the barely civilized American West, where the Texas oil boom fueled human greed and corruption. As Howard wrote to H. P. Lovecraft, “I’ve seen promising youths turn from respectable citizens to dope fiends, drunkards, gamblers and gangsters in a matter of months.”

In another letter, Howard stated:

“My characters are more like men than these real men are, see. They're rough and rude, they got hands and they got bellies. They hate and they lust; break the skin of civilization and you find the ape, roaring and red-handed.”

Howard was not only a brilliant storyteller, but a sharp-eyed observer of his fellow man. He recognized the promise and corruption of the human soul, as well as its strengths and shortcomings.

What is the “natural man” Conan represents? The writings of science popularizer Robert Ardrey argue for an unblinking look at man as he is, as evidenced by man’s origins. Ardrey, after a successful career writing for Broadway and Hollywood, took an interest in science, and travelled to Africa to meet anthropologist Raymond Dart, who had amassed a collection of Australopithecus fossils. From those meetings, Ardrey turned into an advocate of Dart’s hypothesis that humans were shaped by the harsh challenges of surviving on the African savannah. African Genesis was the result.

The primary elements of Dart’s Hunting Hypothesis are vividly reflected in the Conan stories.

1 – Violence is intrinsic to human existence.

Abandoning the mostly vegetarian diet of our ape ancestors, early man competed with other predators. Only by forming tight-knit tribes could such relatively puny beings come out on top as the apex predator. Our tribal existence made language and culture vital to our survival.

Dart’s paper “The Predatory Transition from Ape to Man” contended that the use of weapons sparked the rise of humanity. Ardrey summarizes it in African Genesis:

A rock, a stick, a heavy bone – to our ancestral killer ape it meant the margin of survival. But the use of the weapon meant new and multiplying demands on the nervous system from the co-ordination of muscle and touch and sight. And so at last came the enlarged brain; so at last came man. Far from the truth lay the antique assumption that man had fathered the weapon. The weapon, instead, had fathered man. ... We design and compete with our weapons as birds build distinctive nests.” African Genesis p. 31-32

The rigors of natural selection etched this trait into our inner beings. A weapon in the hand imparted to its bearer a sense of mastery and authority. Ardrey put it this way:

Why did children play with guns? Why did boys scarcely out of diapers cock their fingers and go bang-bang? Was it frustration? Or was it by genetic impulse? ... Man takes deeper delight in hisweapons than in his women. He will pledge a treasury to the one; a pittance to the other. From hand axe to hydrogen bomb his best efforts have been spent on the weapon’s perfection. African Genesis, p. 206.

Recall Conan’s reaction in The Hour of the Dragon when the slave girl Zenobia helps him escape his cell and smuggles a knife to him:

Whatever else she might be, she was proven by that dagger to be a person of practical intelligence. It was no slender stiletto, selected because of a jeweled hilt or gold guard, fitted only for dainty murder in milady's boudoir; it was a forthright poniard, a warrior's weapon, broad-bladed, fifteen inches in length, tapering to a diamond-sharp point.

He grunted with satisfaction. The feel of the hilt cheered him and gave him a glow of confidence. Whatever webs of conspiracy were drawn about him, whatever trickery and treachery ensnared him, this knife was real. The great muscles of his right arm swelled in anticipation of murderous blows.

2 – Our social nature makes us both aggressive and compassionate.

Ardrey argued the defense of one’s tribe and its territory gave rise to what he called the amity-enmity complex. Evolutionary pressures have made each human being both a caregiver and killer:

In Charles Darwin’s observations of primitive man he found the answer to the question of how the various facets of goodness can be of evolutionary value. If the contest exists between individuals only, then qualities of mercy and altruism will contribute nothing to a competitor’s fortune. But if the contest is between societies, then the member of a successful society must develop two sets of emotional responses: the many facets of friendship and cooperation reserved for members of his own society, and the many facets of hostility and enmity for members of the opposing society. African Genesis p. 171

In The Hour of the Dragon, Conan escapes from a dungeon, thanks to Zenobia, and races on horseback toward Aquilonia to reclaim his throne. But he stops when he comes across Nemedian soldiers attacking an old woman:

Conan felt slow fury swell his heart as he looked silently down and saw the ruffians dragging her toward a tree whose low-spreading branches were obviously intended to act as a gibbet. He had crossed the frontier an hour ago. He was standing on his own soil, watching the murder of one of his own subjects.

He speeds to the old woman’s aid and tears into the soldiers, “his eyes coals of blue fire and his lips smiling bleakly.” Later, he risks his life to rescue another loyal subject from the executioner’s axe, bashing skulls and letting one of his attackers bleed to death. That’s amity and enmity illustrated in one memorable scene.

If Robert Ardrey ever read Robert E. Howard, he never mentioned it. However, Ardrey the playwright did have something to say about the popularity of the musical West Side Story:

We watch our animal legacy unfold in its awful power. There is the timeless struggle over territory, as lunatic in the New York streets as it is logical in our animal heritage. There is the gang, indistinguishable from that among baboons. There is the ceaseless individual defense of status. There is the amity-enmity code of any animal society: mercy, devotion, and sacrifice for the social partner; suspicion, antagonism, and unending hostility for the territorial neighbor.” African Genesis, p. 337

3 – The rights and duties of the Alpha

Sexual reproduction, says Ardrey, makes equality impossible, thanks to the endless possibilities in the recombination of genes. That makes each individual “a pioneer, a biological adventure.”

Discovering and expressing our uniqueness is a driving force in our lives:

Every being will seek to achieve non-identicality and to fulfill its diverse genetic potential through an aggressiveness inborn. The drive to fulfill oneself, to perfect if possible the genetic potential of one’s unique endowment, is itself coded in our genetic instructions. The Social Contract, p. 39.

In The Phoenix on the Sword, King Conan confides to his aide, 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.”

Having fulfilled his dreams as a leader, Conan bolsters the power of his supporters, establishing a hierarchy. This brings stability to Aquilonia, which had long suffered from internal turbulence.

Hierarchies, writes Ardrey, occur throughout nature:

In recent ethological thought, increasing attention has been given to the alpha fish. The gang of thugs ruling a baboon troop may be feared; but their attraction is such that no unruly juvenile need ever be herded back into the fold. The magnetism of the dominants keeps the troop together. The Social Contract. p. 121

It’s good to be king, but the role carries responsibilities as well. While on the run in The Hour of the Dragon, Conan edges quietly onto the plantation of Servius, a steadfast supporter. Servius complies with Conan’s commands, then informs his king that another supporter, Countess Albiona, faces execution:

"I'm going into Tarantia after Albiona tonight," answered the king. "I've failed all my other loyal subjects, it seems—if they take her head, they can have mine too."

"This is madness!" cried Servius, staggering up and clutching his throat, as if he already felt the noose closing about it.

"There are secrets to the Tower which few know," said Conan. "Anyway, I'd be a dog to leave Albiona to die because of her loyalty to me. I may be a king without a kingdom, but I'm not a man without honor."

Howard did indeed have a special ability to “tap into the sub-conscious.” His insights are of special value in an age that not only denies humanity’s place in the natural world but despises those very attributes that make us human.

M. C. Tuggle is a tinkerer and science aficionado now retired from project management and operations research. His science fiction, fantasy, and mystery stories have been featured in Mystery Magazine, Little Blue Marble, and On Spec. His latest work appears in the anthology Minstrels in the Galaxy: Stories in the Key of Tull. He posts his literary rants at mctuggle.com.