¶ Aquilonia
"The proudest kingdom of the world was Aquilonia, reigning supreme in the dreaming west." -- The Nemedian Chronicles
Aquilonia The foremost of the Hyborean kingdoms, situated east of the Pictish wilderness, west of Nemedia, north of Zingara and Ophir, and south of Cimmeria.
¶ Argos
"My name is Tito, licensed master-shipman of the ports of Argos. I am bound for Cush, to trade beads and silks and sugar and brass-hilted swords to the black kings for ivory, copra, copper ore, slaves and pearls." -- Robert E. Howard: "Queen of the Black Coast"
Argos Hyborian kingdom situated southwest of Ophir, west of Koth and Shem, and south of Zingara -- where an Argossean panhandle juts westward.
¶ Asgard
"Conan opened his eyes and stared into the bearded faces that bent over him. He was surrounded by tall golden-haired warriors in mail and furs." -- Robert E. Howard: "The Frost Giant's Daughter"
Asgard The nation of the Aesir, situated east of Vanaheim and the Blue Mountains, west of Hyperborea and the putative River of Death Ice, and north of Cimmeria and the Eiglophian Mountains.
¶ Border Kingdom
Serving as a buffer state between Nemedia and Brythunia and the more savage people of the north, the Border Kingdom was probably the last Hyborian nation to be founded. The country also served as a trade route for merchants trying to avoid the strict taxes of Nemedia. A sad wilderness with deserted, disconsolate marshlands.
- Tech level: Dark Age
- Religion: Various
¶ Brythunia
"The kingdoms of the Hyborians - Aquilonia, Nemedia, Brythunia, Hyperborea, Koth, Ophir, Argos, Corinthia and the Border Kingdom - dominate the Western world." -- Robert E. Howard: "The Hyborian Age"
Brythunia A loosely-knit kingdom comprised of city-states, lying east of Nemedia, south of Hyperborea and the Border Kingdom, and north of Corinthia and Zamora. Its Nemedian frontier is the north-flowing Yellow River. Another river, the Frozen, flowed eastward along the Brythunian side of the Graaskal Mountains and marked the northern border.
¶ Cimmeria
"It was so long ago and far away
I have forgotten the very name men called me.
The axe and flint-tipped spear are like a dream,
And hunts and wars are like shadows. I recall
Only the stillness of that sombre land;
The clouds that piled forever on the hills,
The dimness of the everlasting woods.
Cimmeria, land of Darkness and the Night."
-- Robert E. Howard: "Cimmeria"
Cimmeria A nation of barbarian tribes situated north of Aquilonia and separated from it by a narrow strip of the Bossonian Marches and Gunderland. The Pictish Wilderness lay to the west of Cimmeria. The high Eiglophian Mountains walled off the country from Vanaheim and Asgard on the north.
¶ Corinthia
"He slunk along alleys and shadowed plazas until he came to the district which was his destination -- the Maze. Along its labyrinthian ways he went with the certainty of familiarity. It was indeed a maze of black alleys and enclosed courts and devious ways; of furtive sounds, and stenches." -- Robert E. Howard: "Rogues in the House"
Corinthia One of the lesser Hyborian kingdoms (or perhaps a confederacy), comprised of loosely allied city-states and presumed to be mostly mountainous. It lay south of Brythunia and Nemedia, west of Zamora, east of Ophir, and north of Koth.
¶ Darfar
"He understood now (...) the riddle of the black drum thrumming out there beyond the palm groves, and that pit of charred bones -- that pit where strange meat might be roasted under the stars, while black beasts squatted about to glut a hideous hunger. The man on the floor was a cannibal slave from Darfar." -- Robert E. Howard: "Shadows in Zamboula"
Darfar A black kingdom of hot, humid jungle lying between Kush and Keshan, south of the Purple Lotus Swamp of central Stygia.
¶ Hyperborea
"Meanwhile, the first of the Hyborian kingdoms has come onto existence, the rude and barbaric kingdom of Hyperborea, which had its beginnings in a crude fortress of boulders heaped to repel tribal attack. There are few more dramatic events in history than the rise of this fierce kingdom, whose people turned abruptly from nomadic life to rear dwellings of naked stone, surrounded by cyclopean walls." -- Robert E. Howard: "The Hyborian Age"
Hyperborea A northeastern Hyborian kingdom situated east of Asgard, west of Turan, and north of Brythunia and the Border Kingdom.
¶ Hyrkania
"'The southwestern shore is held by the Hyrkanians for hundreds of miles. We still have a long way to go before we pass beyond their northern boundaries. I intend to go northwards until I think we have passed them. Then we'll turn westward, and try to land on the shore bordered by the uninhabited steppes.'
'Suppose we meet pirates or a storm?' she asked. 'And we shall starve on the steppes.'
'Well', he reminded her, 'I didn't ask you to come with me.'" -- Robert E. Howard: "Shadows in the Moonlight"
Hyrkania Pushing westward, one tribe establishes the kingdom of Turan on the Southwestern shore of the inland Vilayet Sea. Later, other Hyrkanian clans push westward around that sea's northern extremity.
¶ Iranistan
"Conan stood over [the assassin], listening with tense expectancy. Up the street, around the next corner, he caught the shuffle of sandaled feet, the muffled clink of steel. These sinister sounds told him the nighted streets of Anshan were a death-trap." -- Robert E.Howard and L. Sprague de Camp: "The Flame Knife"
Iranistan A nation south of the Vilayet Sea and the Ilbars Mountains, west of Venjipur and Vendhya.
¶ Kambuja
Ruled by the god-king of the Scarlet Circle, deep in the jungle-girdled city of Angkhor crouches the hungry kingdom of Kambuja. The Kambujans are forever locked in war with neighbouring Khitai, whose great wizards, the dragon-sons, also contest on an arcane level. The Kambujan host fields huge war elephants, relied upon to smash the formations of Khitai in battle.
- Tech level: Oriental
- Religion: Ganesha, Zath, Hina
¶ Keshan
"Keshan was a barbaric kingdom lying in the eastern hinterlands of Kush where the broad grasslands merge with the forests that roll up from the south. The people were a mixed race, a dusky nobility ruling a population that was largely pure negro. The rulers -- princes and high priests -- claimed descent from a white race which, in a mythical age, had ruled a kingdom whose capital city was Alkmeenon." -- Robert E. Howard: "Jewels of Gwahlur"
Keshan A barbaric kingdom situated south of Stygia, west of Darfar, and east of Punt, mostly covered with tropical rainforest.
¶ Khauran
"Salome laughed fiercely, and slapped her bosom. The low-necked tunic left the upper parts of her firm breasts bare, and between them there shone a curious mark -- a crescent, red as blood.
'The mark of the witch!' cried Taramis, recoiling.
'Aye!' Salome's laughter was dagger-edged with hate. 'The curse of the kings of Khauran! Aye, they tell the tale in the market-places, with wagging beards and rolling eyes, the pious fools! They tell how the first queen of our line had traffic with a fiend of darkness and bore him a daughter who lives in foul legendry to this day. And thereafter in each century a girl baby was born into the Askhaurian dynasty, with a scarlet half-moon between her breasts, that signified her destiny.'" -- Robert E. Howard: "A Witch Shall Be Born"
Khauran A small border kingdom between the eastern tip of Koth and the Eastern Desert region of the Zuagirs.
¶ Khitai
"Then there were camels, and yellow-skinned men who wore silk robes and spoke in a weird tongue. (...) He was a magician from far Khitai, returning to his native kingdom after a journey to Stygia. He took me with him to purple-towered Paikang, its minarets rising amid the vine-festooned jungles of bamboo, and there I grew to womanhood under his teaching. Age had steeped him deep in black wisdom, not weakened his powers of evil. Many things he taught me --" -- Robert E. Howard: "A Witch Shall Be Born"
Khitai An important kingdom of the Far East, shielded from western invasion by a Great Wall. Its people are called Khitans. It is comprised of many city-states in the north, the greatest of which was Paikang.
¶ Khoraja
"Rumors drifted up through the meadowlands, into the cities of the Hyborians. The word ran along the caravans, the long camel-trains plodding through the sands, herded by lean, hawk-eyed men in white kaftans. It was passed on by the hook-nosed herdsmen of the grasslands, from the dwellers in tents to the dwellers in the squat stone cities where kings with curled blue-black beards worshipped round-bellied gods with curious rites. The word passed up through the fringe of hills where gaunt tribesmen took toll of the caravans. The rumors came into the fertile uplands where stately cities rose above blue lakes and rivers: the rumors marched along the broad white roads thronged with ox-wains, with lowing herds, with rich merchants, knights in steel, archers and priests." -- Robert E. Howard: "Black Colossus"
Khoraja A small but important kingdom lying southeast of Koth; named after its walled capital city. The southern border of Khoraja is the steep Kothian Escarpment, pierced only by the Shamla Pass, part of the main caravan route from the Hyborian kingdoms into the East and South.
¶ Koth
"Before midnight they crossed the Ophirean border and at dawn the spires of Khorshemish stood up gleaming and rose-tinted on the southeastern horizon, the slim towers overawed by the grim scarlet citadel that at a distance was like a splash of bright blood in the sky. (...) From the walls of the citadel one could look down on the broad white streets of the city, on minareted mosques, shops, temples and markets. One could look down, too, on the palaces of the king, set in broad gardens, high-walled, luxurious riots of fruit trees and blossoms, through which artificial streams murmured, and silvery fountains rippled incessantly. Over all brooded the citadel, like a condor stooping above its prey, intent on its own dark meditations." -- Robert E. Howard: "The Scarlet Citadel"
Koth A Hyborian kingdom south of Ophir, Corinthia, and Zamora, North of Shem and Argos, and bordered on the east by Khoraja and Khauran.
¶ Kush
"...a tall and massive wall, which enclosed the palaces of the ruling caste, descendants of those Stygians who centuries ago had come southward to hack out a black empire, and to mix their proud blood with the blood of their dusky subjects." -- Robert E. Howard: "The Snout in the Dark"
Kush - Northernmost of the Black Kingdoms situated south of Stygia. There were Kushite villages along the shore of the Western Ocean, then a band of thick forest. Inland stretched a savanna, which ended in eastern hills. Beyond this was the Southern Desert, only nominally part of the kingdom.
¶ Meru
"'You asked why we call our king a god; it is because he has lived for 10,000 years, his spirit being reborn in a different body after each sojourn in mortal flesh. (...) Yama, king of demons, created this valley for us, his chosen people, to dwell on -- under the shamans, of course. If we defy the shamans, Yama's great spell creating the valley will be nullified -- and this land will rise high, and become again a cold waste where no man can dwell! Jalong Thongpa is the only-begotten son of Yama himself... and when he calls his father... the god comes!'" -- Roy Thomas/L. Sprague de Camp: "The City of Skulls"
Meru A little-known kingdom situated south of the Talakma Mountains and north of the Himelians.
¶ Nemedia
"The last glints of the sun shone on the golden banner of Nemedia with the scarlet dragon, unfurled in the breeze above the pavillion of King Tarascus on an eminence near the eastern cliffs." -- Robert E. Howard: "Hour of the Dragon"
Nemedia Second most powerful of the Hyborian kingdoms, it lies east of Aquilonia, south of the Border Kingdom, west of Brythunia, and north of Corinthia and Ophir. The Border Range lies between Aquilonia and Nemedia. Most of the passes into Aquilonia are in the northwest; two southern passes exist, one is a well-defended gap in the range that the Road of Kings runs through, the other is the difficult Pass of Oteron. At the south end of the range lies the Tybor Gap, a large river valley that connects the kingdoms of Aquilonia, Nemedia, and Ophir. The rugged, impenetrable range of the Karpash Mountains lay on the southern border with Ophir.
¶ Ophir
"A strange peace had settled over the Western lands. The petty warlords were temporarily drained of cash and energy, hence of ferocity. The lands which were traditional enemies, which was to say all of them, were war-weary and had turned to settling internal problems and reestablishing disrupted trade. (...) Even the chronic civil war in Ophir had shuddered to a halt from sheer exhaustion." -- John Maddox Roberts: "The Treasure of Python"
Ophir One of the Hyborian kingdoms, situated south of Aquilonia, Nemedia, and Corinthia, and north of Argos and Koth.
¶ Pictland
"What do we know -- what does anyone know -- of the things the jungle may hide? We have dim rumors of great swamps and rivers, and a forest that stretches on and on over everlasting plains and hills to end at last on the shores of the western ocean. But what things lie between this river and that ocean we dare not even guess. No white man has ever plunged deep into that fastness and returned alive to tell us what he found. (...) Who knows what gods are worshipped under the shadows of the heathen forest, or what devils crawl out of the black ooze of the swamps?" -- Robert E. Howard: "Beyond the Black River"
Pictland Also called the Pictish Wilderness, the far western region of the world continent, lying west of Aquilonia, north of Zingara, and south of Vanaheim. The Aquilonian frontier of Pictland seems to have fluctuated between Thunder River in the east and Black River in the west. The land in between, Westermarck, is rather optimistically deemed a part of Aquilonia.
¶ Punt
"'We'll go to Punt. The people of Punt worship an ivory woman, and they wash gold out of the river in wicker baskets.'" -- Robert E. Howard: "Jewels of Gwahlur"
Punt A black kingdom lying east of Keshan and west of Zembabwei.
¶ Shem
"Bęlit's eyes were like a woman's in a trance. The Shemite soul finds a bright drunkenness in riches and material splendor, and the sight of this treasure might have shaken the soul of a sated emperor of Shushan." -- Robert E. Howard: "Queen of the Black Coast"
Shem A southern kingdom bounded on the west by the Western Ocean, on the east by the Eastern Desert, on the south by Stygia, and on the north by Argos, Koth and Khoraja.
¶ Stygia
"Human foes he did not fear, nor any death by steel or fire. But this was a black land of sorcery and nameless horror. Set the Old Serpent, men said, banished long ago from the Hyborian races, yet lurked in the shadows of the cryptic temples, and awful and mysterious were the deeds done in the nighted shrines." -- Robert E. Howard: "The Hour of the Dragon"
Stygia A southern kingdom bound by the Western Ocean on the west, the River Styx on the north and east, the kingdoms of Kush, Darfar, and Keshan on the South. There are forests, marshes, and numerous islands along the western coast; but inland the land seems mostly to have been a featureless desert, dotted with tombs and sinister ruins. In the south-central grasslands are the ghost-haunted Swamps of the Purple Lotus. The jungle rainforest begin near the frontier with Darfar and Keshan. There are more grasslands and a portion of the Southern Desert at the frontier with Kush. Cultivated lands lay along the great river.
¶ Turan
"Yezdigerd, king of Turan, was the mightiest monarch in the world. In his palace in the great port city of Aghrapur was heaped the plunder of empires. His fleets of purple-sailed war galleys had made Vilayet an Hyrkanian lake. The dark-skinned people of Zamora paid him tribute, as did the eastern provinces of Koth. The Shemites bowed to his rule as far west as Shushan. (...) His gilt-helmeted swordsmen had trampled hosts under their horses' hoofs, and walled cities went up in flames at his command. In the glutted slave markets of Aghrapur, Sultanapur, Khawarizm, Shapur and Khorusun, women were sold for three small silver coins -- blond Brythunians, tawny Stygians, dark-haired Zamorians, ebon Kushites, olive-skinned Shemites." -- Robert E. Howard: "The Devil In Iron"
Turan Also called the Sunrise Empire, Turan is a nation with lands first extending only along the western reaches of the Vilayet Sea, but eventually stretching westward over the steppes and desert, eventually reaching the border of Zamora.
¶ Vanaheim
"'Swear not so often by Ymir,' uneasily muttered a warrior, glancing at the distant mountains. 'This is his land and the god bides among yonder mountains the legends say.'" -- Robert E. Howard: "The Frost Giant's Daughter"
Westernmost of the nations of the Far North, lying west of Asgard and North of Cimmeria and Pictland.
Vanaheim It is a somber country, mostly a bleak tundra plain that was snow-covered through the long winters. Swampy taiga forests clothe its high southern regions thinly. Glaciers creep down from the Eiglophian Mountains in the south and the Blue Mountains on the frontier with Asgard. Far to the north are more mountains, crowned with a permanent ice cap that grows larger as the climate changes.
¶ Vendhya
"'Haven't I offered you gold?'
Chunder Shan laughed.
'Gold? There is more gold in Peshkhauri than you ever saw (...) And it is but a drop of all the treasure of Vendhya.'" -- Robert E. Howard: "The People of the Black Circle"
Vendhya An ancient and prosperous eastern kingdom having a tropical climate. To the north is the titanic massif of the Himelian Mountains, its inhabited area known as Ghulistan to the Vendhyans. To the west is the minor kingdom of Kosala, dominated to a great extent by its larger neighbor. East of Vendhya are the mysterious lands of Uttara Kuru and Kambuja. To the northeast, beyond mountains and deep jungles, lies Khitai.
¶ Yamata
Yamata A cluster of islands east of Khitai, ruled by the Witch Queen of Yamatai. The current political ruler is Mikoto Kamu, the adolescent son of Mikoto Kyoji, who died under questionable circumstances.
¶ Zamora
"...Zamora with its dark-haired women and towers of spider-haunted mystery..." -- the Nemedian Chronicles
Zamora An eastern kingdom founded by the ancient Zhemri people several thousand years ago. (The elephant-being, Yag-kosha, said the Zamoran race was pre-Cataclysmic.)
¶ Zembabwei
"From the curious angles and proportions of the passage, Conan guessed that the old myths were true; that it had indeed been the mysterious serpent-folk of prehuman times who had first raised the city of Old Zembabwei -- or at least laid the foundations on which the present city was built. He had seen that strangely angled masonry twice before in his long career: once in a ruined castle on the grassy plains of Kush; and again, years later, on the Nameless Isle in the uncharted Western Ocean." -- L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter: "Red Moon of Zembabwei"
Zembabwei Also called Zimbabwe, a powerful black kingdom lying south and east of Punt. It is ruled by Twin Kings and has everglade flatlands in the north, merging into thick tropical jungle toward the south and east. The upper Styx forms its western boundary; a large river in the northeast and barren plains in the south are presumed to delineate other frontiers; while in the east its lands stretched to the Southern Ocean shore.
¶ Zingara
"As he came into the waist the crew thronged about him -- Zingarans, all of them, half naked, their gaudy silk garments splashed with tar, jewels glinting in earrings and dagger-hilts." -- Robert E. Howard: "The Pool of the Black One"
Zingara A non-Hyborian nation situated south of the Bossonian Marches of Aquilonia and Pictland, west of Poitain and Ophir, and north of the panhandle of Argos.