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156-483: Michael Arnold (born October 1979) is a British novelist who writes historical fiction . Michael Arnold was brought up and educated in the market town of Petersfield , in Hampshire , where he still lives with his wife and three children. Arnold worked in the financial services industry for 10 years before writing full-time. He started creating his series of civil war novels in 2009. The first book, Traitor's Blood ,

312-583: A Cossack near Kiliya . In the 16th century, these Cossack societies merged into two independent territorial organizations, as well as other smaller, still-detached groups: There are also references to the less well-known Tatar Cossacks, including the Nağaybäklär and Meshchera -speaking Volga Finns , of whom Sary Azman was the first Don ataman . These groups were assimilated by the Don Cossacks, but had their own irregular Bashkir and Meshchera Host up to

468-500: A century prior and its author asserted that her work could present a "fuller and therefore 'truer ' " version of history. One of the early examples of the historical novel in Europe is La Princesse de Clèves , a French novel published anonymously in March 1678. It is regarded by many as the beginning of the modern tradition of the psychological novel and as a great work. Its author generally

624-453: A close resemblance to our own world at various points in history. Historiographic metafiction combines historical fiction with metafiction . The term is closely associated with postmodern literature including writers such as Salman Rushdie and Thomas Pynchon . Several novels by Nobel Prize laureate José Saramago are set in historical times including Baltasar and Blimunda , The Gospel According to Jesus Christ and The History of

780-499: A combined Muscovite-Swedish army and facilitate the occupation of Moscow from 1610 to 1611, riding into Moscow with Stanisław Żółkiewski . The final attempt by King Sigismund and Wladyslav to seize the throne of Muscovy was launched on April 6, 1617. Although Wladyslav was the nominal leader, it was Jan Karol Chodkiewicz who commanded the Commonwealth forces. By October, the towns of Dorogobuzh and Vyazma had surrendered. But

936-472: A contemporary narrative, but rather as a distinct social and cultural setting. Scott's Scottish novels such as Waverley (1814) and Rob Roy (1817) focused upon a middling character who sits at the intersection of various social groups in order to explore the development of society through conflict. Ivanhoe (1820) gained credit for renewing interest in the Middle Ages . Many well-known writers from

1092-696: A defeat, when the counterattack on Moscow by Chodkiewicz failed between Vyasma and Mozhaysk , prompted the Polish-Lithuanian army to retreat. In 1618, Petro Konashevych-Sahaidachny continued his campaign against the Tsardom of Russia on behalf of the Cossacks and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Numerous Russian towns were sacked, including Livny and Yelets . In September 1618, with Chodkiewicz, Konashevych-Sahaidachny laid siege to Moscow, but peace

1248-612: A detective and spy. Although the story itself is fiction, many of the persona and events are not. The book is based on research by Monaldi and Sorti, who researched information from 17th-century manuscripts and published works concerning the siege of Vienna , the plague and papacy of Pope Innocent XI . The genre of the historical novel has also permitted some authors, such as the Polish novelist Bolesław Prus in his sole historical novel, Pharaoh , to distance themselves from their own time and place to gain perspective on society and on

1404-489: A distinct subgenre recognized by both publishers and libraries. Romantic themes have also been portrayed, such as Doctor Zhivago by Boris Pasternak and Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell . One of the first popular historical romances appeared in 1921, when Georgette Heyer published The Black Moth , which is set in 1751. It was not until 1935 that she wrote the first of her signature Regency novels, set around

1560-636: A historical event or biography , to the degree that the available historical research will allow. Other historical dramas are fictionalized tales that are based on an actual person and their deeds, such as Braveheart , which is loosely based on the 13th-century knight William Wallace 's fight for Scotland 's independence. For films pertaining to the history of East Asia , Central Asia , and South Asia , there are historical drama films set in Asia , also known as Jidaigeki in Japan. Wuxia films like The Hidden Power of

1716-831: A historical work in the manner of Sir Walter Scott. This was subsequently incorporated into La Comédie Humaine . The bulk of La Comédie Humaine , however, takes place during the Bourbon Restoration and the July Monarchy , though there are several novels which take place during the French Revolution and others which take place of in the Middle Ages or the Renaissance, including About Catherine de Medici and The Elixir of Long Life . Victor Hugo 's The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1831) furnishes another 19th-century example of

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1872-652: A lifestyle that combined the ancient Cossack order and habits with those of the Knights Hospitaller . The Cossack structure arose, in part, in response to the struggle against Tatar raids. Socio-economic developments in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth were another important factor in the growth of the Ukrainian Cossacks. During the 16th century, serfdom was imposed because of the favorable conditions for grain sales in Western Europe. This subsequently decreased

2028-499: A long tradition in many cultures; both western traditions (as early as Ancient Greek and Latin literature ) as well as Eastern, in the form of oral and folk traditions (see mythology and folklore ), which produced epics , novels, plays and other fictional works describing history for contemporary audiences. Definitions differ as to what constitutes a historical novel. On the one hand the Historical Novel Society defines

2184-612: A prisoner of the Solovetsky Islands . Some Cossacks moved to the Danube Delta region, where they established a new sich under Ottoman rule. To prevent further defection of Cossacks, the Russian government restored the special Cossack status of the majority of Zaporozhian Cossacks. This allowed them to unite in the Host of Loyal Zaporozhians, and later to reorganize into other hosts, of which

2340-649: A reputation for their raids against the Ottoman Empire and its vassals , although they also sometimes plundered other neighbors. Their actions increased tension along the southern border of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. Low-level warfare took place in those territories for most of the period of the Commonwealth (1569–1795). Prior to the formation of the Zaporozhian Sich , Cossacks had usually been organized by Ruthenian boyars , or princes of

2496-444: A veiled attack on Austria, which controlled the region at the time the novel was written. The critical and popular success of The Betrothed gave rise to a crowd of imitations and, in the age of unification , almost every Italian writer tried his hand at the genre; novels now almost forgotten, like Marco Visconti by Tommaso Grossi (Manzoni's best friend) or Ettore Fieramosca by Massimo D'Azeglio (Manzoni's son-in-law), were

2652-478: Is Christopher Meredith (b. 1954), whose Griffri (1991) is set in the 12th century and has the poet of a minor Welsh prince as narrator. Nobel Prize laureate William Golding wrote a number of historical novels. The Inheritors (1955) is set in prehistoric times, and shows "new people" (generally identified with Homo sapiens sapiens ) triumphing over a gentler race (generally identified with Neanderthals ) by deceit and violence. The Spire (1964) follows

2808-475: Is Peter I (1929–34) by Aleksey Nikolayevich Tolstoy , and I, Claudius (1934) and King Jesus (1946) by Robert Graves . Other recent biographical novel series, include Conqueror and Emperor by Conn Iggulden and Cicero Trilogy by Robert Harris. The gothic novel was popular in the late eighteenth century. Set in the historical past it has an interest in the mysterious, terrifying and haunting. Horace Walpole 's 1764 novel The Castle of Otranto

2964-464: Is a genre of largely Italian-made historical or biblical epics (costume dramas) that dominated the Italian film industry from 1958 to 1965. Most pepla featured a superhumanly strong man as the protagonist, such as Hercules , Samson , Goliath , Ursus or Italy's own popular folk hero Maciste . These supermen often rescued captive princesses from tyrannical despots and fought mythological creatures. Not all

3120-576: Is an epic retelling of the story of an Italian nobleman who lives through the Napoleonic period in Italian history. It includes a description of the Battle of Waterloo by the principal character. Stendhal fought with Napoleon and participated in the French invasion of Russia . The Betrothed (1827) by Alessandro Manzoni has been called the most famous and widely read novel of the Italian language. The Betrothed

3276-518: Is considered to be an influential work. Historical mysteries or "historical whodunits " are set by their authors in the distant past, with a plot that which involves the solving of a mystery or crime (usually murder). Though works combining these genres have existed since at least the early 1900s, many credit Ellis Peters 's Cadfael Chronicles (1977–1994) with popularizing them. These are set between 1137 and 1145 A.D. The increasing popularity of this type of fiction in subsequent decades has created

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3432-517: Is held to be Madame de La Fayette . The action takes place between October 1558 and November 1559 at the royal court of Henry II of France. The novel recreates that era with remarkable precision. Nearly every character – except the heroine – is a historical figure. Events and intrigues unfold with great faithfulness to documentary records. In the United Kingdom, the historical novel "appears to have developed" from La Princesse de Clèves , "and then via

3588-459: Is one of the earliest examples of the historical novel in English and went through at least 84 editions, including translation into French and German. The first true historical novel in English was in fact Maria Edgeworth 's Castle Rackrent (1800). In the 20th century György Lukács argued that Scott was the first fiction writer who saw history not just as a convenient frame in which to stage

3744-445: Is one of the most famous 19th-century American historical novels. Set in 17th-century Puritan Boston, Massachusetts during the years 1642 to 1649, it tells the story of Hester Prynne , who conceives a daughter through an affair and struggles to create a new life of repentance and dignity. In French literature, the most prominent inheritor of Scott's style of the historical novel was Balzac . In 1829 Balzac published Les Chouans ,

3900-511: Is set amid the Gordon Riots , and A Tale of Two Cities in the French Revolution . In some works, the accuracy of the historical elements has been questioned, as in Alexandre Dumas ' 1845 novel Queen Margot . Postmodern novelists such as John Barth and Thomas Pynchon operate with even more freedom, mixing historical characters and settings with invented history and fantasy, as in

4056-588: Is set in 16th century Småland and his widely read novel series The Emigrants tells the story of Småland emigrants to the United States in the 19th century. Per Anders Fogelström wrote a hugely popular series of five historical novels set in his native Stockholm beginning with City of My Dreams (1960). Other writers of historical fiction in Swedish literature include Sara Lidman , Birgitta Trotzig , Per Olov Enquist and Artur Lundkvist . The historical novel

4212-572: Is the German author Thomas Mann 's Buddenbrooks (1901). This chronicles the decline of a wealthy north German merchant family over the course of four generations, incidentally portraying the manner of life and mores of the Hanseatic bourgeoisie in the years from 1835 to 1877. Mann drew deeply from the history of his own family, the Mann family of Lübeck , and their milieu. This was Mann's first novel, and with

4368-597: Is the author of historical novels which were translated into 11 languages. Anton Donchev (1930–) is an old living author, whose first independent novel, Samuel's Testimony , was published in 1961. His second book, Time of Parting , which dealt with the Islamization of the population in the Rhodopes during the XVII century was written in 1964. The novel was adapted in the serial movie " Time of Violence ", divided into two parts with

4524-656: The Leatherstocking Tales pentalogy. The Last of the Mohicans is set in 1757, during the French and Indian War (the Seven Years' War ), when France and Great Britain battled for control of North America. Cooper's chief rival, John Neal , wrote Rachel Dyer (1828), the first bound novel about the 17th-century Salem witch trials . Rachel Dyer also influenced future American fiction set in this period, like The Scarlet Letter (1850) by Nathaniel Hawthorne which

4680-427: The 1930s and 1940s . The following American authors have also written historical novels in the 20th century: Gore Vidal , John Barth , Norman Mailer , E. L. Doctorow and William Kennedy . Thomas Pynchon 's historical novel Mason & Dixon (1997) tells the story of the two English surveyors, Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon, who were charged with marking the boundary between Pennsylvania and Maryland in

4836-825: The American Girl novels and the Magic Tree House series . A prominent award within children's historical fiction is the Scott O'Dell Award for Historical Fiction . Historical narratives have also found their way in comics and graphic novels. There are Prehistorical elements in jungle comics like Akim and Rahan . Ancient Greece inspired graphic novels are 300 created by Frank Miller , centered around Battle of Thermopylae , and Age of Bronze series by Eric Shanower , that retells Trojan War . Historical subjects can also be found in manhua comics like Three Kingdoms and Sun Zi's Tactics by Lee Chi Ching , Weapons of

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4992-669: The Black Sea Cossack Host together with Loyal Zaporozhians. Most of the remaining Cossacks who had stayed in the Danube Delta returned to Russia in 1828. They settled in the area north of the Azov Sea , becoming known as the Azov Cossacks . The majority of Zaporizhian Cossacks who had remained loyal to Russia despite the destruction of Sich became known as Black Sea Cossacks . Both Azov and Black Sea Cossacks were resettled to colonize

5148-667: The Black Sea Host was most important. Because of land scarcity resulting from the distribution of Zaporozhian Sich lands among landlords, they eventually moved on to the Kuban region . The majority of Danubian Sich Cossacks moved first to the Azov region in 1828, and later joined other former Zaporozhian Cossacks in the Kuban region. Groups were generally identified by faith rather than language in that period, and most descendants of Zaporozhian Cossacks in

5304-649: The Cossack szlachta . The uprising was one of a series of catastrophic events for the Commonwealth, known as The Deluge , which greatly weakened the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and set the stage for its disintegration 100 years later. Influential relatives of the Ruthenian and Lithuanian szlachta in Moscow helped to create the Russian–Polish alliance against Khmelnitsky's Cossacks, portrayed as rebels against order and against

5460-727: The Danubian Sich . While Ukrainian folklore remembers the Danubian Sich, other new siches of Loyal Zaporozhians on the Bug and Dniester rivers did not achieve such fame. Other Cossacks settled on the Tisa river in the Austrian Empire , also forming a new Sich. During the Cossack sojourn under Turkish rule, a new host was founded that numbered around 12,000 people by the end of 1778. Cossack settlement on

5616-589: The Dnieper , Don , Terek , and Ural river basins, and played an important role in the historical and cultural development of both Ukraine and parts of Russia. The Cossack way of life persisted via both direct descendants and acquired ideals in other nations into the twentieth century, though the sweeping societal changes of the Russian Revolution disrupted Cossack society as much as any other part of Russia; many Cossacks migrated to other parts of Europe following

5772-702: The Dnieper Rapids (Ukrainian: za porohamy ), also known as the Wild Fields . The group became well known, and its numbers increased greatly between the 15th and 17th centuries. The Zaporozhian Cossacks played an important role in European geopolitics , participating in a series of conflicts and alliances with the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth , Russia , and the Ottoman Empire . The Zaporozhians gained

5928-682: The Dniester and the Volga were mentioned in Ruthenian chronicles. Historical records of the Cossacks before the 16th century are scant, as is the history of the Ukrainian lands in that period. As early as the 15th century, a few individuals ventured into the Wild Fields , the southern frontier regions of Ukraine separating Poland-Lithuania from the Crimean Khanate. These were short-term expeditions, to acquire

6084-808: The Don and the Dnieper after the demise of the Khazars . Their arrival was probably not before the 13th century, when the Mongols broke the power of the Cumans , who had assimilated the previous population on that territory. It is known that new settlers inherited a lifestyle that long pre-dated their presence, including that of the Turkic Cumans and the Circassian Kassaks. In contrast, Slavic settlements in southern Ukraine started to appear relatively early during Cuman rule, with

6240-826: The Don Republic and the Kuban People's Republic , and the revived Hetmanate emerged in Ukraine. Cossack troops formed the effective core of the anti-Bolshevik White Army , and Cossack republics became centers for the anti-Bolshevik White movement . With the victory of the Red Army , Cossack lands were subjected to decossackization and the Holodomor famine. As a result, during the Second World War, their loyalties were divided and both sides had Cossacks fighting in their ranks. Following

6396-564: The English Regency period (1811–1820), when the Prince Regent ruled England in place of his ill father, George III . Heyer's Regency novels were inspired by Jane Austen 's novels of the late 18th and early 19th century. Because Heyer's writing was set in the midst of events that had occurred over 100 years previously, she included authentic period detail in order for her readers to understand. Where Heyer referred to historical events, it

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6552-1095: The Gothic novel ". Another early example is The Unfortunate Traveller by Thomas Nashe , published in 1594 and set during the reign of King Henry VIII . Historical fiction rose to prominence in Europe during the early 19th century as part of the Romantic reaction to the Enlightenment , especially through the influence of the Scottish writer Sir Walter Scott , whose works were immensely popular throughout Europe. Among his early European followers we can find Willibald Alexis , Theodor Fontane , Bernhard Severin Ingemann , Miklós Jósika , Mór Jókai , Jakob van Lennep , Demetrius Bikelos , Enrique Gil y Carrasco , Carl Jonas Love Almqvist , Victor Rydberg , Andreas Munch , Alessandro Manzoni , Alfred de Vigny , Honoré de Balzac or Prosper Mérimée . Jane Porter 's 1803 novel Thaddeus of Warsaw

6708-436: The Khmelnytsky Uprising . Afterwards, the Treaty of Pereyaslav (1654) brought most of the Cossack state under Russian rule. The Sich, with its lands, became an autonomous region under the Russian protectorate. The Don Cossack Army, an autonomous military state formation of the Don Cossacks under the citizenship of the Moscow State in the Don region in 1671–1786, began a systematic conquest and colonization of lands to secure

6864-421: The Kuban steppe , a crucial foothold for Russian expansion in the Caucasus . In 1860, more Cossacks were resettled to the North Caucasus , and merged into the Kuban Cossack Host . The native land of the Cossacks is defined by a line of Russian town-fortresses located on the border with the steppe, and stretching from the middle Volga to Ryazan and Tula , then breaking abruptly to the south and extending to

7020-727: The Napoleonic Wars . There are also adventure novels with pirate characters like Robert Louis Stevenson 's Treasure Island (1883), Emilio Salgari 's Sandokan (1895–1913) and Captain Blood (1922) by Rafael Sabatini . Recent examples of historical novels about pirates are The Adventures of Hector Lynch by Tim Severin , The White Devil (Белият Дявол) by Hristo Kalchev and The Pirate Devlin novels by Mark Keating. A number of work take place in variants of known history, in which events had occurred differently. This can involve time travel . There are also works of historical fantasy , which add fantastical elements to known (or alternative) history or which take place in second worlds with

7176-401: The Polish–Ottoman War of 1633–1634. Cossack numbers increased when the warriors were joined by peasants escaping serfdom in Russia and dependence in the Commonwealth. Attempts by the szlachta to turn the Zaporozhian Cossacks into peasants eroded the formerly strong Cossack loyalty towards the Commonwealth. The government constantly rebuffed Cossack ambitions for recognition as equal to

7332-400: The Pontic–Caspian steppe , north of the Black Sea near the Dnieper River . By the end of the 15th century, the term was also applied to peasants who had fled to the devastated regions along the Dnieper and Don Rivers , where they established their self-governing communities. Until at least the 1630s, these Cossack groups remained ethnically and religiously open to virtually anybody, although

7488-507: The Roman Catholic -dominated Commonwealth. Tensions increased when Commonwealth policies turned from relative tolerance to suppression of the Eastern Orthodox Church after the Union of Brest . The Cossacks became strongly anti-Roman Catholic, an attitude that became synonymous with anti-Polish. After the Ottoman-Polish and Polish-Muscovite warfare ceased, the official Cossack register was again reduced. The registered Cossacks ( reiestrovi kozaky ) were isolated from those who were excluded from

7644-407: The dissolution of the Soviet Union , the Cossacks made a systematic return to Russia. Many took an active part in post-Soviet conflicts . In the 2002 Russian Census , 140,028 people reported their ethnicity as Cossack. There are Cossack organizations in Russia, Kazakhstan , Ukraine , Belarus , and the United States . The Zaporozhian Cossacks lived on the Pontic–Caspian steppe below

7800-404: The early Christians and has been adapted several times for film, in 1913 , 1924 , 1951 , 2001 to only name the most prominent. Sigrid Undset 's Kristin Lavransdatter fulfilled a similar function for Norwegian history ; Undset later won a Nobel Prize for Literature (1928). Many early historical novels played an important role in the rise of European popular interest in the history of

7956-489: The historical romance genre and its subgenre Regency romance , which was inspired by Jane Austen . To ensure accuracy, Heyer collected reference works and kept detailed notes on all aspects of Regency life. While some critics thought the novels were too detailed, others considered the level of detail to be Heyer's greatest asset; Heyer even recreated William the Conqueror 's crossing into England for her novel The Conqueror . Naomi Mitchison's finest novel, The Corn King and

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8112-404: The human condition , or to escape the depredations of the censor . In some historical novels, major historic events take place mostly off-stage, while the fictional characters inhabit the world where those events occur. Robert Louis Stevenson 's Kidnapped recounts mostly private adventures set against the backdrop of the Jacobite troubles in Scotland . Charles Dickens 's Barnaby Rudge

8268-428: The magnum opus by the 2018 Nobel Prize laureate Olga Tokarczuk . A 20th-century variant of the historical novel is documentary fiction, which incorporates "not only historical characters and events, but also reports of everyday events" found in contemporary newspapers. Examples of this variant form of historical novel include U.S.A. (1938), and Ragtime (1975) by E.L. Doctorow . Memoirs of Hadrian by

8424-406: The suzerainty of the Russian Tsar from 1667 but was ruled by local hetmans for a century. The principal political problem of the hetmans who followed the Pereyeslav Agreement was defending the autonomy of the Hetmanate from Russian/Muscovite centralism. The hetmans Ivan Vyhovsky , Petro Doroshenko and Ivan Mazepa attempted to resolve this by separating Ukraine from Russia. Relations between

8580-431: The szlachta . Plans for transforming the Polish–Lithuanian two-nation Commonwealth into a Polish–Lithuanian–Ruthenian Commonwealth made little progress, due to the unpopularity among the Ruthenian szlachta of the idea of Ruthenian Cossacks being equal to them and their elite becoming members of the szlachta . The Cossacks' strong historic allegiance to the Eastern Orthodox Church also put them at odds with officials of

8736-488: The 16th century, with the area of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth extending south, the Zaporozhian Cossacks were mostly, if tentatively, regarded by the Commonwealth as their subjects. Foreign and internal pressure on the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth led to the government making concessions to the Zaporozhian Cossacks. King Stephen Báthory granted them certain rights and freedoms in 1578, and they gradually began to create their foreign policy. They did so independently of

8892-403: The 18th century. More recently there have been works such as Neal Stephenson 's Baroque Cycle . In Italy, the tradition of historical fiction has flourished in the modern age, the nineteenth century in particular having caught writers’ interests. Southern Italian novelists like Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa ( The Leopard ), Francesco Iovine ( Lady Ava ), Carlo Alianello ( The Heritage of

9048-430: The Belgian-born French writer Marguerite Yourcenar is about the life and death of Roman Emperor Hadrian . First published in France in French in 1951 as Mémoires d'Hadrien , the book was an immediate success, meeting with enormous critical acclaim. Margaret George has written fictional biographies about historical persons in The Memoirs of Cleopatra (1997) and Mary, called Magdalene (2002). An earlier example

9204-409: The Cossack starshyna (nobility), their property, and their autonomy under his rule; and freed the Cossacks from the Polish sphere of influence and the land claims of the Ruthenian szlachta . Only some of the Ruthenian szlachta of the Chernigov region, who had their origins in the Moscow state, saved their lands from division among Cossacks and became part of the Cossack szlachta . After this,

9360-400: The Cossack cultural identity across the world even though the majority, especially in the Russian Federation, have little to no connection to the original Cossack people because cultural ideals and legacy changed greatly with time. Cossack organizations operate in Russia , Ukraine , Belarus , Kazakhstan , Canada , and the United States . Max Vasmer 's etymological dictionary traces

9516-413: The Cossack starshyna , including hetman Ivan Vyhovsky . The treaty failed, however, because the starshyna were divided on the issue, and it had even less support among rank-and-file Cossacks. As a result of the mid–17th century Khmelnytsky Uprising, the Zaporozhian Cossacks briefly established an independent state, which later became the autonomous Cossack Hetmanate (1649–1764). It was placed under

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9672-417: The Cossack nation of the Zaporozhian Host was divided into two autonomous republics of the Russian Tsardom: the Cossack Hetmanate , and the more independent Zaporizhia . These organisations gradually lost their autonomy, and were abolished by Catherine II in the late 18th century. The Hetmanate became the governorship of Little Russia , and Zaporizhia was absorbed into New Russia . With the destruction of

9828-533: The Dragon Sabre (1984) and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon (2000), based on novels by Jin Yong and Wang Dulu , have also been produced. Zhang Yimou has directed several acclaimed wuxia films like Hero (2002), House of Flying Daggers (2004) and Curse of the Golden Flower (2006). Although largely fictional some wuxia films are considered historical drama. Samurai films like Zatoichi and Lone Wolf and Cub series also fall under historical drama umbrella. Peplum films also known as sword-and-sandal,

9984-459: The Eastern Zhou Kingdoms ), Chu Renhuo 's Sui Tang yanyi ( Romance of the Sui and Tang dynasties ), Xiong Damu 's Liang Song Nanbei Zhizhuan ( Records of the Two Songs, South and North ) and Quan han zhi zhuan , Yang Erzeng 's Dong Xi Jin yan yi ( Romance of the Eastern and Western Jin dynasties ), and Qian Cai's The General Yue Fei , etc. Classical Greek novelists were also "very fond of writing novels about people and places of

10140-422: The Empire in order to abolish slavery and harsh bureaucracy, and to maintain independence. The Empire responded with executions and tortures, the destruction of the western part of the Don Cossack Host during the Bulavin Rebellion in 1707–1708, the destruction of Baturyn after Mazepa's rebellion in 1708, and the formal dissolution of the Lower Dnieper Zaporozhian Host after Pugachev's Rebellion in 1775. After

10296-494: The Gods by Wong Yuk Long as well as The Ravages of Time by Chan Mou . There are also straight Samurai manga series like Path of the Assassin , Vagabond , Rurouni Kenshin and Azumi . Several comics and graphic novels have been produced into anime series or a movie adaptations like Azumi and 300 . Historical drama film stories are based upon historical events and famous people. Some historical dramas are docudramas , which attempt an accurate portrayal of

10452-448: The Hetmanate and their new sovereign began to deteriorate after the autumn of 1656, when the Muscovites, going against the wishes of their Cossack partners, signed an armistice with the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in Vilnius . The Cossacks considered the Vilnius agreement a breach of the contract they had entered into at Pereiaslav. For the Muscovite tsar, the Pereiaslav Agreement signified the unconditional submission of his new subjects;

10608-426: The Kuban region are bilingual, speaking both Russian and Balachka , the local Kuban dialect of central Ukrainian . Their folklore is largely Ukrainian. The predominant view of ethnologists and historians is that its origins lie in the common culture dating back to the Black Sea Cossacks. The waning loyalty of the Cossacks, and the szlachta 's arrogance towards them, resulted in several Cossack uprisings against

10764-483: The Lion d'Or (concerned with the War's consequences); Pat Barker 's Regeneration Trilogy and Sebastian Barry 's A Long Long Way . American Nobel laureate William Faulkner 's novel Absalom, Absalom! (1936) is set before, during and after the American Civil War . Kenneth Roberts wrote several books set around the events of the American Revolution, of which Northwest Passage (1937), Oliver Wiswell (1940) and Lydia Bailey (1947) all became best-sellers in

10920-497: The Middle Ages . Victor Hugo 's The Hunchback of Notre-Dame often receives credit for fueling the movement to preserve the Gothic architecture of France , leading to the establishment of the Monuments historiques , the French governmental authority for historic preservation . Rita Monaldi and Francesco Sorti 's historical mystery saga Imprimateur Secretum Veritas Mysterium has increased interest in European history and features famous castrato opera singer Atto Melani as

11076-445: The Ottomans, to ease pressure on their own borders. Many Cossacks and Tatars developed longstanding enmity due to the losses of their raids. The ensuing chaos and cycles of retaliation often turned the entire southeastern Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth border into a low-intensity war zone. It catalyzed escalation of Commonwealth–Ottoman warfare, from the Moldavian Magnate Wars (1593–1617) to the Battle of Cecora (1620) , and campaigns in

11232-690: The Patriarch (1975) by Gabriel García Marquez . Other writers of historical fiction include Abel Posse , Antonio Benitez Rojo , João Ubaldo Ribeiro , Jorge Amado , Homero Aridjis . In the first decades of the 21st century, an increased interest for historical fiction has been noted. One of the most successful writers of historical novels is Hilary Mantel . Other writers of historical fiction include Philippa Gregory , Bernard Cornwell , Sarah Waters , Ken Follett , George Saunders , Shirley Hazzard and Julie Orringer . The historical novel The Books of Jacob set in 18th century Poland has been praised as

11388-573: The Perestroika era in the late 1980s, descendants of Cossacks began to revive their national traditions. In 1988, the Soviet Union enacted a law permitting the re-establishment of former Cossack hosts and the formation of new ones. Throughout the 1990s, numerous regional authorities consented to delegate certain local administrative and policing responsibilities to these reconstituted Cossack hosts. Between 3.5 and 5 million people associate themselves with

11544-722: The Po , a patchwork saga of a family of millers from the time of Napoleon to the First World War , one of the most epic novels of the last century. In 1980, Umberto Eco achieved international success with The Name of the Rose , a novel set in an Italian abbey in 1327 readable as a historical mystery, as an allegory of Italy during the Years of Lead , and as an erudite joke. Eco's work, like Manzoni's preceding it, relaunched Italian interest in historical fiction. Many novelists who till then had preferred

11700-678: The Polish government. Cossack rebellions eventually culminated in the Khmelnytsky Uprising , led by the hetman of the Zaporizhian Sich, Bohdan Khmelnytsky . The Zaporozhian Sich had its own authorities, its own "Lower" Zaporozhian Host , and its own land. In 1775, the Lower Dnieper Zaporozhian Host was destroyed. Later, its high-ranking Cossack leaders were exiled to Siberia, its last chief, Petro Kalnyshevsky , becoming

11856-537: The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth to create a third constituent, comparable in status to that of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The Union of Hadiach provoked a war between the Cossacks and the Muscovites/Russians that began in the fall of 1658. In June 1659, the two armies met near the town of Konotop . One army comprised Cossacks, Tatars, and Poles, and the other was led by a top Muscovite military commander of

12012-659: The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and the Lower Dnieper (Nyzovyi in Ukrainian) Cossack Host under the joint protectorate of Russia and the Commonwealth. By the end of the 18th century, Cossack nations had been transformed into a special military estate ( sosloviye ), "a military class". The Malorussian Cossacks (the former Registered Cossacks also known as "Town Zaporozhian Host") were excluded from this transformation, but were promoted to membership of various civil estates or classes (often Russian nobility), including

12168-507: The Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in the early 17th century. Finally, the King's adamant refusal to accede to the demand to expand the Cossack Registry prompted the largest and most successful of these: the Khmelnytsky Uprising , that began in 1648. Some Cossacks, including the Polish szlachta in Ukraine, converted to Eastern Orthodoxy, divided the lands of the Ruthenian szlachta , and became

12324-701: The Prioress ) and more recently Andrea Camilleri ( The Preston Brewer ) retold the events of the Italian Unification , at times overturning its traditionally heroic and progressive image. The conservative Riccardo Bacchelli in The Devil at the Long Point and the communist Vasco Pratolini in Metello described, from ideologically opposite points of view, the birth of Italian Socialism . Bacchelli also wrote The Mill on

12480-1014: The Pugachev rebellion, the Empire renamed the Yaik Host, its capital, the Yaik Cossacks, and the Cossack town of Zimoveyskaya in the Don region to try to encourage the Cossacks to forget the men and their uprisings. It also formally dissolved the Lower Dnieper Zaporozhian Cossack Host, and destroyed their fortress on the Dnieper (the Sich itself). This may in part have been due to the participation of some Zaporozhian and other Ukrainian exiles in Pugachev's rebellion. During his campaign, Pugachev issued manifestos calling for restoration of all borders and freedoms of both

12636-590: The Russian border was approved by the Ottoman Empire after the Cossacks officially vowed to serve the sultan . Yet internal conflict, and the political manoeuvring of the Russian Empire led to splits among the Cossacks. Some of the runaway Cossacks returned to Russia, where the Russian army used them to form new military bodies that also incorporated Greeks, Albanians and Crimean Tatars. After the Russo-Turkish war of 1787–1792 , most of these Cossacks were absorbed into

12792-707: The Russian navy had no Cossack ships and units. Cossack service was considered rigorous. Cossack forces played an important role in Russia's wars of the 18th–20th centuries, including the Great Northern War , the Seven Years' War , the Crimean War , the Napoleonic Wars , the Caucasus War , many Russo-Persian Wars , many Russo-Turkish Wars , and the First World War . In the late 19th and early 20th centuries,

12948-502: The Ruthenian szlachta refrained from plans to have a Moscow Tsar as king of the Commonwealth, its own Michał Korybut Wiśniowiecki later becoming king. The last, ultimately unsuccessful, attempt to rebuild the Polish–Cossack alliance and create a Polish–Lithuanian–Ruthenian Commonwealth was the 1658 Treaty of Hadiach . The treaty was approved by the Polish king and the Sejm , and by some of

13104-466: The Siege of Lisbon . In a parallel plot set in the 12th and 20th century where history and fiction are constantly overlapping, the latter novel questions the reliability of historical sources and deals with the difference of writing history and fiction. A prominent subgenre within historical fiction is the children's historical novel. Often following a pedagogical bent, children's historical fiction may follow

13260-704: The Slavic element predominated . There were several major Cossack hosts in the 16th century: near the Dnieper, Don, Volga and Ural Rivers ; the Greben Cossacks in Caucasia ; and the Zaporozhian Cossacks , mainly west of the Dnieper. It is unclear when people other than the Brodnici and Berladnici (which had a Romanian origin with large Slavic influences) began to settle in the lower reaches of major rivers such as

13416-627: The Spring Queen (1931), is regarded by some as the best historical novel of the 20th century. Mary Renault is best known for her historical novels set in Ancient Greece . In addition to fictional portrayals of Theseus , Socrates , Plato , Simonides of Ceos and Alexander the Great , she wrote a non-fiction biography of Alexander. The Siege of Krishnapur (1973) by J. G. Farrell has been described as an "outstanding novel". Inspired by events such as

13572-458: The Tatars and Turks. Tsar Boris Godunov had incurred the hatred of Ukrainian Cossacks by ordering the Don Cossacks to drive away from the Don all the Ukrainian Cossacks fleeing the failed uprisings of the 1590s. This contributed to the Ukrainian Cossacks' willingness to fight against him. In 1604, 2,000 Zaporizhian Cossacks fought on the side of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and their proposal for

13728-661: The Three Kingdoms concerns 3rd-century wars which ended the Han dynasty ; Wu Cheng'en 's 16th-century Journey to the West concerns the 7th-century Buddhist pilgrim Xuanzang . In addition to those, there was a wealth of historical novels that became popular in the literary circles during the Ming and Qing periods in Chinese history; they include Feng Menglong 's Dongzhou Lieguo Zhi ( Chronicles of

13884-517: The Tsar ( Dmitri I ), against the Muscovite army. By September 1604, Dmitri I had gathered a force of 2,500 men, of whom 1,400 were Cossacks. Two thirds of these "cossacks", however, were in fact Ukrainian civilians, only 500 being professional Ukrainian Cossacks. On July 4, 1610, 4,000 Ukrainian Cossacks fought in the Battle of Klushino , on the side of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. They helped to defeat

14040-634: The Tsarist regime used Cossacks extensively to perform police service. Cossacks also served as border guards on national and internal ethnic borders, as had been the case in the Caucasus War. During the Russian Civil War , Don and Kuban Cossacks were the first people to declare open war against the Bolsheviks . In 1918, Russian Cossacks declared their complete independence, creating two independent states,

14196-409: The Ukrainian hetman considered it a conditional contract from which one party could withdraw if the other was not upholding its end of the bargain. The Ukrainian hetman Ivan Vyhovsky, who succeeded Khmelnytsky in 1657, believed the Tsar was not living up to his responsibility. Accordingly, he concluded a treaty with representatives of the Polish king, who agreed to re-admit Cossack Ukraine by reforming

14352-553: The United Kingdom published historical novels in the mid 19th century, the most notable include Thackeray 's Vanity Fair , Charles Dickens 's A Tale of Two Cities , George Eliot 's Romola , and Charles Kingsley 's Westward Ho! and Hereward the Wake . The Trumpet-Major (1880) is Thomas Hardy 's only historical novel, and is set in Weymouth during the Napoleonic wars , when

14508-476: The Zaporizhian Sich, a number of Ukrainian-speaking Eastern Orthodox Zaporozhian Cossacks fled to the territory under control of the Ottoman Empire . Together with Cossacks of Greater Russian origin , as well as the vast majority of Old Believers and other people from "Greater Russia" ( Muscovy ), they settled in the area of the Danube river, and founded a new Sich. Many Ukrainian peasants and adventurers later joined

14664-406: The best-sellers of their time. Many of these authors (like Niccolò Tommaseo , Francesco Domenico Guerrazzi and D'Azeglio himself) were patriots and politicians too, and in their novels, the veiled politic message of Manzoni became explicit (the hero of Ettore Fieramosca fights to defend the honor of the Italian soldiers, mocked by some arrogant Frenchmen). In them, the narrative talent not equaled

14820-762: The borders on the Volga , the whole of Siberia (see Yermak Timofeyevich ), and the Yaik (Ural) and Terek Rivers . Cossack communities had developed along the latter two rivers well before the arrival of the Don Cossacks. By the 18th century, Cossack hosts in the Russian Empire occupied effective buffer zones on its borders. The expansionist ambitions of the Empire relied on ensuring Cossack loyalty, which caused tension given their traditional exercise of freedom, democracy, self-rule, and independence. Cossacks such as Stenka Razin , Kondraty Bulavin , Ivan Mazepa and Yemelyan Pugachev led major anti-imperial wars and revolutions in

14976-403: The building (and near collapse) of a huge spire onto a medieval cathedral (generally assumed to be Salisbury Cathedral ); the spire symbolizing both spiritual aspiration and worldly vanity. The Scorpion God (1971) consists of three novellas, the first set in a prehistoric African hunter-gatherer band ( Clonk, Clonk ), the second in an ancient Egyptian court ( The Scorpion God ) and the third in

15132-480: The conditions of the Union of Hadiach. In 1660, however, the hetman asked the Polish king for protection, leading to the period of Ukrainian history known as The Ruin . Historian Gary Dean Peterson writes: "With all this unrest, Ivan Mazepa of the Ukrainian Cossacks was looking for an opportunity to secure independence from Russia and Poland". In response to Mazepa's alliance with Charles XII of Sweden , Peter I ordered

15288-482: The contemporary novel tried their hand at stories set in previous centuries. Among them were Fulvio Tomizza ( The Evil Coming from North , about the Reformation ), Dacia Maraini ( The Silent Duchess , about the female condition in the eighteenth century), Sebastiano Vassalli ( The Chimera , about a witch hunt ), Ernesto Ferrero ( N ) and Valerio Manfredi ( The Last Legion ). Fani Popova–Mutafova (1902–1977)

15444-428: The conventions of many of the other subgenres of historical fiction. A number of such works include elements of historical fantasy or time travel to facilitate the transition between the contemporary world and the past in the tradition of children's portal fiction. Sometimes publishers will commission series of historical novels that explore different periods and times. Among the most popular contemporary series include

15600-613: The court of a Roman emperor ( Envoy Extraordinary ). The trilogy To the Ends of the Earth , which includes the Rites of Passage (1980), Close Quarters (1987), and Fire Down Below (1989), describes sea voyages in the early 19th century. Anthony Burgess also wrote several historical novels; his last novel, A Dead Man in Deptford , is about the murder of Christopher Marlowe in the 16th century. Though

15756-402: The development of the Cossacks. In the 15th century, Cossack society was described as a loose federation of independent communities, which often formed local armies and were entirely independent from neighboring states such as Poland, the Grand Duchy of Moscow, and the Crimean Khanate. According to Mykhailo Hrushevsky , the first mention of Cossacks dates back to the 14th century, although

15912-482: The earliest, such as Oleshky , dating back to the 11th century. Early "Proto-Cossack" groups are generally reported to have come into existence within what is now Ukraine in the 13th century as the influence of Cumans grew weaker, although some have ascribed their origins to as early as the mid-8th century. Some historians suggest that the Cossack people were of mixed ethnic origin, descending from East Slavs , Turks , Tatars , and others who settled or passed through

16068-838: The eighteenth century, as well as historical novels written primarily in exile in France and California, including most prominently the Josephus trilogy set in Ancient Rome (1932 / 1935 / 1942), Goya (1951), and his novel Raquel: The Jewess of Toledo - set in Medieval Spain. Robert Graves of Britain wrote several popular historical novels, including I, Claudius , King Jesus , The Golden Fleece and Count Belisarius . John Cowper Powys wrote two historical novels set in Wales, Owen Glendower (1941) and Porius (1951). The first deals with

16224-465: The end of the 19th century. The Kalmyk and Buryat Cossacks also deserve mention . The Zaporizhian Sich became a vassal polity of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth during feudal times. Under increasing pressure from the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, in the mid-17th century the Sich declared an independent Cossack Hetmanate . The Hetmanate was initiated by a rebellion under Bohdan Khmelnytsky against Polish and Catholic domination, known as

16380-532: The era, Prince Aleksey Trubetskoy . After terrible losses, Trubetskoy was forced to withdraw to the town of Putyvl on the other side of the border. The battle is regarded as one of the Zaporizhian Cossacks' most impressive victories. In 1659, Yurii Khmelnytsky was elected hetman of the Zaporizhian Host/Hetmanate, with the endorsement of Moscow and supported by common Cossacks unhappy with

16536-605: The establishment of the Soviet Union , while others remained and assimilated into the Communist state. Cohesive Cossack-based units were organized and many fought for both Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union during World War II . After World War II, the Soviet Union disbanded the Cossack units within the Soviet Army, leading to the suppression of many Cossack traditions during the rule of Joseph Stalin and his successors. However, during

16692-428: The familiar biblical stories of Genesis , from Jacob to Joseph (chapters 27–50), setting it in the historical context of the reign of Akhenaten (1353–1336 BC) in ancient Egypt . In the same era, Lion Feuchtwanger was one of the most popular and accomplished writers of historical novels, with publications between the 1920s and 1950s. His reputation began with the bestselling work, Jud Süß (1925), set in

16848-505: The films were fantasy-based, however. Many featured actual historical personalities such as Julius Caesar , Cleopatra , and Hannibal , although great liberties were taken with the storylines. Gladiators, pirates, knights, Vikings, and slaves rebelling against tyrannical kings were also popular subjects. There are also films based on Medieval narratives like Ridley Scott 's historical epics Robin Hood (2010) and Kingdom of Heaven (2005) and

17004-482: The genre as works "written at least fifty years after the events described", while critic Sarah Johnson delineates such novels as "set before the middle of the last [20th] century ... in which the author is writing from research rather than personal experience." Then again Lynda Adamson, in her preface to the bibliographic reference work World Historical Fiction , states that while a "generally accepted definition" for

17160-655: The genre for its other thematic and critical interests. Historical fiction as a contemporary Western literary genre has its foundations in the early-19th-century works of Sir Walter Scott and his contemporaries in other national literatures such as the Frenchman Honoré de Balzac , the American James Fenimore Cooper , and later the Russian Leo Tolstoy . However, the melding of historical and fictional elements in individual works of literature has

17316-547: The genre has evolved since its inception, the historical novel remains popular with authors and readers to this day and bestsellers include Patrick O'Brian 's Aubrey–Maturin series , Ken Follett 's Pillars of the Earth and Dorothy Dunnett 's Lymond Chronicles . A development in British and Irish writing in the past 25 years has been a renewed interest in the First World War . Works include William Boyd 's An Ice-Cream War ; Sebastian Faulks ' Birdsong and The Girl at

17472-489: The government, and often against its interests, as for example with their role in Moldavian affairs, and with the signing of a treaty with Emperor Rudolf II in the 1590s. Registered Cossacks formed a part of the Commonwealth army until 1699. Around the end of the 16th century, increasing Cossack aggression strained relations between the Commonwealth and the Ottoman Empire. Cossacks had begun raiding Ottoman territories during

17628-517: The historical novel is a novel "about a time period at least 25 years before it was written", she also suggests that some people read novels written in the past, like those of Jane Austen (1775–1817), as if they were historical novels. Historical fiction sometimes encouraged movements of romantic nationalism . Walter Scott's Waverley novels created interest in Scottish history and still illuminate it. A series of novels by Józef Ignacy Kraszewski on

17784-524: The history of Poland popularized the country's history after it had lost its independence in the Partitions of Poland . Henryk Sienkiewicz wrote several immensely popular novels set in conflicts between the Poles and predatory Teutonic Knights , rebelling Cossacks and invading Swedes . He won the 1905 Nobel Prize in literature . He also wrote the popular novel Quo Vadis , which was about Nero 's Rome and

17940-421: The line between fiction and history, in order to get closer to the truth. The novel is set 60 years before it was composed, and alongside researching the war through primary and secondary sources, he spoke with people who had lived through war during the French invasion of Russia in 1812; thus, the book is also, in part, ethnography fictionalized. The Charterhouse of Parma by Marie-Henri Beyle (Stendhal)

18096-615: The locals in war, by raising the Cossack registry in times of hostility, and then radically decreasing it and forcing the Cossacks back into serfdom in times of peace. This institutionalized method of control bred discontent among the Cossacks. By the end of the 16th century, they began to revolt, in the uprisings of Kryshtof Kosynsky (1591–1593), Severyn Nalyvaiko (1594–1596), Hryhorii Loboda (1596), Marko Zhmailo (1625), Taras Fedorovych (1630), Ivan Sulyma (1635), Pavlo Pavliuk and Dmytro Hunia (1637), and Yakiv Ostrianyn and Karpo Skydan (1638). All were brutally suppressed and ended by

18252-412: The locals' land allotments and freedom of movement. In addition, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth government attempted to impose Catholicism, and to Polonize the local Ukrainian population. The basic form of resistance and opposition by the locals and burghers was flight and settlement in the sparsely populated steppe. The major powers tried to exploit Cossack military power for their own purposes. In

18408-409: The military duty to serve in the irregular troops: Zaporozhian Cossacks were mostly infantry soldiers, using war wagons, while Don Cossacks were mostly cavalry soldiers. The various Cossack groups were organized along military lines, with large autonomous groups called hosts . Each host had a territory consisting of affiliated villages called stanitsas . They inhabited sparsely populated areas in

18564-659: The mouth of the Dnieper river. In 1615 and 1625, Cossacks razed suburbs of Constantinople , forcing the Ottoman Sultan to flee his palace. In 1637, the Zaporozhian Cossacks, joined by the Don Cossacks , captured the strategic Ottoman fortress of Azov , which guarded the Don. The Zaporizhian Cossacks became particularly strong in the first quarter of the 17th century under the leadership of hetman Petro Konashevych-Sahaidachny , who launched successful campaigns against

18720-400: The name 'Monte Cristo' into their titles." Tolstoy's War and Peace offers an example of 19th-century historical fiction used to critique contemporary history. Tolstoy read the standard histories available in Russian and French about the Napoleonic Wars , and used the novel to challenge those historical approaches. At the start of the novel's third volume, he describes his work as blurring

18876-580: The name to the Turkic word kazak , kozak , in which cosac meant 'free man' but also 'conqueror'. The ethnonym Kazakh is from the same Turkic root. In written sources, the name is first attested in the Codex Cumanicus from the 13th century. In English , Cossack is first attested in 1590. The origins of the Cossacks are disputed. Originally, the term referred to semi-independent Tatar groups ( qazaq or "free men") who inhabited

19032-439: The newly created civil estate of Cossacks. Similar to the knights of medieval Europe in feudal times, or to the tribal Roman auxiliaries, the Cossacks had to obtain their cavalry horses , arms, and supplies for their military service at their own expense, the government providing only firearms and supplies. Lacking horses, the poor served in the Cossack infantry and artillery. In the navy alone, Cossacks served with other peoples as

19188-487: The nobility, especially various Lithuanian starostas . Merchants, peasants, and runaways from the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, Muscovy , and Moldavia also joined the Cossacks. The first recorded sich prototype was formed by the starosta of Cherkasy and Kaniv , Dmytro Vyshnevetsky , who built a fortress on the island of Little Khortytsia on the banks of the Lower Dnieper in 1552. The Zaporozhian Host adopted

19344-456: The nominal suzerainty of various Eastern European states at the time, were allowed a great degree of self-governance in exchange for military service. Although numerous linguistic and religious groups came together to form the Cossacks, most of them coalesced and became East Slavic -speaking Orthodox Christians . The rulers of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and Russian Empire endowed Cossacks with certain special privileges in return for

19500-552: The novels The Sot-Weed Factor (1960) and Mason & Dixon (1997) respectively. A few writers create historical fiction without fictional characters. One example is the series Masters of Rome by Colleen McCullough . Historical prose fiction has a long tradition in world literature. Three of the Four Classics of Chinese novels were set in the distant past: Shi Nai'an 's 14th-century Water Margin concerns 12th-century outlaws; Luo Guanzhong 's 14th-century Romance of

19656-440: The past". The Iliad has been described as historic fiction, since it treats historic events, although its genre is generally considered epic poetry . Pierre Vidal-Naquet has suggested that Plato laid the foundations for the historical novel through the myth of Atlantis contained in his dialogues Timaeus and Critias . The Tale of Genji (written before 1021) is a fictionalized account of Japanese court life about

19812-529: The past. Some subgenres such as alternate history and historical fantasy insert intentionally ahistorical or speculative elements into a novel. Works of historical fiction are sometimes criticized for lack of authenticity because of readerly criticism or genre expectations for accurate period details. This tension between historical authenticity and fiction frequently becomes a point of comment for readers and popular critics, while scholarly criticism frequently goes beyond this commentary, investigating

19968-545: The patriotic passion, and their novels, full of rhetoric and melodramatic excesses, are today barely readable as historical documents. A significant exception is The Confessions of an Italian by Ippolito Nievo , an epic about the Venetian republic 's fall and the Napoleonic age , told with satiric irony and youthful brio (Nievo wrote it when he was 26 years old). In Arabic literature, the Lebanese writer Jurji Zaydan (1861–1914)

20124-444: The private property of the Ruthenian Orthodox szlachta . Don Cossacks' raids on Crimea left Khmelnitsky without the aid of his usual Tatar allies. From the Russian perspective, the rebellion ended with the 1654 Treaty of Pereyaslav , in which, in order to overcome the Russian–Polish alliance against them, the Khmelnitsky Cossacks pledged their loyalty to the Russian Tsar . In return, the Tsar guaranteed them his protection; recognized

20280-457: The publication of the 2nd edition in 1903, Buddenbrooks became a major literary success. The work led to a Nobel Prize in Literature for Mann in 1929; although the Nobel award generally recognizes an author's body of work, the Swedish Academy's citation for Mann identified "his great novel Buddenbrooks " as the principal reason for his prize. Mann also wrote, between 1926 and 1943, a four-part novel Joseph and His Brothers . In it Mann retells

20436-420: The rebellion of the Welsh Prince Owain Glyndŵr (AD 1400–16), while Porius takes place during the Dark Ages, in AD 499, just before the Anglo-Saxon invasion of Britain. Powys suggests parallels with these historical periods and Britain in the late 1930s and during World War II . Other significant British novelists include Georgette Heyer , Naomi Mitchison and Mary Renault . Heyer essentially established

20592-458: The reference was to people who were either Turkic or of undefined origin. Hrushevsky states that the Cossacks may have descended from the long-forgotten Antes , or from groups from the Berlad territory of the Brodnici in present-day Romania , then a part of the Grand Duchy of Halych. There, the Cossacks may have served as self-defence formations, organized to defend against raids conducted by neighbors. The first international mention of Cossacks

20748-405: The register, and from the Zaporizhian Host. This, together with intensified socioeconomic and national-religious oppression of the other classes in Ukrainian society, led to many Cossack uprisings in the 1630s. The nobility, which had obtained legal ownership of vast expanses of land on the Dnipro from the Polish kings, attempted to impose feudal dependency on the local population. Landowners utilized

20904-438: The resources of what was a naturally rich and fertile region teeming with cattle, wild animals, and fish. This lifestyle, based on subsistence agriculture , hunting, and either returning home in the winter or settling permanently, came to be known as the Cossack way of life. Crimean–Nogai slave raids in Eastern Europe caused considerable devastation and depopulation in this area. The Tatar raids also played an important role in

21060-425: The romantic-historical novel. Victor Hugo began writing The Hunchback of Notre-Dame in 1829, largely to make his contemporaries more aware of the value of the Gothic architecture , which was neglected and often destroyed to be replaced by new buildings, or defaced by replacement of parts of buildings in a newer style. The action takes place in 1482 and the title refers to the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, on which

21216-525: The sacking of the then capital of the Hetmanate, Baturyn . The city was burnt and looted, and 11,000 to 14,000 of its inhabitants were killed. The destruction of the Hetmanate's capital was a signal to Mazepa and the Hetmanate's inhabitants of severe punishment for disloyalty to the Tsar's authority. The Zaporizhian Sich at Chortomlyk , which had existed since 1652, was also destroyed by Peter I's forces in 1709, in retribution for decision of its otaman Kost Hordiyenko , to ally with Mazepa. Under Russian rule,

21372-420: The second part of the 16th century. The Polish government could not control them, but was held responsible as the men were nominally its subjects. In retaliation, Tatars living under Ottoman rule launched raids into the Commonwealth, mostly in the southeast territories. Cossack pirates responded by raiding wealthy trading port-cities in the heart of the Ottoman Empire, as these were just two days away by boat from

21528-432: The sieges of Cawnpore and Lucknow , the book details the siege of a fictional Indian town, Krishnapur, during the Indian Rebellion of 1857 from the perspective of the town's British residents . The main characters find themselves subject to the increasing strictures and deprivation of the siege, and the absurdity of maintaining the British class system in a town no one can leave becomes a source of comic invention, though

21684-412: The sixteenth century the Cossack were increasingly joined by Slavs such as Russians and Poles, Balto-slavic Lithuanians and people from today's Ukraine, thus becoming a Slav-Tatar ethnic hybrid. As the grand duchies of Moscow and Lithuania grew in power, new political entities appeared in the region. These included Moldavia and the Crimean Khanate . In 1261, Slavic people living in the area between

21840-629: The story is centered. Alexandre Dumas also wrote several popular historical fiction novels, including The Count of Monte Cristo and The Three Musketeers . George Saintsbury stated: " Monte Cristo is said to have been at its first appearance, and for some time subsequently, the most popular book in Europe." This popularity has extended into modern times as well. The book was "translated into virtually all modern languages and has never been out of print in most of them. There have been at least twenty-nine motion pictures based on it ... as well as several television series, and many movies [have] worked

21996-617: The strength of it. The Finnish writer Mika Waltari is known for the historical novel The Egyptian (1945). Faroes–Danish writer William Heinesen wrote several historical novels, most notably Det gode håb (1964, "Fair Hope") set in the Faroe Islands in 17th century. Historical fiction has long been a popular genre in Sweden, especially since the 1960s a huge number of historical novels has been written. Nobel laureates Eyvind Johnson and Pär Lagerkvist wrote acclaimed historical novels such as Return to Ithaca (1946) and Barabbas (1950). Vilhelm Moberg 's Ride This Night (1941)

22152-402: The subgenred films based on the Arthurian legend such as Pendragon: Sword of His Father (2008) and King Arthur (2004). Cossack The Cossacks are a predominantly East Slavic Eastern Christian people originating in the Pontic–Caspian steppe of eastern Ukraine and southern Russia . Historically, they were a semi- nomadic and semi-militarized people, who, while under

22308-462: The subtitles ("The Threat" and "The Violence") by 1987 by the director Lyudmil Staykov. In June 2015, " Time of Violence " was chosen as the most beloved film of Bulgarian viewers in "Laced Shoes of Bulgarian Cinema", a large-scale consultation with the audience of Bulgarian National Television . One of the best known Scandinavian historical novels is Sigrid Undset 's Kristin Lavransdatter (1920–1922) set in medieval Norway. For this trilogy Undset

22464-560: The text is serious in intent and tone. In Welsh literature, the major contributor to the genre in Welsh is William Owen Roberts (b. 1960). His historical novels include Y Pla (1987), set at the time of the Black Death; Paradwys (2001), 18th century, concerning the slave trade; and Petrograd (2008) and Paris (2013), concerning the Russian revolution and its aftermath. Y Pla has been much translated, appearing in English as Pestilence , and Petrograd and Paris have also appeared in English. A contemporary of Roberts' working in English

22620-406: The town was then anxious about the possibility of invasion by Napoleon. In the United States, the first historical novelist was Samuel Woodworth , who wrote The Champions of American Freedom in 1816. James Fenimore Cooper was better known for his historical novels and was influenced by Scott. His most famous novel is The Last of the Mohicans: A Narrative of 1757 (1826), the second book of

22776-437: The vast Steppe. Some Turkologists , however, argue that Cossacks are descendants of the native Cumans of Ukraine , who had lived there long before the Mongol invasion. some other just state that first Cossacks were Turkic origin according to Serhii Plokhy first Cossacks were of Turkic rather than Slavic stock. Christoph Baumer state that predesecessor from the thirteenth century on were mainly of Turkic stock, but from

22932-411: Was a Bulgarian author who is considered by many to have been the best-selling Bulgarian historical fiction author ever. Her books sold in record numbers in the 1930s and the early 1940s. However, she was eventually sentenced to seven years of imprisonment by the Bulgarian communist regime because of some of her writings celebrating Hitler , and though released after only eleven months for health reasons,

23088-541: Was as background detail to set the period, and did not usually play a key role in the narrative. Heyer's characters often contained more modern-day sensibilities, and more conventional characters in the novels would point out the heroine's eccentricities, such as wanting to marry for love. Some historical novels explore life at sea, including C. S. Forester 's Hornblower series , Patrick O'Brian 's Aubrey–Maturin series , Alexander Kent 's The Bolitho novels , Dudley Pope 's Lord Ramage 's series, all of which all deal with

23244-430: Was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1928. Johannes V. Jensen 's trilogy Kongens fald (1900–1901, "The Fall of the King"), set in 16th century Denmark, has been called "the finest historical novel in Danish literature". The epic historical novel series Den lange rejse (1908–1921, "The Long Journey") is generally regarded as Jensen's masterpiece and he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1944 partly on

23400-474: Was forbidden to publish anything between 1943 and 1972. Stoyan Zagorchinov (1889–1969) also a Bulgarian writer, author of "Last Day, God's Day" trilogy and " Ivaylo ", continuing the tradition in the Bulgarian historical novel, led by Ivan Vazov . Yana Yazova (1912–1974) also has several novels that can be considered historical as " Alexander of Macedon ", her only novel on non-Bulgarian thematic, as well as her trilogy " Balkani ". Vera Mutafchieva (1929–2009)

23556-430: Was in 1492, when Crimean Khan Meñli I Giray complained to Grand Duke of Lithuania Alexander Jagiellon that his Cossack subjects from Kiev and Cherkasy had pillaged a Crimean Tatar ship: the duke ordered his "Ukrainian" (meaning borderland) officials to investigate, execute the guilty, and give their belongings to the khan. Sometime in the 16th century, there appeared the old Ukrainian Ballad of Cossack Holota , about

23712-402: Was inspired by Walter Scott's Ivanhoe but, compared to its model, shows some innovations (two members of the lower class as principal characters, the past described without romantic idealization, an explicitly Christian message), somehow forerunning the realistic novel of the following decades. Set in northern Italy in 1628, during the oppressive years under Spanish rule, it is sometimes seen as

23868-607: Was published in 2010 to positive reviews. Since then Arnold has released seven more novels in this series, and started a new series called 'Highwayman'. Historical fiction An essential element of historical fiction is that it is set in the past and pays attention to the manners, social conditions and other details of the depicted period. Authors also frequently choose to explore notable historical figures in these settings, allowing readers to better understand how these individuals might have responded to their environments. The historical romance usually seeks to romanticize eras of

24024-445: Was quite popular in 20th century Latin American literature , including works such as The Kingdom of This World (1949) by Alejo Carpentier , I, the Supreme (1974) by Augusto Roa Bastos , Terra Nostra (1975) by Carlos Fuentes , News from the Empire (1987) by Fernando del Paso , The Lightning of August (1964) by Jorge Ibargüengoitia , The War of the End of the World (1981) by Mario Vargas Llosa and The Autumn of

24180-425: Was secured. Consecutive treaties between the Ottoman Empire and the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth called for the governments to keep the Cossacks and Tatars in check, but neither enforced the treaties strongly. The Polish forced the Cossacks to burn their boats and stop raiding by sea, but the activity did not cease entirely. During this time, the Habsburg monarchy sometimes covertly hired Cossack raiders against

24336-454: Was the most prolific novelist of this genre. He wrote 23 historical novels between 1889 and 1914. His novels played an important in shaping the collective consciousness of modern Arabs during the Nahda period and educated them about their history. The Fleeing Mamluk (1891), The Captive of the Mahdi Pretender (1892), and Virgin of Quraish (1899) are some of his nineteenth-century historical novels. A major 20th-century example of this genre

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