Writing the Past: Living the Present
Whilst drawing from history and archaeology to develop my stories, even I have to admit that the world I actually inhabit is very much rooted in the here and now. In the case of both The Wilusiad and The Ka of Ruby Chapman, this results in my attempting to get into the heads and lives of characters separated from myself by thousands of years, yo say nothing of cultural barriers that can seem insurmountable.
Although research is one of the most rewarding ways of negotiating these obstacles, that still leaves some that remain because they fundamentally have nothing to do with the past, but everything to do with presenting it to a reader who also lives in the modern day. The centuries of politics and myth-making that lie between the 21st century and the second millenium BCE have created unique pitfalls which historical writers have to face, which I discuss below.
Historical Authenticity versus Historical Accuracy
One of the most talked about problems in historical fiction is the so-called "Tiffany problem". This happens when the meaming of a motif, name or other aspect of life in a specific historical period has morphed over time. Often this change in meaning is so pronounced that the use of the element in the historically correct context now takes the reader out of the narrative or worse, introduces ideas or associations into the narrative that have no place in the period being described.
In the story of Troy for example, Paris is often depicted wearing a Phrigian cap (top). This was a white cloth cap that became known as the "cap of freedom" that was also worn by Caesar's assassins when they announced his death, as well as by French revolutionaries during the reign of terror. For many modern readers however, this cap is now strongly associated with the headgear worn by The Smurfs in the comic series by the Franco-Belgian comic artist Peyo (centre). Since images of happy blue people dancing in circles are not helpful when one is trying to evoke either the fall of Troy, Marcus Junius Brutus, or the Committee of Public Safety, most modern writers now avoid describing it in such contexts.
Forgetting such modern associations can be merely amusing, at least for readers with the right sense of humour, but may cause more serious problems when symbols of previous civilisations have been co-opted by modern political movements with values utterly alien to the civilisations that originally used them. An obvious example is the hooked cross, a solar symbol used by many civilisations throughout history, including the Hittites (below) but which is not depicted in historical fiction other than that set during the 1930s and 1940s for obvious reasons. Although rarely this clear cut, historical fiction writers often find themselves negotiating a minefield of political and cultural history and their resultant sensitivities in order to tell a story that resonates in a way that is authentic to the period they describe, rather than one that accidently mirrors modern culture or politics.
Paris wearing the Phrygian cap as traditionally depicted in classical art. This statue is in the Pius-Clementine Museum in the Vatican, Rome - Photo by Ilya Shurygin.
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Enheduanna of Akkad, High Priestess of the Goddess Nanna and the author of a series of hymns praising her, making Enheduanna the earliest named author in recorded history. photo by Mefman00 - This image has been extracted from another file, CC0,
Historical Authenticity and Modern Politics
Whenever issues of historical authenticity in writing, particularly fiction and fantasy writing are raised so are suspicions in some quarters that “historically authentic” is code for “an all white, able-bodied and straight cast where men are warriors and women exist to be rescued”.Rather than give comfort to such an idea, is not historical authenticity a small price to pay for a cast which better fits modern ideals of inclusivity and diversity given that we are writing in 2026?
Thai would be a valid point of view if the afore-mentioned all white, straight, able-bodied etc casting were indeed historically authentic. In the case of the Eastern Mediterranean bronze age where The Wilusiad is set, it simply is not.
This novel is set in the city of Wilusa, which was a major trading port at the entrance to the Black Sea, right at the confluence of Europe and Asia. It was thus a magnet for traders from a network that stretched as far as Cornwall in the UK to the West, Denmark to the north, Afghanistan, India and Arabia to the east and Somalia to the South. Even if character backgrounds were restricted to areas where there is evidence of direct contact with Anatolia in the late Bronze Age, that still leaves an area ranging from Libya and Italy in the West, the Balkans and Black Sea coast in the North, Mesopotamia and Arabia in the East and Sudan in the South together with every point in between.
Either geographic range is more than large enough to draw an ethnically diverse cast from. Indeed the presence of mercenaries, artisans, diplomats and traders from far flung branches of the network it relied upon for its survival lends a depth and richness to this busy trading city which adds to, rather than detracts from its historic authenticity. This is also before we get to the point that Wilusa is located in Anatolia in Northern Turkiye, so the local population would not necessarily look like the British and American actors usually cast when the Tale of Troy is presented on screen.
The same is also true of the position of women. Whilst women warriors are comparatively rare in this context, politically powerful women, and women who held independent positions in society most definitely were not. Add to this the fact that historical sieges were times when everyone in a city assisted in its defence (even the most cursory examination of the history of war attests to this), women with agency, responsibilities, goals and economic and political ambitions of their own fitted naturally into the Wilusiad.
So all in all, the periods I have written about so far in my writing journey, do not support the idea that historical authenticity and the inclusion of active female characters or those from multiple ethnic backgrounds are fundamentally at odds. Such characters may require research to fit them naturally into the setting, but that is equally true of all characters in historical fiction and fantasy stories. That research, and the truth it unearths, is your friend, not your foe.