The weird of the wanderer : Being the papyrus records of some incidents in one…
"The weird of the wanderer" by Frederick Rolfe and C. H. C. Pirie-Gordon is a fantasy novel written in the early 20th century. Framed as translated papyri found in an Armenian rock-tomb, it follows modern Englishman Nicholas Crabbe—revealed as the reincarnated Odysseus and later as King Balthazar of Moxoene—through an occult time‑slip into the ancient world. The book blends archaeological intrigue, ritual magic, classical mythology, and high adventure across Egypt and Armenia.
The opening of this novel presents a scholarly frame: letters describe the discovery of a sealed tomb behind a ruined chapel, holding a perfectly preserved youth, modern objects (a revolver, a watch, English coins), and Greek papyri that upend chronology. A professor’s note sketches a timeline linking Crabbe’s late‑Victorian disappearance to magical experiments in Egypt and a fall back into Ptolemaic times, identifying him with Odysseus reincarnate. The translated papyri then begin in Crabbe’s voice: he becomes a student of occult rites, sails up the Nile, and in a moonlit ceremony endures a burning‑staff ordeal to summon an Egyptian priest, Amenemhat, as his guide. Seeking deeper power, he penetrates Thebes’ underground sanctuaries, accepts priestly ordination to pass a barred gate, undergoes a vast vision, and is told he will be set back through time; emerging to find Thebes in its glory, he adopts practical garb, overawes skeptical soldiers and boatmen, and secures a barge southward despite a mercenary mutiny, dramatically proving his command by summoning crocodiles before setting out at dawn. (This is an automatically generated summary.)
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About this eBook
| Author | Rolfe, Frederick, 1860-1913 |
|---|---|
| Author | Pirie-Gordon, C. H. C. (Charles Harry Clinton), 1883-1969 |
| Title | The weird of the wanderer : Being the papyrus records of some incidents in one of the previous lives of Mr. Nicholas Crabbe |
| Original Publication | London: William Rider & Son, 1912. |
| Credits | Tom Trussel, Tim Lindell and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) |
| Language | English |
| LoC Class | PR: Language and Literatures: English literature |
| Subject | Fantasy fiction |
| Subject | Time travel -- Fiction |
| Category | Text |
| EBook-No. | 78126 |
| Release Date | Mar 6, 2026 |
| Copyright Status | Public domain in the USA. |
| Downloads | 5067 downloads in the last 30 days. |
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