Strange Relics: Stories of Archaeology and the Supernatural

Handheld Weirds #7

by Amara Thornton (Editor), Katy Soar (Editor), E.F. Benson

Handheld Press presents a new classic short story anthology, combining the supernatural and archaeology. Never before have so many relics from the past caused such delicious and intriguing shivers down the spine.

Archaeological historian Amara Thornton of the University of London, and Classical archaeologist Katy Soar from the University of Winchester have curated a selection of twelve outstanding short stories encompassing horror, ghosts, hauntings, and possession, all from archaeological excavation. From a Neolithic rite to Egyptian religion to Roman remains to medieval masonry to some uncanny ceramic tiles in a perfectly ordinary American sun lounge, the relics in these stories are, frankly, horrible.

Stories include:
The Ape, by E F Benson
Roman Remains, by Algernon Blackwood
Ho! The Merry Masons, by John Buchan
Through the Veil, by Arthur Conan Doyle
View From A Hill, M R James
Curse of the Stillborn, by Margery Lawrence
Whitewash, by Rose Macaulay
The Shining Pyramid, by Arthur Machen
Cracks of Time, by Dorothy Quick
The Cure, by Eleanor Scott

Genres: Horror, Short Stories, Fiction, Anthropology, Anthologies, 19th Century

195 pages, Paperback

Published September 20, 2022

Reviews

[Nancy Oakes · Rating 4 out of 5]

full post here:
http://www.oddlyweirdfiction.com/2022...

Strange Relics is another fine anthology of strange tales from Handheld Press, this time linking archaeology to the supernatural. As the editors reveal in the introduction to this volume, "all but one of the authors ... called Britain home," where remains of the past were "being researched, mapped and excavated," spawning not only historical and archaeological societies but also awakening different writers to the link between the uncanny and the remnants of the past. Margaret Murray acknowledged that connection in her autobiography noting that "due to the nature of their work, archaeologists were essentially assumed to have supernatural encounters." And then, of course, there's the fact that many of these stories were written during a time of great interest in "psychical research, spiritualism and the occult," involving intellectuals across a range of different disciplines. The stories in Strange Relics, as the editors explain, move well beyond the "discovery-led trope in which a naive (white male) scholar/excavator brings to light that-which-should-be-left-buried," instead focusing on capturing " 'fantastic' ; one might say magical, encounters with the material remains of the past..." and it is through these encounters that "the barrier between the present and the past becomes thin, and strange happenings result."

Strange happenings indeed! I'm sure the people in these stories would never have been the same after experiencing the weird phenomena that crops up throughout the book via "horrible" relics

"from a Neolithic rite to ancient Egyptian religion to Roman battle remains to medieval masonry to some uncanny ceramic tiles in a perfectly ordinary American sun lounge..."

and much, much more.

Readers who are well into weird fiction will recognize pretty much all of the authors whose work appears here; I only found one whose work I'd not read before, Alan JB Wace, and it's likely because he was an archaeologist, not a writer of weird tales, whose wife had put together a book called Greece Untrodden after his death containing stories that he and his field colleagues would tell each other after their evening meals. I've previously enjoyed seven of the twelve stories found here, but rereading them here was a pleasure: "The Shining Pyramid" by Arthur Machen, "Through The Veil" by Arthur Conan Doyle, "View From a Hill" by MR James, "Curse of the Stillborn," by Margery Lawrence (which I must say is a great tale in which someone truly gets what they deserve) as part of her Number Seven Queer Street, "The Cure" by Eleanor Scott (from her Randall's Round) and "Cracks of Time" by Dorothy Quick, which I first encountered in The Horned God: Weird Tales of the Great God Pan, edited by Michael Wheatley and published by the British Library just this year and finally, "The Ape," by EF Benson.

My vote for most disturbing story in this anthology goes to Rose Macaulay's "Whitewash." While vacationing in the Mediterranean on the Isle of Capri, a woman reading The Story of San Michele expresses to her aunt that "it's nice to know what an excellent man Tiberius actually was, after all one was brought up to think of him." Evidently, Suetonius was all wrong about him -- as she notes, "Tiberius has been cleared" and he was in truth a "saintly" emperor. But after what was supposed to have been a refreshing swim in one of the caves ... Super shivers from this one, and even better, the aunt's take on whitewashing is more than relevant to our present.


Editors Amara Thornton and Katy Soar have selected some great stories for inclusion in this volume; I can only imagine the huge amount of time and effort they've put into making their choices. I have to say that Handheld Press is fast becoming one of my favorite small indie presses, and each of their "Handheld Weirds" that I've had the pleasure to have read have turned out to be absolutely awesome. I have discovered many new-to-me authors from the past and many stories I'd not previously encountered, which is of course something I always look forward to in my reading. Strange Relics is a must read for anyone who enjoys weird tales or strange fiction; in this book the added angle of archaeology takes these stories to another level indeed.

definitely recommended.

[Jay Rothermel · Rating 4 out of 5]

You didn’t go between them stones, did you, sir?’

* * *

Introduction, by Amara Thornton and Katy Soar
[….] Survivals are not just practices and beliefs but can also be physical, material artefacts from an earlier society which, as remnants, have the power to destabilise the present.
[….] At other times it is not a physical but a psychic connection with the past which produces the horror. Some ancient or historic settings of the stories are imbued with what has been called the ‘Stone Tape’ effect.
[….] it is when we are at home, or on holiday, during our trip to an archaeological site or historic property, our walk among the barrows, our swim in the sea, or even by treading on some very old tiles, that we may encounter a ‘strange relic’, out of time …

1. The Shining Pyramid, by Arthur Machen
Two men deduce the survival of an ancient and hidden race by its markings on a garden wall. Sadly for them, physical confirmation follows.

2. "Through The Veil" by Arthur Conan Doyle
A stayed installed middle class married couple spend a couple of hours in the recently uncovered remains of a Roman town. Slowly—to the sensitive—the town reveals it's ancient history

3. "The Ape" by E F Benson
A young man re-glues a broken ape figurine of menacing power. But it's not half as menacing as

Julia Draycott’s arrival that evening speedily put such antique imaginings as the lordship of apes out of Hugh’s head. He chucked Tahu-met into the box where he kept his scarabs and ushapti figures, and devoted himself to this heartless and exquisite girl, whose mission in life appeared to be to make as miserable as possible the largest possible number of young men. Hugh had already been selected by her in Cairo as a decent victim, and now she proceeded to torture him. She had no intention whatever of marrying him, for poor Hugh was certainly ugly, with his broad, heavy face, and though rich, he was not nearly rich enough. But he had a couple of delightful Arab horses, and so, since there was no one else on hand to experiment with, she let him buy her a side-saddle, and be, with his horses, always at her disposal. She did not propose to use him for very long, for she expected young Lord Paterson (whom she did intend to marry) to follow her from Cairo within a week. She had beat a Parthian retreat from him, being convinced that he would soon find Cairo intolerable without her; and in the meantime Hugh was excellent practice. Besides, she adored riding.

4. "The Next Heir" by H D Everett
Cain, Pan, stigmata, and a scrying crystal. It's all the aftermath of a long ago showdown of brother against brother.

5. "View From A Hill" by M.R. James
[….] And I do not think that anything else happened that night which bears on my story.
Except, perhaps, the sensation which invaded Fanshawe in the small hours that something had been let out which ought not to have been let out.

N.B. James does some notable breaks from showing to telling in "A View from the Hill." As Fanshawe first climbs the hill with host Squire Richards:
Writing as I am now with a winter wind flapping against dark windows and a rushing, tumbling sea within a hundred yards, I find it hard to summon up the feelings and words which will put my reader in possession of the June evening and the lovely English landscape of which the Squire was speaking.

"A View from the Hill" is leave ed throughout with reassuring sketches of June landscape and atmosphere, even when James must climb over his own narrative voice to bestow them.

Cf. Wodehouse, "Anselm Gets His Chance"

6. "Curse of the Stillborn" by Margery Lawrence
Colonial missionaries in Egypt find out.

7. "The Cure" by Eleanor Scott
Another unalloyed masterpiece from the collection Randall's Round. The narrator takes in a friend from youth who has gone too far in studying Northern European folklore.

It was like a frightened kid asking you to keep ghosts off. All I could say was, ‘It’ll be quite all right, old chap. This isn’t Iceland, you know. No icefields and barrows here. Only good farmed land and friendly country … Now let’s get to bed.’
‘It isn’t only Iceland,’ he said slowly. ‘It’s everywhere – if you look …

8. "Ho! The Merry Masons" by John Buchan
Edward Leithen learns better once again, courtesy of an old friend.
[….] Some of them – the masons especially – had secret societies with a fairly devilish side to them. They were under the special protection of the Church, you see, in their work, and made sure of Heaven at their death, so in their lives they could dabble with impunity in Hell. They might be building a shrine for the Virgin or St Peter, but it was Priapus or Nodens or Vaunus, or some other old Pagan miscreant that often inspired their work. You can find it here and in many other places – there’s a spirit in the stone, a spirit of black malice and blood and cynical mockery. They were queer lads, some of those old masons, and they have left behind them something which is not quite dead. Often their work speaks to me, and what it says scares me. So when I read rhapsodies about the Ages of Faith, and the consecration of the old builders, and their gentle ribaldry which belongs only to people who are assured in their faith, I’m inclined to laugh. I know too much about the merry masons.’

9. "Roman Remains" by Algernon Blackwood
A convalescent airman is sent to the country. To rest his nerves.

10. "Cracks of Time" by Dorothy Quick
But the analogy held. I looked at the face again. The full lips were parted. I could almost feel the hot quickened breath on my nearby ankle.
This was getting beyond sense. I was making myself see things that couldn’t be, hear a voice, feel emotions that should be kept under cover. It was incredible; yet it was so real! It was uncanny. It made me a little afraid.

11. "Whitewash" by Rose Macaulay
Never visit Capri. I posted about this story two years ago here.
https://jayrothermel.substack.com/p/t...

12. "The Golden Ring" by Alan J B Wace
A Mycean ring offers protection for those who care for it. The arrogant and dismissive get something else.


* * *

Strange Relics is a carefully organized anthology. It braids some classic—of their kind—authors with previously unremembered or actively neglected dynamos like H D Everett, Dorothy Quick, and Alan J B Wace.

[Lizixer · Rating 4 out of 5]

It isn’t exactly a revelation to recognise that horror and supernatural stories reveal very little about the occult but a great deal about the preoccupations and anxieties of the age.

Many of these stories have a colonial or war setting in which newcomers to very old counties such as Greece or Egypt find themselves confronted by survivals of ancient beliefs or gods in the modern world against which they are powerless, reflecting either a fear of the people that you are colonising or a sense that war allows old human savagery and destructive practices to come back and overwhelm civilisation.

There’s also a few stories rooted in the British landscape where supposedly Roman pagan gods haven’t quite given up their place in the woods, acting as a sensual presence that encourages women (and men) to abandon societal expectations of how women should behave and abandon themselves to the ecstasy of sexual freedom. These women are inevitably punished but also the men in the story begin to find them “repulsive” while usually managing to barely escape being lured to the “other side”. At a time when women were beginning to asset their sexual independence, stories like these reflect an anxiety that they are abandoning the traditional roles of modesty and sexual propriety.

There’s also an exploration of the uncanny in the British countryside, particularly in Machen where extremely ancient races secretly co-exist in the isolated places unseen by newer incomers unless a blood sacrifice is needed. The fairy in British folklore becomes not a child’s story but a dangerous force that taps into a deep “magic” in the landscape. Perhaps these stories reflect the sense of alienation from the land through the 19th and 20th centuries caused by enclosure, mechanisation and the Industrial Revolution that depopulated the land and pushed millions into towns to live, far away from these uncanny places while the Enlightenment reasons away older beliefs about the sacred landscape in favour of science and empirical evidence. People lose their belief in the supernatural until the supernatural bites back.

There’s a good selection of authors mixing the usual suspects with less anthologised authors co-edited by the dependable Katy Soar who has done great work with the British Library anthologies. Handheld Press appears to have closed down which seems a shame but the BL are doing a good job of picking up the baton on publishing the weird, occult and supernatural stories of the past which are such a key part of our literary tradition in Britain.

[Julia O'Connell]

The goal of this collection, as set out in the introduction, is to present stories that “capture ‘fantastic,’ one might say magical, encounters with the material remains of the past,” though the editors avoided including more obvious tales of intrepid archeologists exploring tombs and discovering mummies and treasure. Instead, the stories here are more subtle, and while a few take place abroad, the majority of them are set within Great Britain, where most of these authors called home. In the introduction, Amara Thornton and Katy Soar lay out the historical context behind this wave are archeology-inspired literature, which includes the height of British imperialism in Egypt, the experiences of British soldiers in the Mediterranean during both World Wars, and the excavations of Roman sites in Britain during the early twentieth century. They also discuss some of the recurring themes in these stories, such as the secret survival of ancient beliefs, practices, or beings; psychic imprints left on places by past inhabitants, and a blurring of the boundaries between past and present. The introduction is followed by short biographies of each of the authors included in the collection which not only give a general overview of their life and works but also touch on each author’s connection to archeology (if applicable) and highlight some of the major themes related to this anthology’s topic that show up throughout that author’s body of work. Then come the twelve short stories, written by both well-known authors such as M. R. James and Arthur Conan Doyle and more obscure writers.

See my full review: https://www.thegothiclibrary.com/revi...

[Owen Summerscales · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good collection of archaeology themed supernatural short stories from the early 20th century, mostly British. My favorites were:

— The Shining Pyramid by Arthur Machen
— The Next Heir by HD Everett
— View From A Hill by MR James
— The Cure by Eleanor Scott
— Cracks of Time by Dorothy Quick

[Jess]

This ones on me, I didn’t understand what it was gonna give and like,, I don’t care enough

[Kathryn Houldcroft · Rating 4 out of 5]

Published by Bath-based handheldpress this is a collection of unsettling short stories, each with a connection to an ancient culture, burial site or place of worship. It’s a clever way to present writings by famous authors of weird and haunting tales such as E F Benson, M R James and Algernon Blackwood as well as featuring lesser-known writers such as Rose Macaulay and Eleanor Scott. From the ruins of Roman temples to Egyptian curses and Neolithic rituals this collection uses archaeological sites and ruins as a basis for short stories that are rather unnerving.

[Jenn Kause · Rating 2 out of 5]

2.5 stars
Honestly I thought the premise of archaeology and horror sounded fascinating! And the premise was there it was just…
But the amount of racism and repetitive themes (especially of Roman ruins and Pan) just didn’t have anything of value. I maybe enjoyed 2 stories and even then, the racism and lack of a better warning (it was maybe 1-2 sentences in the introduction and granted these stories are from the 1900s) I might strayed away.

If anyone has horror recs without violence against woman (somehow this succeeded at least) and racism, let me know cause I feel it’s been hard to find these days.