I finally completed my promised review of The
Chronicle of Zenobia: The Rebel Queen, by Judith Weingarten.
The subject of Zenobia was first treated in modern literature by Chaucer, and later by William Ware (Zenobia or the Fall of Palmyra) and Nathaniel Hawthorne (The Blythdale Romance) in the 19th century. Since then, a number of novels have been published, but most of them are probably not on the general public’s radar screen.
Now comes The Chronicle of Zenobia, The Rebel Queen, subtitled Book One, The World As it Was, the first volume in a trilogy. The author, an archaeologist, has done her homework and tells us that she basically adhered to known history. Out of this, she created a sprawling novel about life and death in Tadmor, the modern-day Palmyra, in the 3rd century A.D.
Before God the listener, I shall remember Tadmor of the high walls and lofty towers. And I shall remember Tadmor’s illustrious Queen, Zenobia, direct descendant of Antiochus, King of Syria, and Cleopatra Thea, great-hearted daughter of Ptolemy of Egypt. Glorious Zenobia, Queen of Tadmor, may God remember her for good.
Every day I shall add to this story.
So speaks Simon, son of Barabas, in the prologue to the book. He is an intimate of Zenobia – the later rebel queen – and her husband Odenathus. Simon, the author tells us, was a real-life Palmyran citizen who lived through the events that unfold in the novel, and who left a parchment manuscript behind, with his narration beginning in 218 A.D.
see also non-fiction treatment of Zenobia.
