The Lost Race

Introduction

The Lost Race (first published in Weird Tales, January 1927). ‘The Lost Race’ is a story in the Bran Mak Morn series and is set during the Roman invasion of Britain. Related to, but does not feature Bran; The central figure is a Briton. Sold for $30; Written in 1924, it took a long time before it was published. It was also returned for revision.

In a letter (#017) to Tevis Clyde Smith dated January 7 1925 he writes:

P.S. I sold two more stories to Weird Tales one for $25 and the other for $30. However, they sent back what I consider my masterpiece thus far, with sarcastic remarks. Write when you get time.

The first of these are ‘The Hyena’ and the latter is ‘The Lost Race’.

In a letter (#131) to Farnsworth Wright, circa June 1930, just before he gets introduced to H.P. Lovecraft he mentions the story:

And I note from the fact that Mr. Lovecraft has his character speaking Gaelic instead of Cymric, in denoting the Age of the Druids, that he holds to Lhuyd’s theory as to the settling of Britain by the Celts.
This theory is not generally agreed to, but I scarcely think that it has ever been disproved, and it was upon this that my story “The Lost Race” was based — that the Gaelic tribes preceded the Cymric peoples into Britain, by way of Ireland, and were later driven out by them.

A couple of months later in a letter (#137) to H.P. Lovecraft he refers to the story:

I had supposed, without inquiring very deeply into the matter, that these legends were based on contact with the earlier Mediterraneans, and indeed, wrote a story on that assumption which appeared some years ago in Weird Tales — “The Lost Race.” I readily see the truth of your remarks that a Mongoloid race must have been responsible for the myths of the Little People, and sincerely thank you for the information.

He also mentions the story in a letter (#144) to Harold Preece, cirka October or early November 1930:

But to return to the Mediterraneans of the Isles, where these tribes remained a race apart longer than anywhere else. These aborigines are popularly known as Picts, and by this name I have designated them in all my stories — and I have written a number in which I mentioned or referred to them — “The Lost Race,” “The Shadow Kingdom,” “The Mirrors of Tuzun Thune,” “The Dark Man,” “Kings of the Night,” to say nothing of several which I have not marketed.

Howard answers H.P. Lovecraft in a letter (#252d), cirka July 1933 where he mentions that he was only 18 when he wrote the story:

Thanks very much for the kind things you said about “Wolfshead” and other early attempts. I was eighteen when I wrote “Spear and Fang”, “The Lost Race”, “The Hyena”; nineteen when I wrote “In the Forest of Villefere” and “Wolfshead.” And after that it was two solid years before I sold another line of fiction. I don’t like to think about those two years. I wrote my first story when I was fifteen, and sent it — to Adventure, I believe. Three years later I managed to break into Weird Tales. Three years of writing without selling a blasted line. (I never have been able to sell to Adventure; guess my first attempt cooked me with them forever!)

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