Appendix G (for Greyhawk)

Art by Gary Gianni. Check out all those polearms!

While my Greyhawk series of posts are all just sort of pseudo-encyclopedia entry sort of stuff, they are informed by a certain conception of Greyhawk, at least. I thought it was worth taking a post to outline the works that inform the way I'm presenting and interpreting what I read in the 1980 folio, and other "primary sources." 

As I mentioned, initially thinking of Greyhawk as a more firmly Medieval place was the impetus for this series, but as these things tend to do, my approach has drifted some with time. While my view remains more realistically Medieval elements are nice to bring in, I also don't want to lose site of the Gygaxian Implied Setting Recipe, because at the end of the day, a Greyhawk that feels like Greyhawk (if more rationalized) is more interesting to me than a straight pseudo-history.

Fiction:
Anderson, Poul. The Broken Sword — Fantasy in a historical setting with some science fictional rationalization.
Buehlman, Christopher. Between Two Fires, The Blacktongue Thief  — The first is a horror/fantasy novel in a Medieval setting, full of horrific monsters and historic detail. The latter is a secondary world fantasy in a world with interesting cultural detail and humor.
DeCamp, L. Sprague. The Reluctant King — Humorous fantasy with good worldbuilding. I've opined before about the relationship between De Camp and Gygax.
Chabon, Michael. Gentlemen of the Road — A historical adventuring duo, highlighting some less discussed areas of history like the Khazar Khaganate.

Howard, Robert E. Conan series, various historical adventure stories. — Pulpy historic adventure or pseudo-historic adventure, with a sweep of history element. "The Hyborian Age" essay seems to have been a strong influence on Greyhawk's presentation.
Jókai, Mór. Told by the Death's Head — Picaresque adventure.
Leiber, Fritz. Fafhrd & Gray Mouser stories — Picaresque-inspired fantasy with the archetypal fantasy city and active gods.
Potocki, Jan. Manuscript Found in the Saragossa  — Stories within stories that mix Gothic, picaresque, and a bit of secret history.
Smith, Clark Ashton. Averoigne stories — Pulpy pseudohistorical fantasy with a lot of atmosphere, humor.

Art by Marie & John Severin

The nonfiction is perhaps less definitive, but it has provided some inspiration to me in the course of the posts I've written so far.

Nonfiction:

Armstrong, Dorsey. Powerful Women of the Medieval World (Great Courses) — Vignettes on the lives of some figures of the Middle Ages.

Bale, Anthony. A Travel Guide to the Middle Ages — A fairly light, but informative series of examines of the stories of various travelers in the Middle Ages.

Devereaux, Bret. "Practical Polytheism," blog series  — A great read on how real polytheism worked.

Gies, Francis and Gies, Joseph. Life in a Medieval City — Street level (literally) view of life in the city of Troyes in 1250 CE.

Haywood, John. Historical Atlas of the Medieval World — Just the one I happened to have at home.

Hoffman-Becking, Dirk. History of the Germans (Podcast) — I particularly found this inspiring regarding the Great Kingdom.

Muesse, Mark W. Great World Religions: Hindusim (Great Courses) — useful inspiration for the thinking about the religions of Oerth.

Various. Osprey Publishing military books — mostly for the pictures of armors and armor of various cultures/eras.