Opar (fictional city)
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Opar is a fictional lost city in the
Tarzan Tarzan (John Clayton II, Viscount Greystoke) is a fictional character, an archetypal feral child raised in the African jungle by the Mangani great apes; he later experiences civilization, only to reject it and return to the wild as a heroic adv ...
novels of Edgar Rice Burroughs and later the
Khokarsa Khokarsa is a fictional empire in ancient Africa that serves as the primary setting for Philip José Farmer's prehistoric fantasy novels ''Hadon of Ancient Opar'', ''Flight to Opar'', and ''The Song of Kwasin'' (the Khokarsa series). Literary or ...
novels of
Philip José Farmer Philip José Farmer (January 26, 1918 – February 25, 2009) was an American author known for his science fiction and fantasy novels and short stories. Obituary. Farmer is best known for his sequences of novels, especially the ''World of Tiers ...
and Christopher Paul Carey, as well as various derivative works in other media. The city first appeared in Burroughs' second Tarzan novel, ''
The Return of Tarzan ''The Return of Tarzan'' is a novel by American writer Edgar Rice Burroughs, the second in his series of twenty-four books about the title character Tarzan. It was first published in the pulp magazine '' New Story Magazine'' in the issues for ...
'' (1913).


In the works of Burroughs

As envisioned by Burroughs, Opar is a
lost colony The establishment of the Roanoke Colony ( ) was an attempt by Sir Walter Raleigh to found the first permanent English settlement in North America. The English, led by Sir Humphrey Gilbert, had briefly claimed St. John's, Newfoundland, in ...
of
Atlantis Atlantis ( grc, Ἀτλαντὶς νῆσος, , island of Atlas) is a fictional island mentioned in an allegory on the hubris of nations in Plato's works '' Timaeus'' and '' Critias'', wherein it represents the antagonist naval power that b ...
located deep in the jungles of
Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
, in which incredible riches have been stockpiled down through the ages. The city's population exhibits extreme
sexual dimorphism Sexual dimorphism is the condition where the sexes of the same animal and/or plant species exhibit different morphological characteristics, particularly characteristics not directly involved in reproduction. The condition occurs in most an ...
caused by a combination of excessive
inbreeding Inbreeding is the production of offspring from the mating or breeding of individuals or organisms that are closely related genetically. By analogy, the term is used in human reproduction, but more commonly refers to the genetic disorders and o ...
,
cross-breeding A crossbreed is an organism with purebred parents of two different breeds, varieties, or populations. ''Crossbreeding'', sometimes called "designer crossbreeding", is the process of breeding such an organism, While crossbreeding is used to main ...
with apes, and selective
culling In biology, culling is the process of segregating organisms from a group according to desired or undesired characteristics. In animal breeding, it is the process of removing or segregating animals from a breeding stock based on a specific tr ...
of offspring. Consequently, female Oparians appear perfectly human, while male Oparians are apelike brutes. The ruler and high priestess of the city is Queen La, who on her first encounter with Tarzan falls in love with him, and subsequently carries a torch for him. Tarzan, already committed to
Jane Porter Jane Porter (3 December 1775 – 24 May 1850) was an English historical novelist, dramatist and literary figure. Her bestselling novels, ''Thaddeus of Warsaw'' (1803) and ''The Scottish Chiefs'' (1810) are seen as among the earliest historical ...
, spurns her advances, thus endangering his own life, as the religion of Opar condones human sacrifice. Yet he returns to the lost city time and again to replenish his personal wealth from its hoarded treasure. After its initial appearance in Burroughs's second Tarzan novel, ''
The Return of Tarzan ''The Return of Tarzan'' is a novel by American writer Edgar Rice Burroughs, the second in his series of twenty-four books about the title character Tarzan. It was first published in the pulp magazine '' New Story Magazine'' in the issues for ...
'' (1913), Opar is revisited in the fifth, '' Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar'' (1916); the ninth, ''
Tarzan and the Golden Lion ''Tarzan and the Golden Lion'' is an adventure novel by American writer Edgar Rice Burroughs, the ninth in his series of twenty-four books about the title character Tarzan. It was first published as a seven part serial in ''Argosy All-Story We ...
'' (1923); and the fourteenth, '' Tarzan the Invincible'' (1930). Exiles from Opar also appear in Burroughs' 1936 juvenile story "Tarzan and the Tarzan Twins, with Jad-Bal-Ja, the Golden Lion" (later published as the second part of '' Tarzan and the Tarzan Twins'' in 1963). The events of this story occur between those of the ninth and fourteenth ''Tarzan'' novels.


In the works of Farmer and Carey

Hints at the nature and origins of Opar appear in
Philip José Farmer Philip José Farmer (January 26, 1918 – February 25, 2009) was an American author known for his science fiction and fantasy novels and short stories. Obituary. Farmer is best known for his sequences of novels, especially the ''World of Tiers ...
's fictional biography '' Tarzan Alive: A Definitive Biography of Lord Greystoke'' (1972). This book attempts to add a high degree of realism and plausibility to the Tarzan stories, including references to Opar. Farmer conjectures on the inhabitants of Opar, and even goes to suggest that the city's populace was on the verge of extinction at the time of the events in the original Tarzan novels. As Edgar Rice Burroughs made clear, there had been cross-breeding with the caveman-like "
great ape The Hominidae (), whose members are known as the great apes or hominids (), are a taxonomic family of primates that includes eight extant species in four genera: '' Pongo'' (the Bornean, Sumatran and Tapanuli orangutan); ''Gorilla'' (the ...
" humanoids and the adoption of that animalistic language. Farmer continues the line of thinking, suggesting that a social desire for perfectly beautiful female babies and perfectly brutish male babies, perhaps coupled with infanticide, led to fatal decline of an already benighted city. The novel also relates events after the Tarzan books, including the ultimate fate of Opar. Tarzan himself returns to Opar, finds it empty or abandoned, tours the ruins, and (out of respect) decides to hide the city from modern curiosity by diverting a river to bury it in sediment. Opar is also the eponymous setting of Farmer's novels ''
Hadon of Ancient Opar ''Hadon of Ancient Opar'' is a fantasy novel by American writer Philip José Farmer, first published in paperback by DAW Books in April 1974, and reprinted three times through 1983. The first British edition was published by Magnum in 1977; it wa ...
'' (1974) and '' Flight to Opar'' (1976), which focus on the ancient history of the city some 10,000 years in the past. In Farmer's vision, the interior of Africa was then occupied by two huge linked
inland seas An inland sea (also known as an epeiric sea or an epicontinental sea) is a continental body of water which is very large and is either completely surrounded by dry land or connected to an ocean by a river, strait, or "arm of the sea". An inland se ...
, which were the cradle of a pre-
Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Medit ...
ian civilization called
Khokarsa Khokarsa is a fictional empire in ancient Africa that serves as the primary setting for Philip José Farmer's prehistoric fantasy novels ''Hadon of Ancient Opar'', ''Flight to Opar'', and ''The Song of Kwasin'' (the Khokarsa series). Literary or ...
. This primeval empire was based on an island in the more northern sea, taken to be
Atlantis Atlantis ( grc, Ἀτλαντὶς νῆσος, , island of Atlas) is a fictional island mentioned in an allegory on the hubris of nations in Plato's works '' Timaeus'' and '' Critias'', wherein it represents the antagonist naval power that b ...
in the Tarzan books; the city of Opar, located on the more southerly sea, is portrayed as having been a small backwater in the Khokarsan realm. Farmer's novels mix in characters from the Tarzan series and H. Rider Haggard's
Allan Quatermain Allan Quatermain is the protagonist of H. Rider Haggard's 1885 novel ''King Solomon's Mines'', its one sequel '' Allan Quatermain'' (1887), twelve prequel novels and four prequel short stories, totalling eighteen works. An English professional ...
series. Specifically, he strongly hints that the character Sahhindar—alias of the time traveler John Gribardsun from his novel '' Time's Last Gift''—is in fact Tarzan himself, while the characters Lalia and Paga are his versions of Haggard's Laleela and Pag. While Farmer wrote only two finished Opar novels, he originally planned to continue the series, and in fact left two incomplete Opar works: the novel ''The Song of Kwasin'' and novella "Kwasin and the Bear God". Both were later completed by Christopher Paul Carey (known best for his work on the ''
Pathfinder Roleplaying Game The ''Pathfinder Roleplaying Game'' is a fantasy role-playing game (RPG) that was published in 2009 by Paizo Publishing. The first edition extends and modifies the System Reference Document (SRD) based on the revised 3rd edition ''Dungeon ...
''), and later the novels were all compiled into the omnibus '' Gods of Opar''. Carey went on to write an original Opar novella, a prequel called '' Exiles of Kho'' (2012). This provided the groundwork for his own continuations of Farmer's Ancient Opar series, which include the novellas ''Hadon, King of Opar'' (2015) and ''Blood of Ancient Opar'' (2016).


In other media

On film, Opar was seen in the early Tarzan films '' The Adventures of Tarzan'' (1921), based on ''
The Return of Tarzan ''The Return of Tarzan'' is a novel by American writer Edgar Rice Burroughs, the second in his series of twenty-four books about the title character Tarzan. It was first published in the pulp magazine '' New Story Magazine'' in the issues for ...
;'' and '' Tarzan the Tiger'' (1929), based on '' Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar''; as well as the film '' Tarzan and the Lost City'' (1998). Opar also appeared, in the guise of a generic African village, in ''
Tarzan and the Lost Safari ''Tarzan and the Lost Safari'' is a 1957 action adventure film featuring Edgar Rice Burroughs' famous jungle hero Tarzan and starring Gordon Scott, Robert Beatty, Yolande Donlan and Betta St. John. Directed by H. Bruce Humberstone, it was the f ...
'' (1957), in which the Oparians were led by the male chief Chief Ogonooro (played by
Orlando Martins Orlando Martins (8 December 1899 – 25 September 1985) was a pioneering Yoruba Nigerian film and stage actor. In the late 1940s, he was one of Britain's most prominent and leading black actors, and in a poll conducted in 1947, he was listed a ...
) rather than the female queen/priestess La. In the pre-title opening sequence for ''The Legend of Tarzan'' (2016), a fictionalized Léon Rom, portrayed by Christoph Waltz, led an expedition to secure the fabled diamonds of Opar to help finance the take-over of the African Congo for King
Leopold II of Belgium * german: link=no, Leopold Ludwig Philipp Maria Viktor , house = Saxe-Coburg and Gotha , father = Leopold I of Belgium , mother = Louise of Orléans , birth_date = , birth_place = Brussels, Belgium , death_date = ...
. Rom's heavily-armed expedition was ambushed and massacred by native warriors, with only Rom himself surviving. Their tribal leader, Chief Mbonga (
Djimon Hounsou Djimon Gaston Hounsou (; ; born April 24, 1964) is a Beninese-American actor and model. He began his career appearing in music videos. He made his film debut in '' Without You I'm Nothing'' (1990) and earned widespread recognition for his role as ...
), offered Rom the diamonds in exchange for Tarzan (
Alexander Skarsgård Alexander Johan Hjalmar Skarsgård (; born August 25, 1976) is a Swedish actor. Born in Stockholm, he began acting at age seven but quit at 13. After serving in the Swedish military, Skarsgård returned to acting and gained his first role in th ...
). The film itself only mentioned Opar but did not actually show the lost city. Opar has also appeared in some of the television series based on the Tarzan books. Most notably it appeared in the Disney TV adaptation, with La still ruling. However, the city's populace are humanoid leopards called the Leopard Men, who act as La's soldiers and servants. The Leopard Men are distantly based on the
Leopard Society The Leopard Society (not to be confused with Ekpe), was a secret society that originated in Sierra Leone. Beatty, p.3 It was believed that members of the society could transform into leopards through the use of witchcraft. The earliest referenc ...
, a historical West African cult that Edgar Rice Burroughs had fictionalized in the non-Opar Tarzan novel '' Tarzan and the Leopard Men'' (1935). When La's
sceptre A sceptre is a staff or wand held in the hand by a ruling monarch as an item of royal or imperial insignia. Figuratively, it means royal or imperial authority or sovereignty. Antiquity Ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia The '' Was'' and other ...
is destroyed, the Leopard Men revert into their original leopard forms, La disintegrates into dust and Opar crumbles into oblivion. Even after the release of the Leopard Men, La's spirit possesses Jane and she (briefly) revives the city and creates statue warriors until Tarzan and a native African
shaman Shamanism is a religious practice that involves a practitioner (shaman) interacting with what they believe to be a spirit world through altered states of consciousness, such as trance. The goal of this is usually to direct spirits or spir ...
interfere. Opar is again destroyed and La's ghost is condemned to be trapped inside a rat's body. The City of Opar was mentioned in passing in the ''
League of Extraordinary Gentlemen League or The League may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Leagues'' (band), an American rock band * ''The League'', an American sitcom broadcast on FX and FXX about fantasy football Sports * Sports league * Rugby league, full contact footba ...
'' graphic novels. The City of Opak-Re in the ''Planetary'' comic-book series is a pastiche of the City of Opar.


Notes

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External links


Opar
by Rick Johnson, ''ERBzine'' No. 1547

by Den Valdron, ''ERBzine'' No. 1937 *
The Return of Tarzan
' by Edgar Rice Burroughs (1913) *
Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar
' by Edgar Rice Burroughs (1916) *
Tarzan and the Golden Lion
' by Edgar Rice Burroughs (1922, 1923) *

' by Edgar Rice Burroughs (1930, 1931)
Khokarsa Series Checklist
by the Christoper Paul Carey website {{Tarzan Fictional elements introduced in 1913 Edgar Rice Burroughs locations Fictional African countries Fictional populated places Tarzan