Didja Notice?

 

The book is dedicated to W.C. Jameson. Jameson is an American writer and treasure hunter, largely focused on the American West.

 

The novel opens with a quote from Roy Chapman Andrews. Andrews (1884-1960) is believed by some to have been one of the inspirations for the character of Indiana Jones. He was an American adventurer/explorer who went on to become president of the Explorers Club and the director of the American Museum of Natural History. The quote is made up of statements from his 1943 autobiography, Under a Lucky Star.

 

Prologue: Castle of the Damned

 

The prologue takes place in the Forteresse Malevil in Marseille, France in October 1933. As far as I can tell, Forteresse Malevil is a fictitious location.

 

Belloq's dialog in his introduction here makes it sound as if this is the first time he's met Indy, but they met previously in "The Viking Scroll" and "The Curse of the Invincible Ruby".

 

Belloq's remarks that he's followed Indy's career in the Herald-Tribune, especially his exploits in Central and South America. The Herald-Tribune was an actual New York City newspaper from 1924-1966. Indy's Central and South American exploits would largely refer to events in The Seven Veils, "Indy vs. the Volcano", The Interior World, The Feathered Serpent, and The Philosopher's Stone.

 

On page 3, Belloq hums "Marseillaise". "La Marseillaise" is the national anthem of France.

 

Belloq tells Indy that all of Provence is his domain and he has eyes everywhere there. Provence is an historical province of southeastern France which includes the city of Marseille where they are now.

 

When Belloq asks Indy what he wants from him, Indy tells him he's there on behalf of a museum to purchase the crystal skull Belloq is said to have in his possession. This is the Crystal Skull of Cozán, which Indy had recovered from a temple in the lost city of Cozán in Honduras in The Philosopher's Stone. The museum Indy is representing is the American Museum of Natural History in New York, where Marcus Brody is now director of special acquisitions.

 

Belloq gloats to Indy that a fascista told him that Indy himself once had the skull in his possession. Fascista is Italian for "fascist".

 

On page 5, Belloq says that Forteresse Malevil belonged to his family in medieval times until they backed the wrong side of the throne, having been Templars. He goes on to say that some believe that the soul of Jesus Christ lives in the Templars. The Knights Templar were a Catholic military order from 1139-1312, often associated with secret societies and Catholic mysticism in modern mythology. Jesus Christ was a first-century Jewish preacher who became the central figure of Christianity, whom later Christians believe was the son of God and the awaited Messiah (the Christ) prophesied in the Old Testament.

 

Wanting to know who Belloq plans to sell the skull to, the French archeologist tells Indy that since Hitler became chancellor earlier that year, the Nazis have been seeking arcane treasures with supposed supernatural powers, including the Crystal Skull of Cozán. Adolf Hitler was the evil Chancellor of Germany from 1933-1945.

 

The German U-boat that comes to Belloq's semi-submerged cavern is U-357. This appears to be a fictitious submarine for the time, though one with the same alphanumeric was built later during WWII.

 

The U-boat sailors are armed with Schmeisser submachine guns.  The name is derived from that of Hugo Schmeisser (1884-1953), a German infantry weapons designer.

 

German Colonel Franz Kroeger is a member of the Leibstandarte SS. As stated in the book, the Leibstandarte was Hitler's personal guard, part of the larger SS (Schutzstaffel, "Protection Squadron"), the Nazi secret police.

 

On page 7, Kroeger lights himself a Players cigarette. This is a real world brand, founded in 1877.

 

On page 9, Belloq says "Merci," and "Mon ami." These are French for "Thank you," and "My friend."

 

On page 12, Kroeger says, "Auf wiedershen, Doktor Jones." This is German for "Goodbye, Doctor Jones."

 

When the Nazis leave in the U-357, Indy mutters, "I could come to hate those guys." This is a retro-callback to his line in The Last Crusade, "Nazis. I hate these guys."

 

When the Daguerre twins fumble with the Schmeisser and its safety catch, then inadvertently fire the weapon haphazardly in the cavern, Belloq screams disgustedly that any respectable Chicago gangster would know how to handle a fully automatic weapon, so why couldn't they. In the 1930's, Chicago was known for its organized crime operations and gang wars.

 

As he holds his breath while clinging to the deck gun of the U-boat, to take his mind off the searing pain of his lungs, Indy thinks of Alecia Dunstin and their first meeting in the British Museum in London. This meeting occurred in The Philosopher's Stone.

 

On page 16, Indy muses to Alecia that the U-boat can't take the skull all the way to Berlin, so there is still a chance to intercept it and get it back. Berlin is the capital city of Germany.

 

Chapter 1: Dragon Bones

 

This chapter opens in Princeton on Halloween, 1933.

 

On page 23, Indy accidentally kicks his bottle of Scotch under his desk in his Princeton office and it rolls to Joan's feet, where she picks it up and asks him if he's still celebrating the end of Prohibition. Prohibition refers to the ban on alcohol production, importation, transportation, and sale in the U.S. from January 17, 1920 to December 5, 1933.

 

Indy tells Joan that he once met her father while he was waiting for a train in Shanghai and they discussed the dinosaur statues in Central Park. Shanghai is the most populous city in China. Central Park is a public park in the center of Manhattan and one of the largest urban parks in the world. There are no discernable dinosaur statues in Central Park, but there were some commissioned and sculpted in 1868 by English natural history artist Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins, and which were destroyed by a corrupt and vengeful politician. The whereabouts of the remains of the statues is currently unknown, but many believe they are buried somewhere in the park. So, this might be what Indy and Dr. Starbuck were talking about or, perhaps the statues were not destroyed in the Indiana Jones universe!

 

Joan tells Indy that her father is currently missing in the Gobi Desert and that she last received a letter from him from Urga six months ago. The Gobi Desert is a large, cold desert region of northern China and southern Mongolia. Urga is a city in Outer Mongolia now known as Ulaanbaatar, the capital of Mongolia.

 

On page 25, Joan tells Indy she plans to stay at the Young Women's Christian Association (YWCA), which she says has a location just a few blocks away from the university. There is, in fact, a branch of the YWCA mere blocks from Princeton University.

 

Page 27 reveals that Indy's Princeton office is on the fifth floor of his building. It also reveals that Brody also has his office (at the American Museum of Natural History) on the fifth floor.

 

Indy takes Joan to see Brody at the American Museum of Natural History. She is amazed by the life-size iron, basswood, and papier-mâché blue whale model that hangs suspended in the building. This was an actual model at the museum, replaced with a more realistic one in 1969.

 

Page 28 introduces Marcus' nephew James "Sunny Jim" Brody, who is working as his assistant part-time while he studies for his doctorate at Columbia University.

 

Sunny Jim tells his uncle of his respect for the convictions of Joe Campbell, a young schoolmaster at the Canterbury School of Connecticut. Joseph Campbell (1904-1987) was an American writer and professor of literature who is famed for his theory of the monomyth, "the hero's journey" in mythologies around the world. Sunny-Jim's description of Campbell's teachings on pages 29-30 is accurate.

 

    On page 30, Sunny Jim paraphrases Campbell as saying that "recorded history is a nightmare from which we struggle to awaken." Indy points out correctly that that idea is from Ulysses. Ulysses is a 1922 novel by James Joyce. Joyce's phrasing of it in his novel is, "History is a nightmare from which I am trying to awake." Campbell did comment on Joyce's "memorable" line in the 1980s; I'm unaware if he did so as far back as the 1930s.

    Indy read Ulysses in The Peril at Delphi. 

 

When the Triceratops horn is determined by Dr. Larson to be from a recently living animal, Indy remarks that it could become the Rosetta Stone of paleontology. The Rosetta Stone is an ancient Egyptian stele transcribed in 196 BC, featuring a text in ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs, Demotic script, and ancient Greek, becoming a translation tool for Egyptian hieroglyphics. Since then the term "Rosetta Stone" has come to stand for anything that provides essential clues to new areas of knowledge.

 

On page 33, Indy remarks that Sir Richard Owen coined the term "dinosaur" a century ago. This is true. Owen (1804-1892) coined the word Dinosauria (terrible lizard) in the 1840s.

 

Marcus comments that the search for Dr. Starbuck may make the search for Dr. Livingstone seem like a walk around the park. Dr. David Livingstone (1813-1873) was a Scottish physician, Christian missionary, and explorer of Africa. He fell out of contact with the outside world for six years until journalist and explorer Henry Stanley found him living in the town of Ujiji on the shores of Lake Tanganyika in 1871.

 

On page 34, Marcus remarks that the Depression has hit the museum as hard as any other institution. The Great Depression was a worldwide economic downturn starting in 1929 and running through much of the 1930s that resulted in high unemployment and poverty rates.

 

Henry Fairfield Osborn is said to be the president of the American Museum of Natural History on page 34. This is true. He was president from 1908-1933. Indy's statement that Osborn believed that humans evolved in Asia is accurate to the man.

 

As Marcus states on pages 34-35, Mongolia's government was largely led by Russia (Soviet Union) at the time.

 

On page 37, Indy notices two Asian men in Buddhist robes seemingly discussing the blue whale model in the museum. Buddhism is the prevalent religion in the Asian countries.

 

A museum janitor mops the stairwell floor on page 37 after several members of a second-grade class from Brooklyn became ill from seeing the shrunken head exhibit.

 

At the end of the chapter, Marcus tells Indy to be packed and ready to head for Shanghai in three hours and explains that he'll call Dr. Morey in Princeton to explain Indy's absence from his class and offer to fill in for him there. Charles Rufus Morey (1877-1955) was the chairman of the Department of Art and Archaeology at Princeton University from 1924-1945. He was introduced to the reader in The Philosopher's Stone.

 

Chapter 2: Shanghai

 

This chapter opens in Shanghai, China on November 7, 1933.

 

Indy is staying at the Cathay Hotel, where Noël Coward stayed three years earlier during a bout with the flu and wrote the play Private Lives in less than a week. The Cathay was an actual hotel in the city, now known as Fairmont Peace Hotel. Noël Coward (1899–1973) was an English playwright, actor, singer, composer, and director; he did write Private Lives there in four days. Private Lives is a 1930 comedy of manners play.

 

Walter Granger travels with Indy to seek a living dinosaur in the Gobi. Granger (1872-1941) was an American paleontologist who, along with Roy Chapman Andrews, was the first westerner to discover fossil dinosaur eggs in the Gobi in the 1920s. He also helped in excavating the site of the Peking Man fossils.

 

"Whore of the Orient", used by Granger in an unflattering and lengthy description of the city, was an actual derogatory nickname for Shanghai in the early 20th Century. Joan points out to him that the city is also known as "Paris of the Orient" for being the most modern and technological city in China at the time.

 

On page 43, Granger points out there are no Michelin guides or four-star hotels where they are going. Michelin Guides are a series of tourist guide books that have been published by the French Michelin tire company since 1900.

 

Page 44 mentions that Indy trusted Granger because the man had saved him from becoming the main course of a cannibal tribe in Polynesia, convincing them that blue-eyed foreigners were much tastier than brown-eyed ones and setting them on the path of a Dutch slave trader named Conrad. I have been unable to find a real world or fictional reference to such a person.

 

Granger shows Indy a map and explains that they will travel by rail to Kalgan at the base of the Shen Shei Mountains, then take a road to a gateway in the Great Wall at Wanshan Pass, then along Desolation Road to Urga. As mentioned earlier, Urga is an actual city in Mongolia, as is Kalgan (more commonly known now as Zhangjiakou). The Great Wall of China is, of course, real as well, as is Wanshan Pass, but Desolation Road seems to be a fictitious name for the route.

 

Indy is introduced to Wu Han by Granger in this novel. Indy and Wu Han become good friends here and Wu Han is seen again assisting Indy in The Emperor's Tomb and The Temple of Doom.

 

On page 47, Indy comments a Chinese city he does like is Peking. Peking is the city now known as Beijing in China.

 

Also on page 47, Manchuria is a region of northeast China.

 

Indy warns Joan that a white woman in the Gobi desert who was found by a local warlord would be sold into slavery quicker than she could say her Hail Mary. The Hail Mary is a Catholic prayer to the Virgin Mary, mother of Jesus:
Hail Mary, full of grace,
The Lord is with thee.
Blessed art thou amongst women,
And blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus.
Holy Mary, Mother of God,
Pray for us sinners,
Now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

 

The Lotus Eaters nightclub in Shanghai appears to be fictitious. The proprietor of the club turns out to be a gangster named Lao Che, who will be seen again in The Temple of Doom. This is the first time Indy meets Lao Che, but page 49 states that he knew the gangster by reputation.

 

The jazz band at the Lotus Eaters is said to fiercely but unsuccessfully try to capture the Dixieland sound. Dixieland is essentially the original style of jazz as started in New Orleans at the beginning of the 1900s.

 

On page 49, Indy asks Joan if she enjoyed her visit to the Bund with Wu Han. The Bund is the protected historical waterfront zone of central Shanghai.

 

On page 50, Indy takes an incorrect guess that Wu Han works for "the university". There are a number of universities in Shanghai to which he could be referring.

 

On page 54, the band at Lotus Eaters starts to play "Ain't We Got Fun". This is a 1921 foxtrot song.

 

Lao Che is flanked by his three sons at his table in Lotus Eaters. Two of these sons appear again later in The Temple of Doom, and are named as Chen and Kao Kan. The third son appears only in this novel and his name remains unknown. Page 55 reveals that each son was born of a different mother, making them all half-brothers.

 

Indy's description of the Manchu ethnic group on page 58 is essentially correct.

 

Indy's expedition to Mongolia includes three brand new trucks donated by the Dodge Motor Company.

 

Granger mentions Sears and Roebuck on page 61.

 

On page 61, Indy refers to himself as having "Yankee ambition." "Yankee" is a term often used by citizens of other countries to refer to Americans.

 

Indy continues to carry a Webley revolver. Presumably, this is the new one he received in The Philosopher's Stone.

 

Chapter 3: Wanshan Pass

 

Indy gives Wu Han a Colt .45 revolver on page 77.

 

On page 77, Indy comments that Kubla Khan is said to have built his summer palace, Xanadu, near Kalgan, referring to a Coleridge poem that Joan then begins to quote. Kubla Khan is an 1816 poem by English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge about the Mongol emperor Kublai Khan (1215-1294) and his summer capital, Shangdu.

 

On page 80, Indy remarks that the Great Wall failed to keep Genghis Khan out of China. "Genghis Khan" (Great Emperor) was the title given to Temujin, the son of a 12th Century leader of the Mongols, who went on to found the Mongol Empire by uniting many of the nomadic tribes of the region and building a powerful army from them.

 

On page 81, Indy jokes that Feng, the Mongolian gatekeeper of local warlord General Tzi, is a member of the Rotary. This refers to Rotary International, an international service organization meant to provide humanitarian services in the local community.

 

Indy gives Feng an American gold eagle coin to let them pass on page 82. The gold eagle coin was issued by the U.S. mint from 1795-1933.

 

Chapter 4: Desolation Road

 

Page 88 states that Indy, Joan, and Granger camp overnight in the Tabool Hills. I've been unable to confirm whether this is an actual name of a range of hills in Mongolia.

 

On page 89, Indy and his friends stop in Tuerin. This is an actual village in Mongolia.

 

The story of the massacre of Chinese troops by Mongols that took place in and around Tuerin told by Granger on page 90 refers to a 1921 battle when the Russian anti-communist fighter Baron Ungern (1886-1921) helped the Mongols drive out the Chinese.

 

Granger's description of the number of, and cushy life of, Mongolian lamas on page 91 is greatly exaggerated, but some would say there is some truth in his assertions. "Lama" is the title of a teacher in Tibetan and Mongolian Buddhism. The Dalai Lama is the head monk of the Gelug school of Tibetan Buddhism, and nominally the leader of Tibet.

 

On page 93, Meryn remarks on Americans discovering the hiding place of fossils of the allergorhai-horhai. Allergorhai-horhai is the Mongolian death worm, a cryptid animal rumored to exist in the Gobi Desert in native lore.

 

The legend of the False Lama of the Black Gobi told by Meryn and Granger on page 95 is accurate to the legend of the man.

 

Indy tells Joan that he's named the feral dog he's semi-adopted Loki after the Norse god of mischief who was chained to a wall. Loki is the god of mischief in Norse mythology and his final fate until the end times of the world was to be bound to a rock inside a cave by the entrails of his sons.

 

Chapter 5: City of the Living God

 

The Buryats mentioned at the beginning of this chapter are an ethnic group of southeastern Siberia.

 

On page 100, the Tula River is an actual river that runs through Urga (Ulaanbaatar).

 

Page 100 states that the communists came to power in Urga in 1924, but it was actually in 1921. On October 29, 1924 the city was renamed Ulaanbaatar (Red-Hero City), and on page 103, Foreign Minister Badmonjohni tells Indy and his friends the city's new name (Ulan Bator).

 

On page 104, Granger compares the banning of religion under communism to Prohibition in the United States, saying that just because its banned doesn't mean you can't get it...you just have to know where to find it. Prohibition refers to the ban on alcohol production, importation, transportation, and sale in the U.S. from 1920-1933. I've been unable to confirm the details for the Dalai Lama's situation in and around Ulaanbaatar that Granger also makes here.

 

Indy meets the Dalai Lama. At this time, this was the 13th Dalai Lama, known as Thupten Gyatso, who had had the title since 1878. He would die in December 1933, close to the time of this novel.

 

On page 105, the Dalai Lama mentions the Garden of Eden. The Garden of Eden, of course, is the land of paradise created by God for Adam and Eve at the beginning of mankind as described in the holy texts of the Abrahamic religions.

 

Gurbun Saikhan, mentioned on page 107, is a mountain range is southern Mongolia. The Dalai Lama says the name means "the three good ones," but it is generally translated more like "three beauties". The Flaming Cliffs nearby are known for its findings of dinosaur eggs and Velociraptor remains.

 

Chapter 6: Wild Dogs

 

On page 111, "the Stars and Stripes" is a nickname for the U.S. flag. 

 

The flag on Indy's truck is said to be a blue pennant emblazoned with the logo of the American Museum of Natural History, the skeleton of a man attempting to control the skeleton of a rearing horse, based on one of the museum's most popular exhibits. This appears to be a fictitious logo for the museum, though the exhibit is real.

 

On page 115, Indy explains to Granger that Joan, when she ran out of water on her nearly fatal ride through the vast desert to catch up to the men of the caravan, drank her own sweat, something she had read of the bedouins doing in National Geographic. As far as I have been able to determine, this is incorrect. Drinking sweat would make things worse because it contains salt. National Geographic is a magazine published by the National Geographic Society, a nonprofit scientific and educational organization. The Bedouin were a nomadic ethnic group of the Arabian deserts, now mostly settled in the modern cities of the Middle East.

 

Meryn says, "Sai!" on page 115. This is Mongolian for "Right!"

 

On page 123, Tzen Khan suggests that perhaps in past lives he was Kubla Khan and Indy was Marco Polo. Kubla Khan was previously mentioned in this study. Marco Polo (1254-1324) was an Italian merchant and explorer who travelled the world, buying and selling.

 

In Tzen Khan's tent is a chest with a picture of the Buddha on it. Buddha was the Indian spiritual teacher Siddhārtha Gautama whose teaching began the Buddhist religion.

 

Looking at the dinosaur eggs found at the Flaming Cliffs, Indy wonders if dinosaurs were just a type of big birds, for which Granger ridicules him. Of course, in modern times, we know that most researchers now believe that many types of dinosaurs evolved into birds.

 

Joan describes the beauty of the Flaming Cliffs as like the Grand Canyon, Petrified Forest, and Pike's Peak all rolled into one.

 

Indy has brought a supply of postcards from New York to use as token gifts for the locals they meet in the Gobi. He gives the village elder of Gurbun Saikhan a postcard of the Statue of Liberty.

 

On page 130, Granger remarks that the eggshell jewelry with the Triceratops carving on it could date to the Stone Age, though the carving would still be an anachronism. The Stone Age is one of the three archaeological ages of humanity (the others being Bronze Age and Iron Age), which began about 3.4 million years ago with primitive hominids and ended in the range of 6000-2000 BC.

 

On page 131, Lieutenant Chang bursts into Indy's tent holding a Thompson submachine gun, known as a Tommy gun during the gangster era of the 1920s-1930s. 

 

General Tzi wears a Fu Manchu mustache and a uniform from the Great War. The "Great War" is a reference to World War One. The style of mustache is one based on that worn by the fictional character Dr. Fu Manchu in movie adaptations of novels by English writer Sax Rohmer. (Right: Actor Christopher Lee as Dr. Fu Manchu.)

 

General Tzi tells Indy and his companions they are at the Citadel of the False Lama. This appears to be a fictitious location, though there was a False Lama in Mongolia at the time, as mentioned earlier in the study.

 

Tzi's monks force Indy to drink reindeer urine, which has a psychedelic effect on his mind. Tzi explains that the Siberian reindeer feed on redcap mushrooms and the hallucinogenic compounds of the mushroom are filtered out in the kidneys and into the urine. There have been rumors throughout the 20th and 21st Centuries that Siberian shaman drink reindeer urine for its psychedelic properties, but it is unproven by the scientific community so far.

 

In his hallucination, Alecia tells Indy that if the world wanted to be saved, there would not be a Hitler or a Mussolini. Hitler was mentioned earlier in this study. Benito Mussolini was the fascist ruler of Italy from 1922-1943.

 

Alecia's face is soon replaced by that of the Serpent King in Indy's hallucination. The Serpent King is a Hindu god called Vasuki. It is the Serpent King that is often depicted coiled around the neck of the major god Shiva in Hindu art.

 

On page 141, Granger sees a brownie in his hallucination. Brownies are small household hobgoblins in Scottish folklore.

 

Chapter 7: The Flaming Cliffs

 

Page 146 mentions Indy's past as a member of the Boy Scouts.

 

Indy mentions St. Peter and Old Nick on page 147. St. Peter was one of the twelve apostles of Jesus Christ and is said by some Christian denominations to accept or reject the deceased's entrance to Heaven. "Old Nick" is a nickname for the devil in Christianity.

 

When he first meets Joan's father, Granger shakes his hand and says, "Dr. Starbuck, I presume." This is a small quip by Granger referencing the famous greeting of explorer Sir Henry Morton Stanley upon finding the long missing Dr. David Livingstone on the shores of Lake Tanganyika in Africa in 1871, "Dr. Livingstone, I presume?"

 

The lamastery in the Flaming Cliffs has a cache of three living Triceratops eggs and Dr. Starbuck says he believes the gestation period for them is about 18 months. This is exceptionally long. Researchers today believe that, in general, dinosaur eggs took 3-6 months to gestate.

 

Page 151 reveals that Joan is not a nun as she had claimed, but a reporter for the Kansas City Star newspaper.

 

Chapter 8: The Happy Valley

 

No notes.

 

Chapter 9: Thunder Child

 

As Indy and Granger lead Tzi's army away from the hidden valley of the Dune Dwellers, they manage to kill a few of the soldiers and obtain a Mauser rifle. Mauser was a German firearm manufacturer from 1811-2004.

 

The trick riding one of Tzi's men does on his horse on pages 173-174 is called Cossack drag, just as Indy states here.

 

Chapter 10: The Knife of Genghis Khan

 

The Polish Karabin army rifle that Chang carried was a model designed by Polish arms designer Wawrzyniec Lewandowski.

 

Turi carries a very old Mosin Russian rifle. This is the Mosin–Nagant rifle which was in production by various firearms manufacturers from 1891-1973.

 

Tzen Khan gives Indy an old heirloom, a knife with a jewel-encrusted handle that he says once belonged to Genghis Khan and which was said to be old even in that time. Inscriptions on the handle suggest to Indy the name of Qin Shi Huang, the first emperor of China. Qin Shi Huang (259–210 BC) actually was the first emperor of China and is the same emperor who is resurrected as the villain of the 2008 film The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor. In fact, Indy himself will later inadvertently resurrect Qin in the Indiana Jones universe in The Emperor's Tomb!

 

Epilogue: Grave of the U-357

 

Indy finds the German sub U-357 off the coast of Denmark on December 31, 1933, aboard the French salvage ship Jules Verne. The ship is named for the French novelist Jules Verne (1828-1905), known for his science-fiction tales.

 

The divemaster of the salvage ship warns Indy before his deep sea dive that he can only stay down 15 minutes at that depth or he risks the bends. The bends is decompression sickness caused by the emergence of dissolved gases forming microbubbles in the blood.

 

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