Real Historical Figures Turned into Fantasy Characters

cropped-chess2.jpgOne of the great joys of writing the Desolate Empire series has been fictionalizing real people. There are some huge benefits to this approach. I can turn about half of them into women and/or I can slander them egregiously. It’s a win-win!

Since Rise of the Storm came out, I’ve had a few people ask me who some of the main characters are based on. Some of them I’ve already covered in this blog, but I still have a lot more to do, and some I won’t cover at all. So here’s a list for the story so far. Those with links have their own blog entries or at least get a mention in one..

KendrykFrederick V, Count-Elector Palatine
General Ensden- Count Tilly
Edric Landrus- Martin Luther
Count Faris- Christian of Anhalt
General Barela- Ambrogio Spinola
Alarys Zelenka- Maximilian of Bavaria
Zofya- Anne of Austria
Raysa- Maria Eleonora of Brandenburg
Trystan Martinek– Bernhard of Saxe-Weimar
Franca Dura- Gottfried von Pappenheim
There will be more, especially as the kids grow up, and the next book- Hammer of the Gods- will see a number of fake Swedish generals come on board. I keep all of these posts on the “character profiles” tab and the “historical background” tab under The Desolate Empire Series drop-down menu.

 

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2 Comments on “Real Historical Figures Turned into Fantasy Characters

  1. I think the one I was really curious about was Edric. I just needed to know if that was, indeed, Martin Luther. I think I was trying to set the time frame in my head.

    • I’ve had a few folks wonder about Teodora and Kendryk as well. Unfortunately for timeframe accuracy, I make a real mess of squishing two centuries together. 😀 Though for general purposes I’m sticking with the 17th century. Luther is the only anomaly.

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