10 h 0 minAudiobook14 minSummaryRead it, hear it, the 15-minute summary, and print and large print at cost
Audiobook edition · 10 h 0 minPaperback · 6 × 9 in · printing soonHardcover · 6 × 9 in · printing soonAbout this book
What if everything you trust gives way to a vision of ancient Egypt, where love and freedom demand courage?
Allan Quatermain is an old hunter and trader, shrewd, modest, and used to trusting what he can touch and test. In The Ancient Allan, H. Rider Haggard carries him beyond his ordinary world through a vision of the distant past. Egypt opens before him: a land of temples, kings, priests, and soldiers.
Here, plots and threats make safety uncertain, and honour can ask more than caution allows. Love and freedom lie at the heart of the danger. Allan tells what he sees and lives through with doubt and humour, setting his plain voice against strange, grand scenes. Can a man who questions marvels turn away from what draws him in?
What you’ll discover
- A guide who doubts Follow Allan as his practical instincts meet wonders he cannot simply dismiss.
- Egypt beyond his time Enter a vision of temples and rituals, where kings rule and priests guide.
- Courage under threat Face the pull between safety and honour amid soldiers, fighters, and dangerous plots.
- Love bound to freedom Discover the desires that give this adventure its emotional stakes beyond danger alone.
- Dream, doubt, and fate Let a plain, humorous narrator lead you through scenes both strange and grand.
Who will love it
Readers who love old-fashioned adventure, ancient Egypt, lion hunts and daring escapes will enjoy this book. It also suits anyone drawn to reincarnation, prophecy and doomed love.
What’s inside
The key ideas, in the 15-minute summary
- The past calls Allan back
- A promise opens another life
- Victory exposes a ruler's cruelty
- Friendship takes hold of royal power
- Silence threatens love amid victory
- Loyalty calls Shabaka back north
- Love pulls against sacred vows
- Fate leaves room for choice
- Small silences shadow great adventures
Who’s who
- Allan QuatermainAn elderly English hunter who tells the tale and, in the vision, is Shabaka, a skilled Egyptian archer who loves Amada.
- Lady RagnallA charming widow with a strange past who believes she and Allan share earlier lives and wants to see them through the Taduki smoke.
- AmadaA royal Egyptian lady and priestess of Isis, learned and devout, torn between her vows to the goddess and her love for Shabaka.
- BesShabaka's dwarf servant and charioteer, witty, loyal and cunning, who secretly hides his birthright as an Ethiopian king.
- TanofirA blind hundred-year-old hermit and magician, Shabaka's great-uncle, who guides events from a tomb beside the Apis bulls.
- KaremaTanofir's Cup, a young Arab seeress who marries Bes, becomes a reluctant queen and longs for the desert and its wisdom.
- PeroaAn Egyptian prince who rules under the Great King but wants to free his country and fears any rival to his throne.
- The King of KingsA proud, fearful Persian ruler who hunts lions, breaks his own word and desires Amada for his house of women.
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The Ancient Allan
by H. Rider Haggard · 1920
An old hunter breathes a dream herb and dreams he is an Egyptian archer who must save a priestess from a king.
Medium level5–10 hours to read20 languages
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“Enchantment is just what this writer exercised; he fixed pictures in our minds that thirty years have been unable to wear away.”
In short
What if you could breathe a dried herb and live a life you lived two thousand years ago? Allan Quatermain, an old hunter retired to England, is asked to try exactly that.
The Ancient Allan at a glance
- Reading time
- About 5 h 50 min4 h 35 min fast, 6 h 55 min slow
- Length
- 82,900 words
- Library level
- Medium longer sentences, everyday words
- First published
- 1920by H. Rider Haggard
Reading time at 238 words a minute (fast 300, slow 200). How long the classics take to read · Updated
From the 15-minute summary · Key idea 1
A letter from Egypt calls Allan to Ragnall Castle
The book opens with Allan Quatermain writing in his old age. He promises a story that may have been one long dream.
Years ago, he helped Lord Ragnall search Africa for his kidnapped wife. When she was freed, they gave her two old papyrus scrolls and a herb called Taduki, whose smoke brings visions. Now a letter arrives from the widowed Lady Ragnall. She and her husband dug out a buried temple of Isis in the desert. Then a sand wall burst, the shrine was smashed, and Lord Ragnall was buried alive.
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- 15-minute summary
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Details
- First published
- 1920
- Language
- English
- Reading time
- 6 h 30 min
- Level
- Medium level
Cite this edition
Haggard, H. Rider. The Ancient Allan. Library of Alexandria, 2026, libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-ancient-allan.
Haggard, H. R. (2026). The ancient Allan. Library of Alexandria. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-ancient-allan (Original work published 1920)
Haggard, H. Rider. The Ancient Allan. Library of Alexandria, 2026. https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-ancient-allan.
@book{haggard2026ancient,
author = {Haggard, H. Rider},
title = {The Ancient Allan},
publisher = {Library of Alexandria},
year = {2026},
url = {https://libraryofalexandria.com/products/the-ancient-allan},
note = {First published 1920}
}
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What is The Ancient Allan about?
Allan Quatermain inhales a dream herb with Lady Ragnall and lives out a vision of ancient Egypt. There he is Shabaka, an archer who defies a Persian king, steals his seal and fights to save a priestess he loves.
Who is Bes in The Ancient Allan?
Bes is Shabaka's dwarf servant and charioteer, clever, funny and loyal. He hides a secret, that he is the rightful king of the Ethiopians, and his wit saves his master more than once.
What is Taduki in The Ancient Allan?
Taduki is a dried herb given to Lady Ragnall by the Kendah priests. Its smoke, breathed in a ritual, brings vivid visions of past lives, and in this book it carries Allan and Lady Ragnall back to ancient Egypt.
The author
H. Rider Haggard
1856–1925 · English adventure novelist
Henry Rider Haggard (1856–1925) was an English novelist. He was born in Norfolk, lived in southern Africa from 1875 to 1881, and later settled in Norfolk. He wrote King Solomon’s Mines (1885), She (1887), and Beatrice (1890). He also wrote about agriculture and rural life. He died in London.
“Never reach out your hand to Death until he reaches out his to you.”
More by H. Rider Haggard
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