Also known as "Heaven is Beside the Red River", Anatolia Story is a manga by Shinohara Chie. A historical fantasy shojo manga, it's set in the Hittite Empire between the approximate years of 1324 and 1319 BC.
The story begins with our 15-year-old protagonist, a Japanese girl named Yuri Suzuki, and her normal life in Japan. The fantasy element of the series in introduced nearly straightaway with water forming arms in an attempt to grab the girl, and before long the arms succeed, dragging Yuri far into the past - to the Hittite Empire during the reign of King Suppiluliuma I.
From there on our spirited protagonist is involved in political intrigues that threaten not only her life, but the lives of the Hittite princes and the empire as a whole. Wars are fought and both allies and enemies introduced in the detailed drawings of Shinohara Chie, the far-away past coming to life in the series.
 |
| Their chins are rather sharp, but you get used to it. |
One of the main antagonists is Ramses, a man from a noble military family who succeeded Horemheb as pharaoh - and as you can see from the two pages above, his grandson is still considered Egypt's most powerful monarch.
I learned a great deal from this manga, and highly recommend it! I've spent most of today reading up on Anatolia, Hattusa, Mursili II, and other figures, places and countries featured prominently in the series, and don't even know where to begin when it comes to writing a blog post about it all. This seemed like a worthy beginning.
Have you ever been to Turkey? That'd be a cool aspect to consider.
ReplyDeleteI've never been, no! I'd like to get to Egypt sometime, too, but I suppose things aren't precisely peaceful there at the moment.
Delete