Thieves’ World as a Rosetta Stone of early RPGs

The Thieves’ World fiction anthology series was an early 80s shared world setting. It was pretty amazing at the time, prolific authors all writing in the same world, borrowing each others’ characters and affecting the course of events. I recall the reader was cautioned that any inconsistencies should be written off as quirks in the characters relating their stories.

This is a recreation of a post I made on November 29, 2013 on my old blog, and was lost due to my subsequent file mismanagement. I found the scan pics I’d taken of Jubal in the various game systems for the article, and I felt it was worth reposting them here.

Thieves’ World page at WB reference site

Thieves’ World items in the shop

Thieves World fiction at Amazon

The genesis of the Thieves’ World roleplaying game setting

The Rosetta Stone is a granodiorite stele discovered in 1799 which is inscribed with three versions of a decree issued in Memphis, Egypt in 196 BC during the Ptolemaic dynasty on behalf of King Ptolemy V Epiphanes. The top and middle texts are in Ancient Egyptian using hieroglyphic and Demotic scripts respectively, while the bottom is in Ancient Greek. The decree has only minor differences among the three versions, so the Rosetta Stone became key to deciphering Egyptian hieroglyphs, thereby opening a window into ancient Egyptian history. –Wikipedia