It’s been several years since my last ARKANE novel, Tomb of Relics, although I wrote a short story, Soldiers of God, in the interim.
My readers often urge me to write faster, but my ARKANE thrillers have a particular restriction. They are all based on actual places and real historic events that I twist into a thriller with elements of the supernatural. These stories take time to emerge because I have to find the threads of the story in the real world first. Here’s how Spear of Destiny originated.
Finding an initial story thread in Vienna
Most of my books are based on places I’ve visited, or researched in depth, and I’ve been wanting to go to Vienna for a long time. At the end of Tomb of Relics, Jake is heading there for another mission, and Morgan has been cursed by the Black Anchorite, so I knew those two elements had to start the next book.
I also wanted to weave in Washington, D.C. somehow, since I visited the city in early 2023, so the initial challenge was finding a religious relic or a story thread that linked the two places.
I started reading about Vienna and the history of the Habsburg dynasty, as well as the early days of psychiatry. But I’ve already featured Sigmund Freud’s influence in Ark of Blood, so I focused on the religious elements of the city instead.
As I researched the various museums in Vienna, I discovered that the Spear of Destiny — or at least one of the relics that are purported to be the spear — was in the Hofburg museum complex.
I read books about the Spear and learned it had fascinated Adolf Hitler when he lived in Vienna as a young man, and then I found out that Heinrich Himmler, head of the SS elite soldiers, had been obsessed with the occult. The Spear of Destiny clearly has a fascinating history — so it became my MacGuffin, the object that centers the plot in action adventure thrillers.
Visiting Vienna and Nuremberg, February 2024
On the first morning of my multi-day trip, I went to the Schatzkammer, the treasury of the Hofburg museum.
The description in Chapter 2 is based on my visit, and the place really was completely empty. I stood alone before the Spear (which is in the same room as the tooth of John the Baptist!) and couldn’t believe there wasn’t more information about its fascinating history. For obvious reasons, Austria and Germany prefer not to focus on the dark history of the Nazi regime, but there was nothing about the religious mythology behind the lance or the other kings who had claimed its power.
I walked out of the treasury and through a corridor, emerging next to the National Library and State Hall, which I entered on a whim since I was passing.
I’m so glad I went in, as the library is truly stunning. As I walked through, I imagined a fight scene there, which turned into Chapter 3.
The Monument Against War and Fascism in the opening of Chapter 5 is also real, and just as disturbing as described.
There are some other fascinating places in Vienna. I particularly enjoyed visiting St Stephen’s Cathedral and the Kapuzinergruft, the Capuchin crypt with the tombs of the Habsburg royalty, but they didn’t make it into the book.
I’ve been as accurate as possible with the dates of historical events. In 1933, Hitler became Chancellor of Germany and then Führer, and in 1938 declared the Anschluss, the annexation of the Federal State of Austria into the German Reich.
On 13 October 1938, the Holy Lance and the other Habsburg imperial regalia were taken to Nuremberg under SS guard and housed in St Catherine’s Church. Heinrich Himmler was Reichsführer of the SS at the time, so this would have been under his direction.
The Allies took control of Nuremberg and the Spear on 20 April 1945, and Hitler committed suicide in his bunker in Berlin ten days later on 30 April 1945.
It’s only a few hours on the fast train from Vienna to Nuremberg, so well worth a visit if you’re in that area. Train travel is easy in Europe and one of the best ways to get around. I used the Trainline app to book tickets, which I also use in the UK.
I didn’t have long in Nuremberg, so I went straight to the art bunker for a tour, which takes about ninety minutes. Chapter 6 is based on that visit and everything is as Jake describes, including the photo of Hitler in front of the Spear and the plans for the Congress Hall. It’s an excellent tour and you need to book in advance.
In the same area, you can visit the Dürer house, where Albrecht Dürer made his wood blocks and Apocalypse prints, among other artworks, which feature in Crypt of Bone.
Just down the hill, I recommend St Sebald’s church, where a ring of snails support the saint’s shrine. You can find some pictures on my Instagram @jfpennauthor.
There are more photos and practical details in my overview article, Vienna, Nuremberg, and Cologne. My Five Day Research Trip for Spear of Destiny.
Hitler, Himmler, Wewelsburg, and Nazi occult interest in the Spear of Destiny
I read books around this area as listed in the Bibliography below, and one of the most fascinating was Adolf Hitler and the Secrets of the Holy Lance, written by two soldiers who fought in World War II on opposite sides.
From a second-hand store in Germany, I managed to source a first edition signed by one of the authors, Colonel Howard A. Buechner, Battalion Surgeon. It’s co-written with Captain Wilhelm Bernhart, Reich Undersea Boat Service, Knight of the Holy Lance.
The book includes sketches of the Spear and the runes that (supposedly) control its power, as well as legends of the Lance prior to World War II, extensive details about Himmler, Wewelsburg, and more.
Adolf Hitler, an Austrian, was rejected from the Academy of Fine Arts in Vienna but remained in the city painting and selling his work in the early 1900s. While he was there, he studied the Lance and learned about the occult. He reportedly underlined a quote in a book, Magic: History, Theory and Practice by Ernst Schertel, which reads:
“He who does not carry demonic seeds within him will never give birth to a new world.”
I added this quote to the altar under Wewelsburg Castle and used it as the basis for Gabriel’s supernatural abilities, but of course, the basement crypt is my invention and there is no evidence of demons summoned there.
Other stories based on similar inspiration include the Hellboy universe, the game Castle Wolfenstein, and Indiana Jones.
You can find out more about Wewelsburg Castle and Himmler’s plans for it at www.wewelsburg.de
Unfortunately, I didn’t find out about the castle until after I returned from Vienna, so I didn’t visit in person, but I researched thoroughly with books and online sources.
The Hall of the Supreme Leaders and the Black Sun mosaic is real with the quote as described over its entrance, ‘my house will be called a house of prayer,’ from Isaiah chapter 56:7. The complete verse reads, “Their burnt offerings and sacrifices will be accepted on my altar; for my house will be called a house of prayer for all nations.”
The ‘burnt offerings and sacrifices’ clearly echo the millions killed in Nazi concentration camps, so perhaps this was a deliberate use of the quote, yet I couldn’t find mention of this in anyone else’s research.
Lhasa, Tibet
The Ahnenerbe scientists, under Himmler’s direction, went on many research trips and in 1938, the German explorer Ernst Schafer led a group to Tibet. The regent welcomed them into the sacred city of Lhasa and they spent several months studying in the library and taking anatomical measurements of Tibetan people.
The anthropologist Bruno Beger did indeed collect skulls later on and was convicted of eighty-six counts of accessory to murder during the Nuremberg trials of 1946.
Although I haven’t visited Lhasa, I spent a lot of time researching the Potala Palace and the journey to the city via the Qinghai–Tibet Railway, a beautiful, slow route that helps travelers adjust to the altitude.
There is extensive restoration and translation work in the ancient library under Chinese direction. You can watch a video about it here.
The Vesuvius Prize that Tenzin mentions is real, and it’s incredible to think that AI technology is now helping decipher these carbonised scrolls. You can read more at Scrollprize.org.
I find the scanning of ancient texts endlessly fascinating, and a similar Vatican project inspired my short story Soldiers of God, if you like this kind of thing, too!
I mainly used Himmler’s Crusade by Christopher Hale as research for this section, and also a documentary, Secret Nazi Expeditions: Tibet.
One of the most rewarding things as an author comes from the moment of synchronicity, when everything lines up, and the story could actually be possible based on research. It’s the moment I look forward to in every book, and it always comes.
My moment of synchronicity for this book arrived during the Tibet research as I discovered that the ‘rushes,’ the original pre-edited footage, lay within the Schäfer Collection in the Library of Congress in Washington, DC, which also has the Third Reich Collection, and Hitler’s personal library.
Washington, DC, USA
I visited the city in January 2023 and had a wonderful few days touring museums and also the Library of Congress. Although I didn’t go inside the Capitol, I walked through the large park at the back where the rally happens in Chapter 4. The crypt underneath the Capitol is my invention, as are the characters and Jericho Command.
I explored the Library of Congress, which is full of beautiful mosaics, murals, and literary quotes as well as special reading rooms. I didn’t have this book in mind at the time so I didn’t apply for access to the Nazi Archives or anything related to Operation Paperclip, the US intelligence program that allowed over 1,600 Nazi scientists to escape justice in order to continue their research.
Kurt Blome was the director of the Nazi biological warfare program and carried out experiments on inmates in concentration camps. Despite the evidence against him, he was acquitted of war crimes at Nuremberg based on intervention from the US military.
Fort Detrick is a real US Army command base. It was the centre of the US biological weapons program after World War II, and is now home to various departments, including the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) and more.
You can find more pictures of my trip in my article, Classical Architecture, Angels Unawares, And A Surprise Gutenberg Bible. A Long Weekend In Washington DC USA.
Bibliography and Further Research:
- Adolf Hitler and the Secrets of the Holy Lance — Col. Howard A. Buechner and Capt. Wilhelm Bernhart
- Blitzed: Drugs in Nazi Germany — Norman Ohler
- “Heinrich Himmler.” Holocaust Encyclopedia, accessed 24 Feb 2024 — https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/heinrich-himmler
- Himmler’s Crusade: The Nazi Expedition to Find the Origins of the Aryan Race — Christopher Hale
- “Hitler’s Forgotten Library” — Timothy W. Ryback, The Atlantic, May 2003, www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2003/05/hitlers-forgotten-library/302727/
- Hitler’s Holy Relics: A True Story of Nazi Plunder and the Race to Recover the Crown Jewels of the Holy Roman Empire — Sidney Kirkpatrick
- Hitler’s Monsters: Supernatural History of the Third Reich — Eric Kurlander
- Operation Paperclip: The Secret Intelligence Program that Brought Nazi Scientists to America — Annie Jacobsen
- Schäfer collection and Third Reich collection, Library of Congress, Washington, DC, www.loc.gov/item/2010651980/ and www.loc.gov/item/2009632506/
- Secret Nazi Expeditions: Tibet. History Play documentary on Amazon Prime
- The Devil’s Disciples: The Lives and Times of Hitler’s Inner Circle — Anthony Read
- The Nazi Occult — Kenneth Hite
- The Spear of Destiny — Trevor Ravenscroft
- The True Cross and the Spear of Destiny — Gustavo Vazquez Lozano & Charles River
- Vienna: The International Capital — Angus Robertson
