History AnachronismStew / Literature

* Most adaptations of ''Literature/TheGreatGatsby'', especially [[Film/TheGreatGatsby2013 the 2013 adaptation]] its and paraphernalia of depicts cars, clothing, and architecture coming from the second half of TheRoaringTwenties despite the novel itself being set in 1922.
** The [[Film/TheGreatGatsby 2013 film]] takes this to extremes, much like in ''Film/MoulinRouge'', with clothing fit for 1927 instead of 1922, taller skyscrapers, streamlined ArtDeco themes, and HipHop. ''Especially HipHop.''

* Most adaptations, especially [[Film/TheGreatGatsby the most recent one]] and paraphernalia of Film/TheGreatGatsby depicts cars clothing and architecture coming from the second half of TheRoaringTwenties despite the novel itself is set in 1922.

** Handler has way too much fun with this. At one point a location (a train station, if I remember correctly) is mentioned to have three shops - one is a computer repair shop. Another is a blacksmith shop. Have fun figuring out what time period those two establishments could coexist in.

* Painfully severe in the ''Literature/RubyRedfort'' book series by author Lauren Child. The various elements clash so badly it's impossible to tell WHAT decade they're set in. You could assume it's set in the 40's but the mentions of Ruby's snarky t-shirts don't fit, you could assume it's set in the modern day but there's no mention whatsoever of any kind of modern technology. The [[http://rubyredfort.com/ website]] seems to place it mid-70s, but some of the characters talk like they're in a 30s film noir.

* Most adaptations, especially [[Film/TheGreatGatsby the most recent one]] and paraphernalia of TheGreatGatsby depicts cars clothing and architecture coming from the second half of TheRoaringTwenties despite the novel itself is set in 1922.

*** The Book of Judith begins by declaring Nebuchadnezzar as the king who "ruled over the Assyrians", though he actually ruled over the Babylonians.

* ''Literature/NewArcana.'' The setting is inspired by fantasy RPGs, and the characters use swords, armor, and other medieval-style equipment. Their world, however, has trains, skyscrapers, electric lights, and factories; technology seems to have been developed to about the point of the early 20th century. The characters themselves have early 21st-century attitudes and speech patterns.

* Painfully severe in the Ruby Redfort book series by author Lauren Child. The various elements clash so badly it's impossible to tell WHAT decade they're set in. You could assume it's set in the 40's but the mentions of Ruby's snarky t-shirts don't fit, you could assume it's set in the modern day but there's no mention whatsoever of any kind of modern technology. The [[http://rubyredfort.com/ website]] seems to place it mid-70s, but some of the characters talk like they're in a 30s film noir.

** The Tribes of Israel are RetConned as having extensively used iron weapons - Deborah is given a battle chariot protected by iron plates - even though bronze would have been universal for all peoples - including mighty Egypt - in this time period.

* George Macdonald Fraser's ''The Pyrates'' is a colossal AnachronismStew, with seventeenth century pirates riding around in catamarans and using face cream. Fraser was a diligent researcher and knew exactly what he was doing, even lampshading it in a few places. It's all more than justified by the fact that the novel is [[CrowningMomentOfFunny hilarious]].

* ''Literature/ThePrincessBride'' actually uses the invention of stew to clarify its chronology. Most definitely RuleOfFunny and metahumor. WilliamGoldman often states that the time he's talking about is before one thing, but after another -- often putting them in ahistorical order, as when he says it's set "before Europe and after America". (Unless he means "after Vespucci's voyages but before the Maastricht Treaty"...)

** Actual monarchs of the 14th century are referred to as mythical figures. Which places it after the 14th century, or an alternate 14th century where Arthur and the historic monarchs swap places, or something. And [[Literature/LeMorteDArthur Tom Mallory]] (1415-1471) appears on the eve of the final battle. White [[WordOfGod once said]] that if you piece all the references from the different books together, you will be forced to the conclusion that the end of Arthur's reign came centuries before its beginning.

* Justified and {{lampshade|Hanging}}d in ''[[Literature/{{Nightside}} A Hard Day's Knight]]'', in which the shiny armor worn by Arthur and his vassals was forged by armorers acting under the explicit instructions of Myth/{{Merlin}}, who'd peeked into the future to see how later generations of warriors were kitted out. This also explains ''why'' Arthur could kick ass on every other military force in 6th century Britain: his guys were more or less invulnerable to the weapons of his rivals.

** There is a story that goes, when Handler was asked when the story took place, he simply answered, "The year of the rat."

* Creator/MichaelCrichton's ''Literature/EatersOfTheDead'' is remarkably true to real history, aside from the obviously fictional and fantastic nature of the "Eaters of the Dead" themselves, and the fact that the real ibn Fadlan never traveled all the way up north to help the [[HornyVikings Vikings]] fight Neanderthals, given that much of the book is based on a historical figure's travelogue. As a result, it's ''so much'' cooler. However there's one minor anachronism... in the basic premise. The plot of the novel is obviously meant to be a "real life" inspiration for ''Literature/{{Beowulf}}'', a poem that most scholars think was written at least a century before ibn Fadlan lived.

* Gene Wolfe's ''New Sun'' series of novels take place a ''looong'' way in the future (the techno-fantasy "post-historical" era where Stone-Age Man, the Modern Era, and the Galaxy-Spanning Imperial Era are all lumped together as the "Age of Myth"). The basic technology and society is late medieval. But at some point time travel had been commonplace, so remnants of all eras of history are common - military energy weapons right along with swords, antigravity craft and ox-drawn wagons, sabretooth tigers and starships, electricians organized like a medieval craft guild, medical men just as likely to use genetic engineering as an herbal infusion, etc. One of the appendices even points out that there are three separate levels of technology: the "smith" level (medieval), the "Urth" level (roughly 20th century plus some genetic engineering) and the "stellar" level (highly powerful artifacts that can only be obtained from extraterrestrials.) It's all justified by the fact that [[ScavengerWorld the planet has been exhausted of most resources]] and can no longer sustain a technological society or educate most of its inhabitants, but the old knowledge remains in a few places.

* Literature/TheBible, especially in some versions/translations, has been known to contain a few anachronisms since often the "books" composing it were written some time after the events were supposed to have taken place. For example: the descriptions of armor, especially that worn by Goliath, in 1 Samuel 17 are typical of Greek armour of the 6th century BC rather than of Philistine armour of the 10th century BC.

** All of the Hebrew Bible from Genesis through 2 Kings wasn't written down and in it's final form until around 500 BC or later, so descriptions such as the above would be based on contemporary examples.

*** The book of Tobit takes place in the 8th century BCE, but uses quotes from the books of Chronicles (which many scholars date to the 4th century BCE.)

* Invoked in ''Return to the Willows'', a fan-written followup to ''Literature/TheWindInTheWillows'', when the characters must dress in armor to disguise themselves, but in order to get everything to fit have to mix 17th and 18th century armor, which one of the characters notes normally shouldn't be done.

* The children's book ''Literature/KoziolekMatolek''. Matołek encounters brigands straight out of a fairy tale, visits a medieval castle, ends up in feudal China, later travels by plane to Poland and drives a car...

* ''Literature/NewArcana.'' The setting is inspired by fantasy rpgs, and the characters use swords, armor, and other medieval-style equipment. Their world, however, has trains, skyscrapers, electric lights, and factories; technology seems to have been developed to about the point of the early 20th century. The characters themselves have early 21st-century attitudes and speech patterns.
* An in-universe version in ''Literature/SixtyEightRooms''. Ruthie finds a pencil in a eighteenth-century French room and a late seventeenth century American mug with a plastic barrette inside in a sixteenth century English room. These are shown to be clues in a mystery for her.

* Painfully severe in the Ruby Redfort book series by author Lauren Child. The various elements clash so badly it's impossible to tell WHAT decade thy're set in. You could assume it's set in the 40's but the mentions of Ruby's snarky t-shirts don't fit, you could assume it's set in the modern day but there's no mention whatsoever of any kind of modern technology. The [[http://rubyredfort.com/ website]] seems to place it mid-70s, but some of the characters talk like they're in a 30s film noir.

* In ''Literature/TheIronTeeth'' web serial most of the world is set in a medieval period, but the mage guilds have somewhat advanced chemistry, given that they know what nitrogen and sulfur are, and can use them to alter properties of crystals.

* ''Literature/{{Graveminder}}'' has Byron enter a tunnel under the funeral home with his father, leading to a strange place where a hopeless scramble of architecture, costumery, transport and weapons exist, where whitewalled model Ts and Thunderbirds share traffic with horse-drawn vehicles, cowboys carrying openly walk about amongst girls in flappers and pinstripe-suited gangsters, and the skyline starts with colonial miners cottages and continues through castles, Gothic cathedrals and brownstones to Art Deco skyscrapers and Streamline Moderne diners. It is eventually revealed to be [[spoiler: the land of the dead, and the stew is cuased by the lives of all the dead who enter.]]
* In ''Literature/TheSorcererOfTheWildeeps'', the story itself is set in a time reminiscent of the [[AncientRome Roman Era]] and the action itself happens in a fantasy equivalent of the [[AncientAfrica African continent]], where warriors use spears and swords are an exotic thing. However, the language the brothers use among themselves is flat-out modern hip-hop slang -- or modern French, in T-Jawn's case --, and not only is Demane knowledgeable in modern genetics and medicine, there's mention of existing, practical [[FasterThanLightTravel faster-than-light]] and interplanetary travel.

* ''Literature/Graveminder'' has Byron enter a tunnel under the funeral home with his father, leading to a strange place where a hopeless scramble of architecture, costumery, transport and weapons exist, where whitewalled model Ts and Thunderbirds share traffic with horse-drawn vehicles, cowboys carrying openly walk about amongst girls in flappers and pinstripe-suited gangsters, and the skyline starts with colonial miners cottages and continues through castles, Gothic cathedrals and brownstones to Art Deco skyscrapers and Streamline Moderne diners. It is eventually revealed to be [[spoiler: the land of the dead, and the stew is cuased by the lives of all the dead who enter.]]

[[AC: KingArthur stories]]

* In ''JohannesCabalTheNecromancer'' and related works the time period is deliberately vague so as to accommodate numerous different contradictory facts-the Germanies are a thing as opposed to one German nation-but its implied World War 1 is over. Cars don't seem to be a thing, but fairly fantastic aeroships are. References to Al Capone and media of the 1960s are tossed about, but the settings largely resemble early 19th century Europe.

* ''Literature/GraveMinder'' has Byron enter a tunnel under the funeral home with his father, leading to a strange place where a hopeless scramble of architecture, costumery, transport and weapons exist, where whitewalled model Ts and Thunderbirds share traffic with horse-drawn vehicles, cowboys carrying openly walk about amongst girls in flappers and pinstripe-suited gangsters, and the skyline starts with colonial miners cottages and continues through castles, Gothic cathedrals and brownstones to Art Deco skyscrapers and Streamline Moderne diners. It is eventually revealed to be [[spoiler: the land of the dead, and the stew is cuased by the lives of all the dead who enter.]]

* ''Literature/GraveMinder'' has Byron enter a tunnel under the funeral home with his father, leading to a strange place where a hopeless scramble of architecture, costumery, transport and weapons exist, where whitewalled model Ts and Thunderbirds share traffic with horse-drawn vehicles, cowboys carrying openly walk about amongst girls in flappers and pinstripe-suited gangsters, and the skyline starts with colonial miners cottages and continues through castles, Gothic cathedrals and brownstones to Art Deco skyscrapers and Streamline Moderne diners. It is eventually revealed to be [[Spoiler:the land of the dead, and the stew is cuased by the lives of all the dead who enter.]]

** The [[Film/TheGreatGatsby 2013 film]] takes this to extremes, much like in ''MoulinRouge'', with clothing fit for 1927 instead of 1922, taller skyscrapers, streamlined ArtDeco themes, and HipHop. ''Especially HipHop.''

** Actual monarchs of the 14th century are referred to as mythical figures. Which places it after the 14th century, or an alternate 14th century where Arthur and the historic monarchs swap places, or something. And [[Literature/LaMortDArthur]] Tom Mallory (1415-1471) appears on the eve of the final battle. White [[WordOfGod once said]] that if you piece all the references from the different books together, you will be forced to the conclusion that the end of Arthur's reign came centuries before its beginning.

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* PeterDavid's ''Literature/KnightLifeSeries'' of Arthur in the modern era. Percival, who gained immortality by drinking from the Grail cup while healthy, is portrayed as a Moor.

* The SpellSinger fantasy novels, while taking place take place in a DungAges Medieval Fantasy setting with wizards, dragons, fairies and anthropomorphic animals. The later books seem to imply that that world is slowly becoming one. As Jon-Tom gradually brings over our world's technology and influences (Though not beyond personal use within friends and family) such as [[spoiler: Mudge's kids who are anthropomorphic otters]] grew up watching Disney movies and Anime, and being fans of rap.