HISTORICAL MYSTERIES AND THE LAW
One area of research that has not been sufficiently explored is the image of legal systems in the historical mystery. Historical mysteries run the gamut from whodunnits set in ancient Greece and Rome, to England in the medieval period, sixteenth and nineteenth centuries, to France during the period of Napoleon, and Spain at the time of Ferdinand and Isabella. Historical mysteries may be written by contemporary authors (for example, the Brother Cadfael novels of Ellis Peters), or we may consider them historical because they were written at the time they are supposed to take place (for example the Sherlock Holmes stories of Arthur Conan Doyle).
GENERAL WEBSITES
Crime Through Time (Membership Site)
The Historical Mystery - A history of the historical mystery by MysteryGuide.comHistorical Mystery Bibliography - Abreviated bibliography. Loose interpretation of 'historical'. Last updated 1996.
Historical Mystery Appreciation Society Journal
Historical Mystery Fiction - Bibliography from Ancient through WWII, with short story section.Historical Mystery Bibliography - Abbreviated bibliography. Loose interpretation of 'historical'. Last updated 1996.
Historical Mysteries: An extensive list
Historical Mysteries Reading List - Fiction Readers' Advisory developed from Armchair Detective lists. By Historical Period, and Geograhic Region/Country Mystery Authors and their Detectives Through Time - Light background info. Chronology. Limited bibliogrpahy. Sample reading list and related links to genre fiction and theme material.
THE ANCIENT WORLD: ROMAN MYSTERIES
Lindsey Davis writes novels set in the early Roman Empire. Her sleuth is Marco Didius Falco.
Steven Saylor
John Maddox Roberts writes another series of Roman era novels, the SPQR series. They include SPQR (reissue 1999), The Sacrilege (reissue 1999); The Temple of the Muses (reissue 1999)
See also Tom Watkins, Policing Rome: Maintaining Order in Fact and Fiction
THE ANCIENT WORLD: EGYPTIAN MYSTERIES
Lauren Haney writes of ancient Egypt: A Face Turned Backward (1999), The Right Hand of Amon (1997) and A Vile Justice (1999), as does P. C. Doherty, The Mask of Ra (1999), who is better known for mysteries set in the England of Richard II.
THE ANCIENT WORLD: MACEDONIAN MYSTERIES
Mysteries set in the European medieval period (roughly 800 Common Era (C.E.) to 1500 C.E.) include the following:
Anna Apostolou sets her mysteries in Macedonia at the time of Philip and Alexander: indeed, Murder in Macedon (1998) is about Philip's assassination and Alexander's accession to the Macedonian throne. She also wrote A Murder in Thebes (1998).
THE MEDIEVAL WORLD: JERUSALEM AND THE NEAR EAST, MEDIEVAL ENGLAND AND WALES
Simon Beaufort's Murder in the Holy City (1999) takes place in Jerusalem during the Crusades and A Head for Poisoning (1999) in Wales shortly after Murder in the Holy City.
Ian Morson's Falconer and the Face of God (1997), Falconer and the Great Beast (1999), Falconer's Judgment (1996), Falconer's Crusade (1997), and A Psalm for Falconer (1997) all deal with the adventures of an Oxford teacher circa 1260-1270.
THE LATE MEDIEVAL AND EARLY RENAISSANCE PERIOD IN ENGLAND
Edward Marston
Candace Robb
Kate Sedley, The Wicked Winter
Margaret Frazer
Sharan Newman
Kathy Lynn Emerson
Susanna Gregory
Alan Gordon
Fiona Buckley
Caroline Roe
Michael Jenks
Ellis Peters
Elizabeth Peters
Iain Pears's An Instance of the Fingerpost (1998) was a best seller.
Sharon Kay Penman, Cruel as the Grave (1998)
Jill Churchill
Laurie R. King
Umberto Eco, The Name of the Rose
Anne Perry, The Cater Street Hangman
Peter Tremayne
Barbara Hambly, A Free Man of Color, (), Fever Season (), Graveyard Dust ().
Margaret Lawrence's Hearts and Bones (1999) is set during the American Revolution.
Kate Ross, Cut to the Quick
Barry Unsworth, Morality Play (1996). The Rage of the Vulture (),
Charles Todd, Search the Dark (), covers World War I.
Bruce Alexander's Sir John Fielding novels cover the period during which London acquired a professional police force. Sir John was Henry Fielding's brother, and Henry himself was a lawyer and a magistrate. Murder in Grub Street, Watery Grave, Jack, Fool, Knave, Death of a Colonial (), Person or Persons Unknown (), Blind Justice
Robin Paige, Death at Devil's Bridge (1998) is a Victorian mystery. Others include Death at Rottingdean (1999),
ENGLAND UNDER EDWARD IV
C. L. Grace
The Ottoman Empire
Habibullah at the Ottoman Court
SEVENTEENTH CENTURY (EDO) JAPAN
Laura Joh Rowland, The Concubine's Tattoo (1998)
Like Bruce Alexander's Sir John Fielding's novels, Robert Van Gulik's Judge Dee mysteries are based on a real person, the seventh century magistrate of that name. See Colin Glassey, Robert Van Gulik.
England--Eighteenth and Nineteenth Century
Michael Dibdin's Robert Booth is the sleuth in a nineteenth century novel set in Italy.
J. Robert Janes writes of Occupied France in Stonekiller,
Late nineteenth and early twentieth century San Francisco come under the scrutiny of Dianne Day in