The Ring of Solomon
Encyclopedia
The Ring of Solomon is a fantasy novel, a prequel
to the Bartimaeus Trilogy
, written by Jonathan Stroud
. It was first published in 2010 and is set in a fantasy version of ancient Jerusalem.
rules his empire from Jerusalem with the help of a magic ring delivered by the archangel Michael
that has the power to control djinn to do the owners bidding. Among the many djinn slaves in the service of the king and his magicians is the djinni Bartimaeus, a demon with extreme cunning, a sarcastic wit, and an unparalleled reputation for insolence. After botching a construction project, Bartimaeus is sent out into the desert to hunt down a group of bandits attacking Solomon's trade route
s, and in the process he encounters Asmira, a girl in the service of the Queen of Sheba. Soon afterwards, she drags the reluctant djinni into a seemingly suicidal mission: kill Solomon and steal the magic ring.
of sorts from the city of Eridu
. Bartimaeus succeeds, and then manages to trick the magician into commanding him to use the artifact against him. It sends a spurt of water out at him and knocks him out of his protective circle. Bartimaeus subsequently devours the old man and with the magician's death is released and returns to the Other Place.
King Solomon of Israel
, upon learning of Bartimaeus's murder
of Ezekiel (the hitherto unnamed old magician) is insulted that a mere djinni is the perpetrator. To make Bartimaeus pay for his actions he commands Khaba, an Egyptian and another of the 17 to summon Bartimaeus into his service and punish him. He also proposes to the queen of Sheba and is refused.
The scene shifts to the Sheba
n capital of Marib where Balkis, the aforementioned queen, receives a message from a marid
supposedly in Solomon's service: either pay a ransom of 40 sacks of frankincense
or be destroyed, and gives her two weeks to pay. Balkis decides to send her loyal guard captain Asmira to Jerusalem to assassinate Solomon.
Back in Jerusalem, after being summoned into Khaba's service, Bartimaeus is commissioned to perform multiple degrading jobs including grain counting, sewage treatment, and artichoke
collecting. Another unpleasant element is that one of his fellow slaves is his old rival Faquarl. Khaba assembles the eight djinn under his command and informs them that they have been commissioned to build Solomon's Temple
on the Temple Mount
and that they are to build it without using any magic whatsoever. After Bartimaeus uses his trademark wit to infuriate Khaba, the magician unleashes his essence flail on the djinn and threatens to place them in his essence cages (devices similar to the Mournful Orb in The Amulet of Samarkand
) should they displease him a second time.
At first Khaba and his foliot
Gezeri directly supervise the initial stages of construction but after a while they stop showing up at the building site and the attitudes of the djinn grows lax. They begin assuming nonhuman forms and start using magic to build the temple (both actions directly violate Solomon's edicts). Several days later Solomon makes an unexpected appearance on the building site. The other djinn manage to revert back to human form and disguise their use of magic but Bartimaeus is caught in the form of a pygmy hippopotamus
in a skirt (a comic reference to one of Solomon's 700 wives, "the one from Moab
"). The king interrogates Bartimaeus and the djinni reluctantly admits his guilt while covering for the other spirits. As Solomon prepares to use the Ring on Bartimaeus, the djinni resorts to a display of groveling in order to appease the king. Bartimaeus's pathetic display amuses Solomon, who agrees to spare the djinni's life and instead punishes him (and Khaba, whom Solomon blames for failing to keep his spirits in line) by sending them to hunt down the bandits.
Several days later, out in the desert
, Bartimaeus and Faquarl find and defeats the bandits and meets Asmira. Faquarl insists on eating her but Bartimaeus hopes she can intercede with Khaba on their behalf. Asmira is then escorted to Jerusalem by Khaba and manages to persuade him to reluctantly dismiss the two djinn. Faquarl gains his freedom but Bartimaeus is imprisoned in a small bottle for his earlier crimes by Khaba and his principle slave, the marid Ammet. Asmira tries to use her feminine wiles to convince Khaba to get her near Solomon and fails. Asmira frees Bartimaeus from the bottle and commands him to help her kill Solomon. The pair sneak through the palace gardens and scale the tower wall to Solomon's chamber almost completely through Bartimaeus' efforts.
They encounter the king in his observatory
and Asmira kills him with her dagger only to discover that it is an illusion
set up to trap them. Bartimaeus escapes and Asmira is captured and taken before the true King Solomon. Meanwhile Bartimaeus encounters the trapped afrit Philocretes and learns the secret behind Solomon and the Ring. He then sneaks into the chamber where Solomon is interrogating Asmira and steals the Ring. Asmira claims the Ring only to discover that its energies inflict pain upon whoever touches it or uses it. Solomon then confesses to having never sent any ransom demand to Sheba which causes Asmira to doubt herself and her loyalty to Queen Balkis. In the end Asmira does not kill the king, choosing instead to take the Ring back to Sheba in spite of Solomon's warnings and Bartimaeus' demoralizing analysis of her motives. Suddenly Khaba arrives, subdues both girl and djinn and claims the Ring for himself. Khaba commands the Spirit of the Ring to destroy his rival magicians as well as Solomon's palace, but Asmira manages to grab her last throwing knife and slices off Khaba's finger, with the ring still on it, and commands Bartimaeus to throw it in the sea. Although weakened by his use of the Ring, Khaba attempts to destroy both Asmira and Solomon who manage to hold off Khaba's other servants for a brief time.
Meanwhile Bartimeaus has fled the palace with Ammet in hot pursuit. The two eventually reach the shores of the Mediterranean Sea
and, in an unexpected move, Bartimaeus puts the Ring on and commands the Spirit to seal Ammet inside a wine jar at the bottom of the sea for a few thousand years. Returning to Jerusalem Bartimaeus knocks out Khaba and returns the Ring to Asmira who gives it back to Solomon. The king imprisons Khaba and pardons both Asmira and Bartimaeus for their deeds. Solomon then summons Queen Balkis to Jerusalem and clears the misunderstanding. However, a spiteful Balkis disowns her loyal guard from her service. Solomon then offers Asmira the opportunity to work for him instead.
In the aftermath of the attack Asmira willingly dismisses Bartimaeus, revealing her intention to turn down Solomon's offer in favor of choosing her own path in life and the two part ways on friendly terms.
Prequel
A prequel is a work that supplements a previously completed one, and has an earlier time setting.The widely recognized term was a 20th-century neologism, and a portmanteau from pre- and sequel...
to the Bartimaeus Trilogy
Bartimaeus Trilogy
Bartimaeus is a fantasy series by Jonathan Stroud consisting of a trilogy published from 2003 to 2005 and a prequel novel published in 2010. The titular character, Bartimaeus, is a five-thousand-year-old djinni, a spirit of approximately mid-level power...
, written by Jonathan Stroud
Jonathan Stroud
Jonathan Anthony Stroud is an author of fantasy books, mainly for children and young adults.-Biography:Born in 1970 in Bedford, England, Stroud began to write stories at a very young age. He grew up in St Albans where he enjoyed reading books, drawing pictures, and writing stories...
. It was first published in 2010 and is set in a fantasy version of ancient Jerusalem.
Plot introduction
It is the year 950 B.C.E. and King Solomon of IsraelIsrael
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
rules his empire from Jerusalem with the help of a magic ring delivered by the archangel Michael
Michael (archangel)
Michael , Micha'el or Mîkhā'ēl; , Mikhaḗl; or Míchaël; , Mīkhā'īl) is an archangel in Jewish, Christian, and Islamic teachings. Roman Catholics, Anglicans, and Lutherans refer to him as Saint Michael the Archangel and also simply as Saint Michael...
that has the power to control djinn to do the owners bidding. Among the many djinn slaves in the service of the king and his magicians is the djinni Bartimaeus, a demon with extreme cunning, a sarcastic wit, and an unparalleled reputation for insolence. After botching a construction project, Bartimaeus is sent out into the desert to hunt down a group of bandits attacking Solomon's trade route
Trade route
A trade route is a logistical network identified as a series of pathways and stoppages used for the commercial transport of cargo. Allowing goods to reach distant markets, a single trade route contains long distance arteries which may further be connected to several smaller networks of commercial...
s, and in the process he encounters Asmira, a girl in the service of the Queen of Sheba. Soon afterwards, she drags the reluctant djinni into a seemingly suicidal mission: kill Solomon and steal the magic ring.
Plot summary
The story opens in Jerusalem with the djinni Bartimaeus who is currently in the service of one of King Solomon's 17 High Magicians. His master commands him to retrieve a magical artifactArtifact (archaeology)
An artifact or artefact is "something made or given shape by man, such as a tool or a work of art, esp an object of archaeological interest"...
of sorts from the city of Eridu
Eridu
Eridu is an ancient Sumerian city in what is now Tell Abu Shahrain, Dhi Qar Governorate, Iraq. Eridu was considered the earliest city in southern Mesopotamia, and is one of the oldest cities in the world...
. Bartimaeus succeeds, and then manages to trick the magician into commanding him to use the artifact against him. It sends a spurt of water out at him and knocks him out of his protective circle. Bartimaeus subsequently devours the old man and with the magician's death is released and returns to the Other Place.
King Solomon of Israel
Israel
The State of Israel is a parliamentary republic located in the Middle East, along the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea...
, upon learning of Bartimaeus's murder
Murder
Murder is the unlawful killing, with malice aforethought, of another human being, and generally this state of mind distinguishes murder from other forms of unlawful homicide...
of Ezekiel (the hitherto unnamed old magician) is insulted that a mere djinni is the perpetrator. To make Bartimaeus pay for his actions he commands Khaba, an Egyptian and another of the 17 to summon Bartimaeus into his service and punish him. He also proposes to the queen of Sheba and is refused.
The scene shifts to the Sheba
Sheba
Sheba was a kingdom mentioned in the Jewish scriptures and the Qur'an...
n capital of Marib where Balkis, the aforementioned queen, receives a message from a marid
Marid
In Arabic folklore and common mythology, a Marid , is a jinn associated with open waters of the seas and oceans where it finds sanctuary. Marids are mentioned in pre-Islamic Arabian mythology and inside the One Thousand and One Nights alongside the Jinn in the story of The Fisherman and the...
supposedly in Solomon's service: either pay a ransom of 40 sacks of frankincense
Frankincense
Frankincense, also called olibanum , is an aromatic resin obtained from trees of the genus Boswellia, particularly Boswellia sacra, B. carteri, B. thurifera, B. frereana, and B. bhaw-dajiana...
or be destroyed, and gives her two weeks to pay. Balkis decides to send her loyal guard captain Asmira to Jerusalem to assassinate Solomon.
Back in Jerusalem, after being summoned into Khaba's service, Bartimaeus is commissioned to perform multiple degrading jobs including grain counting, sewage treatment, and artichoke
Artichoke
-Plants:* Globe artichoke, a partially edible perennial thistle originating in southern Europe around the Mediterranean* Jerusalem artichoke, a species of sunflower with an edible tuber...
collecting. Another unpleasant element is that one of his fellow slaves is his old rival Faquarl. Khaba assembles the eight djinn under his command and informs them that they have been commissioned to build Solomon's Temple
Solomon's Temple
Solomon's Temple, also known as the First Temple, was the main temple in ancient Jerusalem, on the Temple Mount , before its destruction by Nebuchadnezzar II after the Siege of Jerusalem of 587 BCE....
on the Temple Mount
Temple Mount
The Temple Mount, known in Hebrew as , and in Arabic as the Haram Ash-Sharif , is one of the most important religious sites in the Old City of Jerusalem. It has been used as a religious site for thousands of years...
and that they are to build it without using any magic whatsoever. After Bartimaeus uses his trademark wit to infuriate Khaba, the magician unleashes his essence flail on the djinn and threatens to place them in his essence cages (devices similar to the Mournful Orb in The Amulet of Samarkand
The Amulet of Samarkand
The Amulet of Samarkand is the first book in the Bartimaeus Trilogy written by Jonathan Stroud. It is well known for its liberal use of footnotes to voice the title character's sarcastic comments, as well as story background.-Plot introduction:...
) should they displease him a second time.
At first Khaba and his foliot
Foliot
A foliot may refer to:* Part of the verge escapement for early clocks* A creature of Italian folklore , as recorded by Gerolamo Cardano and Robert Burton...
Gezeri directly supervise the initial stages of construction but after a while they stop showing up at the building site and the attitudes of the djinn grows lax. They begin assuming nonhuman forms and start using magic to build the temple (both actions directly violate Solomon's edicts). Several days later Solomon makes an unexpected appearance on the building site. The other djinn manage to revert back to human form and disguise their use of magic but Bartimaeus is caught in the form of a pygmy hippopotamus
Pygmy Hippopotamus
The pygmy hippopotamus is a large mammal native to the forests and swamps of western Africa . The pygmy hippo is reclusive and nocturnal...
in a skirt (a comic reference to one of Solomon's 700 wives, "the one from Moab
Moab
Moab is the historical name for a mountainous strip of land in Jordan. The land lies alongside much of the eastern shore of the Dead Sea. The existence of the Kingdom of Moab is attested to by numerous archeological findings, most notably the Mesha Stele, which describes the Moabite victory over...
"). The king interrogates Bartimaeus and the djinni reluctantly admits his guilt while covering for the other spirits. As Solomon prepares to use the Ring on Bartimaeus, the djinni resorts to a display of groveling in order to appease the king. Bartimaeus's pathetic display amuses Solomon, who agrees to spare the djinni's life and instead punishes him (and Khaba, whom Solomon blames for failing to keep his spirits in line) by sending them to hunt down the bandits.
Several days later, out in the desert
Desert
A desert is a landscape or region that receives an extremely low amount of precipitation, less than enough to support growth of most plants. Most deserts have an average annual precipitation of less than...
, Bartimaeus and Faquarl find and defeats the bandits and meets Asmira. Faquarl insists on eating her but Bartimaeus hopes she can intercede with Khaba on their behalf. Asmira is then escorted to Jerusalem by Khaba and manages to persuade him to reluctantly dismiss the two djinn. Faquarl gains his freedom but Bartimaeus is imprisoned in a small bottle for his earlier crimes by Khaba and his principle slave, the marid Ammet. Asmira tries to use her feminine wiles to convince Khaba to get her near Solomon and fails. Asmira frees Bartimaeus from the bottle and commands him to help her kill Solomon. The pair sneak through the palace gardens and scale the tower wall to Solomon's chamber almost completely through Bartimaeus' efforts.
They encounter the king in his observatory
Observatory
An observatory is a location used for observing terrestrial or celestial events. Astronomy, climatology/meteorology, geology, oceanography and volcanology are examples of disciplines for which observatories have been constructed...
and Asmira kills him with her dagger only to discover that it is an illusion
Illusion
An illusion is a distortion of the senses, revealing how the brain normally organizes and interprets sensory stimulation. While illusions distort reality, they are generally shared by most people....
set up to trap them. Bartimaeus escapes and Asmira is captured and taken before the true King Solomon. Meanwhile Bartimaeus encounters the trapped afrit Philocretes and learns the secret behind Solomon and the Ring. He then sneaks into the chamber where Solomon is interrogating Asmira and steals the Ring. Asmira claims the Ring only to discover that its energies inflict pain upon whoever touches it or uses it. Solomon then confesses to having never sent any ransom demand to Sheba which causes Asmira to doubt herself and her loyalty to Queen Balkis. In the end Asmira does not kill the king, choosing instead to take the Ring back to Sheba in spite of Solomon's warnings and Bartimaeus' demoralizing analysis of her motives. Suddenly Khaba arrives, subdues both girl and djinn and claims the Ring for himself. Khaba commands the Spirit of the Ring to destroy his rival magicians as well as Solomon's palace, but Asmira manages to grab her last throwing knife and slices off Khaba's finger, with the ring still on it, and commands Bartimaeus to throw it in the sea. Although weakened by his use of the Ring, Khaba attempts to destroy both Asmira and Solomon who manage to hold off Khaba's other servants for a brief time.
Meanwhile Bartimeaus has fled the palace with Ammet in hot pursuit. The two eventually reach the shores of the Mediterranean Sea
Mediterranean Sea
The Mediterranean Sea is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean surrounded by the Mediterranean region and almost completely enclosed by land: on the north by Anatolia and Europe, on the south by North Africa, and on the east by the Levant...
and, in an unexpected move, Bartimaeus puts the Ring on and commands the Spirit to seal Ammet inside a wine jar at the bottom of the sea for a few thousand years. Returning to Jerusalem Bartimaeus knocks out Khaba and returns the Ring to Asmira who gives it back to Solomon. The king imprisons Khaba and pardons both Asmira and Bartimaeus for their deeds. Solomon then summons Queen Balkis to Jerusalem and clears the misunderstanding. However, a spiteful Balkis disowns her loyal guard from her service. Solomon then offers Asmira the opportunity to work for him instead.
In the aftermath of the attack Asmira willingly dismisses Bartimaeus, revealing her intention to turn down Solomon's offer in favor of choosing her own path in life and the two part ways on friendly terms.