Sunday, February 10, 2013

The Travels of Sir John Mandeville translated by C.W.R.D. Moseley






 I found this book in a school library. It had been donated.  The school was private and didn’t mind donating the book to me.  It’s a pity this book is obsolete because it is not only interesting but offers an invaluable insight to the workings of the medieval mind.

    Sir John Mandeville wrote this book around 1356 AD.  He claims that the book is a collection of his journaling while he traveled from Europe to the Holy Land and beyond across the Middle East, India and eventually ending up in China.

     While some scoffers think his travels went no further than the nearest library, one cannot deny that his book is filled with a fast flowing narrative providing plenty of rich detail of every place he visited.  Reading Mandeville’s writing is like experiencing a viewfinder flashing its pictures quickly past your eyes. 

       A dry account it isn’t.  Suffused with the value of relics and Holy Places only a medieval Catholic could endow, one learns not only of all the places in Israel and Palestine that were important to a Christian of the Middle Ages but all the relics and miracles that give each place its value.

      Mandeville leaves the Middle East and moves on to Persia, India and China.  One can verify his veracity as far as historical leaders go.  We know that the Kahns did rule most of Asia and Russia at the time but one has to wonder about the fantastical places where he purports to meet humans who have bodies and abilities that sound as though they come straight from Greek and Roman mythology.



        Whether Sir John actually traveled as he claims or the book is a product of a vivid imagination, his writing is fluid and eloquent and it is worth noting that the likes of Christopher Columbus and Leonardo da Vinci as well as many others possessed copies of his book and relied on it for hard geographical information.

       And as the back cover says,

 Sir John’s book demands that, as well as enjoying it, we take it seriously as an indispensable aid to our underwstanding of the world picture of the late middle Ages and the Renaissance.




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10 comments:

Brian Joseph said...

What a great find!

The 14th century was so very interesting. A first hand account of a person's travels has got to be incredibly insightful.

It also sounds like a fun book!

Man of la Book said...

A very interesting book, it seems. I wonder if he actually went on his travels and embellished a little (a lot?) or tried to write a satire which people took seriously.

http://www.ManOfLaBook.com

Sharon Wilfong said...

MolB: He had to have embellished some. He describes quite a few fantastical people as in the contemporary drawings (I think Mandeville's) that I've included.

Sharon Wilfong said...

BJ: I agree with you. I love that time period. And his book does provide a lot of insight to a past culture (as well as being fun to read:)

Leona said...

I have requested this book to be sent to my library. In Minnesota we have MNLINK and I can request books from libraries in the state at no charge. This copy will come from Macalester College. Sounds like a good read.
Thanks.

Sharon Wilfong said...

Leona: I'm so glad you're able to do that. Our library charges a fee to order books from other places. I find it cheaper to buy it used on Amazon or E bay,or Paperback swap. Have a good day and I hope you enjoy the book.

Sharon said...

What a fascinating book to discover.

Sharon Wilfong said...

Arabella: Yes! I love those serendipitous moments.

mnleona said...

I am reading this book now and had an idea. I found it on the Project Gutenberg site. (I re-read your message and see you have the link.)
digital.library.upenn.edu/webbin/gutbook/lookup?num=782
Now I can read it at my leaisure.
I have been to this library while on a AMA Waterways Cruise and it was so interesting. Unable to take pictures except in one area.
washttp://www.gutenberg-museum.de/index.php?id=29&L=1

Sharon Wilfong said...

Wow. That is so interesting. I never thought about visiting the library. I'd love to visit the middle east some day.