The Thirteenth, Greatest of Centuries

With regard to this Colonel Yule, whose personal experience makes him a valuable guide in such matters, has written a paragraph which contains so much compressed information that we venture to quote it entire. It furnishes the grounds for the claim (which might seem overstrained if it were not that its author was himself one of the greatest of modern explorers) that William was an acute and most intelligent observer, keen in the acquisition of knowledge; and the author in fact of one of the best narratives of travel in existence. Col. Yule says:

"Of his interest and acumen in matters of language we may cite examples. The language of the Pascatir (or Bashkirds) and of the Hungarians is the same, as, he had learned from Dominicans who had been among them. The language of the Ruthenians, Poles, Bohemians, and Slavonians is one, and is the same with that of the Wandals or Wends. In the town of Equinus (immediately beyond the Ili, perhaps Aspara) the people were Mohammedans speaking Persian, though so far remote from Persia. The Yugurs (or Uigurs) of the country about the Cailac had formed a language and character of their own, and in that language and character the Nestorians of that tract used to perform their office and write their books. The Yugurs are those among whom are found the fountain and root of the Turkish and Comanian tongue. Their character has been adopted by the Moghals. In using it they begin writing from the top and write downwards, whilst line follows line from left to right. The Nestorians say their service, and have their holy book in Syriac, but know nothing of the language, just as some of our Monks sing the mass without knowing Latin. The Tibet people write as we do, and their letters have a strong resemblance to ours. The Tangut people write from right to left like the Arabs, and their lines advance upwards."

There were other matters besides language and religion on which Friar William made observations, and though his book is eminently human giving us a very interesting view of his own personality and of his difficulties with his dragoman, which many a modern Eastern traveler will sympathize with, and a picture that includes the detail that he was a very heavy man, valde ponderosus, which makes his travel on horseback for some 10,000 miles all the more wonderful; it also contains a mass of particulars, marvelously true—or so near the truth as to be almost more interesting—as to Asiatic nature, ethnography, manners, morals, commercial customs, and nearly everything else relating to the life of the peoples among whom he traveled. A typical example of this is to be found in the following suggestive paragraph:

"The current money of Cathay is of cotton paper, a palm in length and breath, and on this they print lines like those of Mangu Khan's seal: 'imprimunt lineas sicut est sigillum Mangu'"—a remarkable expression. "They write with a painter's pencil and combine in one character several letters, forming one expression: 'faciunt in una figura plures literas comprehendentes unam dictionem'"—a still more remarkable utterance, showing an approximate apprehension of the nature of Chinese writing.

There are other distinguished travelers whose inspiration came to them during the Thirteenth Century though their works were published in the early part of the next century. Some of these we know mainly through their adaptation and incorporation into his work without due recognition, by that first great writer of spurious travels Sir John Mandeville. Mandeville's work was probably written some time during the early part of the second half of the Fourteenth Century, but he used materials gathered from travelers of the end of the Thirteenth and the beginning of the next (his own) century. Sir Henry Yule has pointed out, that by far the greater part of the supposed more distant travels of Sir John Mandeville were appropriated from the narrative of Friar Odoric, a monk, who became a member of the Franciscan order about the end of the Thirteenth Century, and whose travels as a missionary in the East gave him the opportunities to collect a precious fund of information which is contained in Odoric's famous story of his voyages. Of Odoric himself we shall have something to say presently.

In the meantime it seems well worth while calling to attention, that the accepted narrative of Sir John Mandeville as it is called, and which may have been written by a physician of the name of John of Burgoigne under an assumed name, contains a number of interesting anticipations of facts that were supposed to enter into the domain of human knowledge much later in the intellectual development of the race. In certain passages, and especially in one which is familiar from its being cited by Dr. Johnson in the preface to his dictionary, Mandeville, to use the name under which the story is best known, shows that he had a correct idea of the form of the earth and of position in latitude as it could be ascertained by observation of the Pole Star. He knew also, as we noted at the beginning of this article, that there are antipodes, and if ships were sent on voyages of discovery they might sail around the world. As Col. Yule has pointed out, Mandeville tells a curious story which he had heard in his youth of how "a worthy man did travel ever eastward until he came to his own country again."

Odoric of whom we have already spoken must be considered as the next great missionary traveler of this age. He took Franciscan vows when scarcely a boy and was encouraged to travel in the East by the example of his Holy Father St. Francis, and also by the interest and missionary zeal to convert the East which had been aroused by Marco Polo's travels. His long journeys will be more readily understood, however, if we realize, as is stated in the article on him in the Encyclopedia Britannica, an authority that will surely be unsuspected of too great partiality for the work of Catholic missionaries, that "There had risen also during the latter half of the Thirteenth Century an energetic missionary action, extending all over the East on the part of both the new orders of Preaching and Minorite (or Dominican and Franciscan) Friars which had caused members of these orders, of the last especially, to become established in Persia and what is now Southern Russia, in Tartary and in China."

In the course of his travels in the East Odoric visited Malabar touching at Pandarini (twenty miles north of Calicut), at Craganore and at Quilon, preceding thence, apparently, to Ceylon and to the Shrine of St. Thomas at Mailapur near Madras.

Even more interesting than his travels in India, however, are those in China. He sailed from the Hindustan Peninsula in a Chinese junk to Sumatra, visiting various ports on the northern coast of that island and telling something about the inhabitants and the customs of the country. According to Sir Henry Yule he then visited Java and it would seem also the coast of Borneo, finally reaching Kanton, at that time known to Western Asiatics as Chin Kalan or Great China. From there he went to the great ports of Fuhkeen and Schwan Chow, where he found two houses of his order, thence he proceeded to Fuchau from which place he struck across the mountains into Chekaeng and then visited Hang Chow at that time renowned under the name of Cansay. Modern authorities in exploration have suggested that this might be King Sae, the Chinese name for Royal Residence, which was then one of the greatest cities of the world. Thence Odoric passed northward by Nanking, and, crossing the great Kiang, embarked on the Grand Canal and traveled to Cambaluc or Pekin, where he remained for three years and where it is thought that he was attached to one of the churches founded by Archbishop John of Monte Corvino, who was at this time in extreme old age.

The most surprising part of Odoric's travels were still to come. When the fever for traveling came upon him again he turned almost directly westward to the Great Wall and through Shenshua. From here the adventurous traveler (we are still practically quoting Sir Henry Yule) entered Thibet and appears to have visited Lhasa. Considering how much of interest has been aroused by recent attempts to enter Lhasa and the surprising adventures that men have gone through in the effort, the success of this medieval monk in such an expedition would seem incredible, if it were not substantiated by documents that place the matter beyond all doubt even in the minds of the most distinguished modern authorities in geography and exploration. How Odoric returned home is not definitely known, though certain fragmentary notices seem to indicate that he passed through Khorasan and probably Tabriz to Europe.

It only remains to complete the interest of Odoric's wondrous tale to add that during a large portion of these years' long journeys his companion was Friar James, an Irishman who had been attracted to Italy in order to become a Franciscan. As appears from a record in the public books of the town of Udine in Italy, where the monastery of which both he and Odoric were members was situated, a present of two marks was made by the municipal authorities to the Irish friar shortly after Odoric's death. The reason for the gift was stated to be, that Friar James had been for the love of God and of Odoric (a typical Celtic expression and characteristic) a companion of the blessed Odoric in his wanderings. Unfortunately Odoric died within two years after his return though not until the story of his travels had been taken down in homely Latin by Friar William of Bologna. Shortly after his death Odoric became an object of reverence on the part of his brother friars and of devotion on the part of the people, who recognized the wonderful apostolic spirit that he had displayed in his long wanderings, and the patience and good-will with which he had borne sufferings and hardships for the sake of winning the souls of those outside the Church.

Sir Henry Yule summed up his opinion of Odoric in the following striking passage which bears forcible testimony also to the healthy curiosity of the times with regard to all these original sources of information which were recognized as valuable because first hand:

"The numerous MSS. of Odoric's narrative that have come down to our time (upwards of forty are known), and chiefly from the Fourteenth Century, show how speedily and widely it acquired popularity. It does not deserve the charge of general mendacity brought up against it by some, though the language of other writers who have spoken of the traveler as a man of learning is still more injudicious. Like most of the medieval travelers, he is indiscriminating in accepting strange tales; but while some of these are the habitual stories of the age, many particulars which he recited attest the genuine character of the narrative, and some of those which Tiraboschi and others have condemned as mendacious interpolations are the very seals of truth."

Besides Odoric there is another monkish traveler from whom Mandeville has borrowed much, though without giving him any credit. This is the well-known Praemonstratensian Monk Hayton, who is said to have been a member of a princely Armenian family and who just at the beginning of the Fourteenth Century dictated a work on the affairs of the Orient and especially the history of the nearer East in his own time, of which, from the place of his nativity and bringing up, he had abundant information, while he found all round him in France, where he was living at the time, the greatest thirst for knowledge with regard to this part of the world. His book seems to have been dictated originally in French at Poictiers, and to have attracted great attention because of its subject, many copies of it being made as well as translations into other languages within a few years after its original appearance.

The story of Odoric is a forcible reminder of how much the missionaries accomplished for geography, ethnology, and ethnography in the Thirteenth Century, as they did in succeeding centuries. If what the missionaries have added to these sciences were to have been lost, there would have been enormous gaps in the knowledge with which modern scholars began their scientific labors in philology. It may be a surprise to most people, moreover, to be thus forcibly reminded of the wonderful evangelizing spirit which characterized the later middle age. Needless to say these graduates of the Thirteenth Century universities who wandered in distant eastern lands, brought with them their European culture for the uplifting of the Orientals, and brought back to Europe many ideas that were to be fruitful sources of suggestions not only for geographical, ethnological, philological, and other departments of learning, but also in manufactures and in arts.

We mentioned the fact that Odoric in his travels eventually reached Cambaluc, or Pekin, where he found Archbishop John of Monte Corvino still alive though at an advanced age, and was probably attached for the three years of his stay to one of the churches that had been founded by this marvelous old Friar, who had been made Archbishop because of the wonderful power of organization and administration displayed during his earlier career as a missionary. The story of this grand old man of the early Franciscan missions is another one of the romances of Thirteenth Century travels and exploration which well deserves to be studied in detail. Unfortunately the old Archbishop was too much occupied with his work as a missionary and an ecclesiastic to return to Europe in order to tell of it, or to write any lengthy account of his experiences. Like many another great man of the Thirteenth Century he was a doer and not a writer, and, but for the casual mention of him by others, the records of his deeds would only be found in certain ecclesiastical records, and his work would now be known to the Master alone, for whom it was so unselfishly done.

It will be noted that most of these traveling missionaries were Franciscans but it must not be thought that it was only the Franciscans who sent out such missionaries. The Dominicans (established at the beginning of the Thirteenth Century) also did wonderful missionary work and quite as faithfully as even their Franciscan brothers. Undoubtedly the Franciscans surpassed them in the extent of their labors, but then the Dominicans were founded with the idea of preaching and uplifting the people of Europe rather than of spreading the good news of the Gospel outside the bounds of Christianity as it then existed. From the very earliest traditions of their order the Franciscans had their eyes attracted towards the East. The story that St. Francis himself went to the Holy Land at the beginning of the Thirteenth Century in order to convert Saladin, the Eastern monarch whose name has been made famous by the stories of the Crusade in which Richard Coeur de Lion took part, has been doubted, but it seems to be founded on too good contemporary authority to be considered as entirely apocryphal. St. Francis' heart went out to those in darkness who knew nothing of the Christ whom he had learned to love so ardently, and it was a supreme desire of his life that the good tidings of Christianity should be spread by his followers all over the world. While they did this great work they accomplished unwittingly great things in all the series of sciences now included under the term geography, and gathered precious information as to the races of men, their relations to one another and to the part of the earth in which they live. The scientific progress thus made will always redound largely to their credit in the story of the intellectual development of modern Europe. Most of their work was far ahead of the times and was not to be properly appreciated until quite recent generations, but this must only emphasize our sympathy for those obscure, patient but fruitful workers in a great field of human knowledge. As to what should be thought of those who ignorant of their work proclaim that the Church did not tolerate geography it is hard to say. Our geographical knowledge comes mainly from travelers whose wish it is to gain commercial opportunities for themselves or their compatriots; that of the Middle Ages was gained by men who wished anxiously to spread the light of Christianity throughout the world. The geographical societies of these earlier days were the religious orders who sent but the explorers and travelers, furnished them on their return with an enthusiastic audience to hear their stories, and then helped to disseminate their books all over the then civilized world.

There is probably no better refutation of the expression so often heard from those who know nothing about it, with regard to the supposed laziness of the Monks of the Middle Ages, than this chapter of the story of their exploration and missionary labors during the Thirteenth Century. It is usually supposed that if a Monk was fat he could not possibly have accomplished any serious work in life. Some of these men were valde ponderosi, very weighty, yet they did not hesitate to take on themselves these long journeys to the East. Their lives are the best illustration of the expression of Montalembert:

"Let us then banish into the world of fiction that affirmation so long repeated by foolish credulity which made monasteries an asylum for indolence and incapacity, for misanthropy and pusillanimity, for feeble and melancholic temperaments, and for men who were no longer fit to serve society in the world. It was not the sick souls, but on the contrary the most vigorous and healthful the human race has ever produced who presented themselves in crowds to fill them."

XXVI

GREAT BEGINNINGS OF MODERN COMMERCE

For our present eminently commercial age nothing of all the accomplishment of the Thirteenth Century will probably possess livelier interest than the fact that, in spite of what must have seemed insuperable difficulties to a less enterprising generation, the men of that time succeeded in making such business combinations and municipal affiliations, besides arranging various trade facilities among distant, different peoples, that not only was commerce rendered possible and even easy, but some of the most modern developments of the facilitation of international intercourse were anticipated. The story of the rise of this combination of many men of different nations, of many cities whose inhabitants were of different races and of different languages, of commercial enterprise that carried men comparatively much farther than they now go on trade expeditions, though we have thought that our age had exhausted the possibilities of progress in this matter, cannot fail to have an interest for everyone whose attention has been attracted to the people of this time and must be taken as a symbol of the all-pervading initiative of the generations, which allowed no obstacle to hinder their progress and thought no difficulty too great to be surmounted.

In beginning the history of the great commercial league which in the Thirteenth Century first opened men's minds to the possibilities of peace and commerce among the nations and alas! that it should be said, did more perhaps than any other agent except Christianity to awaken in different races the sense of the brotherhood of man, the English historian of the Hanseatic League, Miss Zimmern in the Stories of the Nations, said:

"There is scarcely a more remarkable chapter in history than that which deals with the trading alliance or association known as the Hanseatic League. The league has long since passed away having served its time and fulfilled its purpose. The needs and circumstances of mankind have changed, and new methods and new instruments have been devised for carrying on the commerce of the world. Yet, if the league has disappeared, the beneficial results of its action survive to Europe though they have become so completely a part of our daily life that we accept them as matters of course, and do not stop to inquire into their origin." This last declaration may seem surprising for comparatively few know anything about this medieval commercial league, yet the effects claimed for it are only what we have seen to be true with regard to most of the important institutions of the period—they were the origins of what is best in our modern life.

Like many of the great movements of the Thirteenth Century the origin of the Hanseatic League is clouded somewhat by the obscurity of the times and the lack of definite historical documents.35 There is no doubt, however, that just before the middle of the century it was in flourishing existence, and that by the end of the century it had reached that acme of its power and influence which it was to maintain for several centuries in spite of the jealousy of the nobility, of certain towns that did not have the same privileges, and even of the authorities of the various countries who resented more and more as time went on the growing freedom and independence of these wealthy cities. The impetus for the formation of the League seems to have been given during the Crusades. Like so many other of the important movements of the time commerce was greatly influenced by these expeditions, and the commercial spirit not only aroused but shown the possibility of accomplishing hitherto impossible results in the matter of transportation and exchange. The returning crusaders brought back with them many precious Eastern objects whose possession was a source of envy to others and whose value was rated so high as to make even distant travel for them well worth while. The returning crusaders also knew how cheaply objects considered very precious in the West might be purchased in the East, and they told the stories of their own acquisition of them to willing listeners, who were stimulated to try their fortunes in expeditions that promised such rich rewards.

PALAZZO DEI CONSOLI (GUBBIO)

PALAZZO ZABARELLA (PADUA)

Besides the crusaders on their return through Italy had observed what was accomplished by the League of the Lombard cities which had been in existence in a more or less imperfect way for more than a century, and at the end of the Twelfth and the beginning of the Thirteenth Century had begun to provide an example of the strength there is in union, and of the power for good there is in properly regulated combinations of commercial interests with due regard for civic rights and privileges. This League of the Lombard cities was encouraged by the popes especially by Innocent III. and his successors who are usually said to have given it their approbation for their own purposes, though this is to look at but one side of the case. The German Emperors endeavored to assert their rights over Italian territory and in so doing came into collision with the popes not only in temporal matters but also in spiritual things. As we have noted in the short sketch of the popes of the century, Innocent III. was the first great Italian patriot and original advocate of Italy for the Italians. He constantly opposed the influence of the German Emperor in Italian politics, mainly, of course, because this interfered with the power of the Church, but to a very great degree also because it proved a source of manifold political evil for the Italian cities.

The Germans then, who in the train of the Emperor went down into Italy saw the working of this League of Lombard cities, talked about it on their return, and were naturally tempted to essay what might be accomplished by the same means on German territory. These two elements, the incentive of the crusades and the stimulus of the example of the Italians, must be considered as at the basis of Hansa, though these were only seeds, and it was the nurture and fostering care of the German mind which ever since the days of Tacitus had been noted as the freest in Europe, that gave the League its wonderful development.

It is difficult to tell how many towns belonged to the Hanseatic League during the Thirteenth Century but at the end of this period, Hansa, as it came to be called, was, as we have said, in its most flourishing condition and we know something definite of its numbers a little more than half a century later. In 1367 deputies from all the towns met in the large council chamber of the famous town hall at Cologne to discuss certain injustices that had been committed against the members of the League, or as the document set forth "against the free German merchants," in order to determine some way of preventing further injuries and inflict due punishment. Altogether the deputies of 77 towns were present and declared most solemnly "that because of the wrongs and the injuries done by the King of Denmark to the common German merchant the cities would be his enemies and help one another faithfully." The distant and smaller cities were not expected to send troops or even naval forces but promised to give contributions in money. Such cities as did not take part in this movement were to be considered as having forfeited their membership and would no longer be permitted to trade with the members of Hansa.