Past Perfect: A Knight in Bethlehem?

076

The prologue of The Travels of Sir John Mandeville begins in old-fashioned English, “I, John Mandeville, Knight, albeit I be not worthy, that was born in England, in the town of St. Albans, and passed the sea in the year of our Lord Jesu[s] Christ, 1322, in the day of St. Michael.” Although it has been widely read ever since its publication around 1360, modern scholars believe that the book was not actually an account of Mandeville’s own travels through the Holy Land, Turkey, Armenia, Persia, Syria, Arabia, Egypt, Africa and India; nor do they believe he was a knight.

Written in Latin, the popular book was quickly translated into Anglo-Norman French, English and several other languages. Mandeville may be responsible for some of these translations. He continues in his prologue: “And ye shall understand, that I have put this book out of Latin into French, and translated it again out of French into English, that every man of my nation may understand it.”

Five hundred years passed before scholars determined that most of the travelogue consisted of a compilation of other travelers’ pilgrimages from the 12th and 13th centuries. The few remaining passages that have not been identified from other works were presumably written by Mandeville.

Following is an excerpt of a journey from Hebron to Bethlehem, and from there, to Jerusalem:

From Hebron men go to Bethlehem in half a day, for it is but five mile; and it is full fair way, by plains and woods full delectable. Bethlehem is a little city, long and narrow and well walled, and on each side enclosed with good ditches: and it was wont to be clept [called] Ephrata, as holy writ saith, Ecce, Audimus eum in Ephrata, that is to say, “Lo, we heard it in Ephrata.” And toward the east end of the city is a full fair church and a gracious, and it hath many towers, pinnacles and corners, full strong and curiously made; and within that church be forty-four pillars of marble, great and fair …

Also beside the choir of the church, at the right side, as men come downward sixteen degrees, is the place where our Lord was born, that is full well dight [adorned] of marble, and full richly painted with gold, silver, azure and other colours. And three paces beside is the crib of the ox and the ass. And beside that is the place where the star fell, that led the three kings, Jaspar, Melchior and Balthazar … These three kings offered to our Lord, gold, incense and myrrh, and they met together through miracle of God; for they met together in a city in Ind[ia], that men clepe Cassak, that is a fifty-three days’ journey from Bethlehem; and they were at Bethlehem the thirteenth day; and that was the fourth day after that they had seen the star, when they met in that city, and thus they were in nine days from that city at Bethlehem, and that was great miracle.

Also, under the cloister of the church, by eighteen degrees at the right side, is the charnel of the Innocents,^a where their bones lie. And before the place where our Lord was born is the tomb of Saint Jerome, that was a priest and a cardinal that translated the Bible and the Psalter from Hebrew into Latin: and without the minster is the chair that he sat in when he translated it. And fast beside that church, at sixty fathom, is a church of Saint Nicholas, where our Lady rested her[self] after she was lighted of our Lord; and forasmuch as she had too much milk in her paps, that grieved her, she milked them on the red stones of marble, so that the traces may yet be seen, in the stones, all white.

078

And ye shall understand, that all that dwell in Bethlehem be Christian men …

In this city of Bethlehem was David the king born; and he had sixty wives, and the first wife was called Michal; and also he had three hundred lemans [lovers].

And from Bethlehem unto Jerusalem is but two mile; and in the way to Jerusalem half a mile from Bethlehem is a church, where the angel said to the shepherds of the birth of Christ. And in that way is the tomb of Rachel, that was Joseph’s mother, the patriarch; and she died anon after that she was delivered of her son Benjamin [Genesis 35:16–20]. And there she was buried by Jacob her husband, and he let set twelve great stones on her, in token that she had born twelve children.^b In the same way, half mile from Jerusalem, appeared the star to the three kings. In that way also be many churches of Christian men, by the which men go towards the city of Jerusalem.