Prester John

: Curious Myths Of The Middle Ages

About the middle of the twelfth century, a rumor circulated through

Europe that there reigned in Asia a powerful Christian Emperor,

Presbyter Johannes. In a bloody fight he had broken the power of the

Mussulmans, and was ready to come to the assistance of the Crusaders.

Great was the exultation in Europe, for of late the news from the East

had been gloomy and depressing, the power of the infidel had

increased, overwhel
ing masses of men had been brought into the field

against the chivalry of Christendom, and it was felt that the cross

must yield before the odious crescent.



The news of the success of the Priest-King opened a door of hope to

the desponding Christian world. Pope Alexander III. determined at

once to effect a union with this mysterious personage, and on the 27th

of September, 1177, wrote him a letter, which he intrusted to his

physician, Philip, to deliver in person.



Philip started on his embassy, but never returned. The conquests of

Tschengis-Khan again attracted the eyes of Christian Europe to the

East. The Mongol hordes were rushing in upon the west with devastating

ferocity; Russia, Poland, Hungary, and the eastern provinces of

Germany, had succumbed, or suffered grievously; and the fears of other

nations were roused lest they too should taste the misery of a

Mongolian invasion. It was Gog and Magog come to slaughter, and the

times of Antichrist were dawning. But the battle of Liegnitz stayed

them in their onward career, and Europe was saved.



Pope Innocent IV. determined to convert these wild hordes of

barbarians, and subject them to the cross of Christ; he therefore sent

among them a number of Dominican and Franciscan missioners, and

embassies of peace passed between the Pope, the King of France, and

the Mogul Khan.



The result of these communications with the East was, that the

travellers learned how false were the prevalent notions of a mighty

Christian empire existing in Central Asia. Vulgar superstition or

conviction is not, however, to be upset by evidence, and the locality

of the monarchy was merely transferred by the people to Africa, and

they fixed upon Abyssinia, with a show of truth, as the seat of the

famous Priest-King. However, still some doubted. John de Plano Carpini

and Marco Polo, though they acknowledged the existence of a Christian

monarch in Abyssinia, yet stoutly maintained as well that the Prester

John of popular belief reigned in splendor somewhere in the dim

Orient.



But before proceeding with the history of this strange fable, it will

be well to extract the different accounts given of the Priest-King and

his realm by early writers; and we shall then be better able to judge

of the influence the myth obtained in Europe.



Otto of Freisingen is the first author to mention the monarchy of

Prester John with whom we are acquainted. Otto wrote a chronicle up to

the date 1156, and he relates that in 1145 the Catholic Bishop of

Cabala visited Europe to lay certain complaints before the Pope. He

mentioned the fall of Edessa, and also "he stated that a few years ago

a certain King and Priest called John, who lives on the farther side

of Persia and Armenia, in the remote East, and who, with all his

people, were Christians, though belonging to the Nestorian Church, had

overcome the royal brothers Samiardi, kings of the Medes and Persians,

and had captured Ecbatana, their capital and residence. The said kings

had met with their Persian, Median, and Assyrian troops, and had

fought for three consecutive days, each side having determined to die

rather than take to flight. Prester John, for so they are wont to call

him, at length routed the Persians, and after a bloody battle,

remained victorious. After which victory the said John was hastening

to the assistance of the Church at Jerusalem, but his host, on

reaching the Tigris, was hindered from passing, through a deficiency

in boats, and he directed his march North, since he had heard that the

river was there covered with ice. In that place he had waited many

years, expecting severe cold; but the winters having proved

unpropitious, and the severity of the climate having carried off many

soldiers, he had been forced to retreat to his own land. This king

belongs to the family of the Magi, mentioned in the Gospel, and he

rules over the very people formerly governed by the Magi; moreover,

his fame and his wealth are so great, that he uses an emerald sceptre

only.



"Excited by the example of his ancestors, who came to worship Christ

in his cradle, he had proposed to go to Jerusalem, but had been

impeded by the above-mentioned causes."[19]



At the same time the story crops up in other quarters; so that we

cannot look upon Otto as the inventor of the myth. The celebrated

Maimonides alludes to it in a passage quoted by Joshua Lorki, a Jewish

physician to Benedict XIII. Maimonides lived from 1135 to 1204. The

passage is as follows: "It is evident both from the letters of Rambam

(Maimonides), whose memory be blessed, and from the narration of

merchants who have visited the ends of the earth, that at this time

the root of our faith is to be found in the lands of Babel and Teman,

where long ago Jerusalem was an exile; not reckoning those who live in

the land of Paras[20] and Madai,[21] of the exiles of Schomrom, the

number of which people is as the sand: of these some are still under

the yoke of Paras, who is called the Great-Chief Sultan by the Arabs;

others live in a place under the yoke of a strange people ... governed

by a Christian chief, Preste-Cuan by name. With him they have made a

compact, and he with them; and this is a matter concerning which there

can be no manner of doubt."



Benjamin of Tudela, another Jew, travelled in the East between the

years 1159 and 1173, the last being the date of his death. He wrote an

account of his travels, and gives in it some information with regard

to a mythical Jew king, who reigned in the utmost splendor over a

realm inhabited by Jews alone, situate somewhere in the midst of a

desert of vast extent. About this period there appeared a document

which produced intense excitement throughout Europe--a letter, yes! a

letter from the mysterious personage himself to Manuel Comnenus,

Emperor of Constantinople (1143-1180). The exact date of this

extraordinary epistle cannot be fixed with any certainty, but it

certainly appeared before 1241, the date of the conclusion of the

chronicle of Albericus Trium Fontium. This Albericus relates that in

the year 1165 "Presbyter Joannes, the Indian king, sent his wonderful

letter to various Christian princes, and especially to Manuel of

Constantinople, and Frederic the Roman Emperor." Similar letters were

sent to Alexander III., to Louis VII. of France, and to the King of

Portugal, which are alluded to in chronicles and romances, and which

were indeed turned into rhyme, and sung all over Europe by minstrels

and trouvA"res. The letter is as follows:--



"John, Priest by the Almighty power of God and the Might of our Lord

Jesus Christ, King of Kings, and Lord of Lords, to his friend Emanuel,

Prince of Constantinople, greeting, wishing him health, prosperity,

and the continuance of Divine favor.



"Our Majesty has been informed that you hold our Excellency in love,

and that the report of our greatness has reached you. Moreover, we

have heard through our treasurer that you have been pleased to send to

us some objects of art and interest, that our Exaltedness might be

gratified thereby.



"Being human, I receive it in good part, and we have ordered our

treasurer to send you some of our articles in return.



"Now we desire to be made certain that you hold the right faith, and

in all things cleave to Jesus Christ, our Lord, for we have heard that

your court regard you as a god, though we know that you are mortal,

and subject to human infirmities.... Should you desire to learn the

greatness and excellency of our Exaltedness and of the land subject to

our sceptre, then hear and believe:--I, Presbyter Johannes, the Lord

of Lords, surpass all under heaven in virtue, in riches, and in power;

seventy-two kings pay us tribute.... In the three Indies our

Magnificence rules, and our land extends beyond India, where rests the

body of the holy Apostle Thomas; it reaches towards the sunrise over

the wastes, and it trends towards deserted Babylon near the tower of

Babel. Seventy-two provinces, of which only a few are Christian, serve

us. Each has its own king, but all are tributary to us.



"Our land is the home of elephants, dromedaries, camels, crocodiles,

meta-collinarum, cametennus, tensevetes, wild asses, white and red

lions, white bears, white merules, crickets, griffins, tigers, lamias,

hyenas, wild horses, wild oxen and wild men, men with horns, one-eyed,

men with eyes before and behind, centaurs, fauns, satyrs, pygmies,

forty-ell-high giants, Cyclopses, and similar women; it is the home,

too, of the phA"nix, and of nearly all living animals. We have some

people subject to us who feed on the flesh of men and of prematurely

born animals, and who never fear death. When any of these people die,

their friends and relations eat him ravenously, for they regard it as

a main duty to munch human flesh. Their names are Gog and Magog, Anie,

Agit, Azenach, Fommeperi, Befari, Conei-Samante, Agrimandri,

Vintefolei, Casbei, Alanei. These and similar nations were shut in

behind lofty mountains by Alexander the Great, towards the North. We

lead them at our pleasure against our foes, and neither man nor beast

is left undevoured, if our Majesty gives the requisite permission. And

when all our foes are eaten, then we return with our hosts home again.

These accursed fifteen nations will burst forth from the four quarters

of the earth at the end of the world, in the times of Antichrist, and

overrun all the abodes of the Saints as well as the great city Rome,

which, by the way, we are prepared to give to our son who will be

born, along with all Italy, Germany, the two Gauls, Britain and

Scotland. We shall also give him Spain and all the land as far as the

icy sea. The nations to which I have alluded, according to the words

of the prophet, shall not stand in the judgment, on account of their

offensive practices, but will be consumed to ashes by a fire which

will fall on them from heaven.



"Our land streams with honey, and is overflowing with milk. In one

region grows no poisonous herb, nor does a querulous frog ever quack

in it; no scorpion exists, nor does the serpent glide amongst the

grass, nor can any poisonous animals exist in it, or injure any one.



"Among the heathen, flows through a certain province the River Indus;

encircling Paradise, it spreads its arms in manifold windings through

the entire province. Here are found the emeralds, sapphires,

carbuncles, topazes, chrysolites, onyxes, beryls, sardius, and other

costly stones. Here grows the plant Assidos, which, when worn by any

one, protects him from the evil spirit, forcing it to state its

business and name; consequently the foul spirits keep out of the way

there. In a certain land subject to us, all kinds of pepper is

gathered, and is exchanged for corn and bread, leather and cloth....

At the foot of Mount Olympus bubbles up a spring which changes its

flavor hour by hour, night and day, and the spring is scarcely three

days' journey from Paradise, out of which Adam was driven. If any one

has tasted thrice of the fountain, from that day he will feel no

fatigue, but will, as long as he lives, be as a man of thirty years.

Here are found the small stones called Nudiosi, which, if borne about

the body, prevent the sight from waxing feeble, and restore it where

it is lost. The more the stone is looked at, the keener becomes the

sight. In our territory is a certain waterless sea, consisting of

tumbling billows of sand never at rest. None have crossed this sea; it

lacks water altogether, yet fish are cast up upon the beach of various

kinds, very tasty, and the like are nowhere else to be seen. Three

days' journey from this sea are mountains from which rolls down a

stony, waterless river, which opens into the sandy sea. As soon as the

stream reaches the sea, its stones vanish in it, and are never seen

again. As long as the river is in motion, it cannot be crossed; only

four days a week is it possible to traverse it. Between the sandy sea

and the said mountains, in a certain plain is a fountain of singular

virtue, which purges Christians and would-be Christians from all

transgressions. The water stands four inches high in a hollow stone

shaped like a mussel-shell. Two saintly old men watch by it, and ask

the comers whether they are Christians, or are about to become

Christians, then whether they desire healing with all their hearts. If

they have answered well, they are bidden to lay aside their clothes,

and to step into the mussel. If what they said be true, then the water

begins to rise and gush over their heads; thrice does the water thus

lift itself, and every one who has entered the mussel leaves it cured

of every complaint.



"Near the wilderness trickles between barren mountains a subterranean

rill, which can only by chance be reached, for only occasionally the

earth gapes, and he who would descend must do it with precipitation,

ere the earth closes again. All that is gathered under the ground

there is gem and precious stone. The brook pours into another river,

and the inhabitants of the neighborhood obtain thence abundance of

precious stones. Yet they never venture to sell them without having

first offered them to us for our private use: should we decline them,

they are at liberty to dispose of them to strangers. Boys there are

trained to remain three or four days under water, diving after the

stones.



"Beyond the stone river are the ten tribes of the Jews, which, though

subject to their own kings, are, for all that, our slaves and

tributary to our Majesty. In one of our lands, hight Zone, are worms

called in our tongue Salamanders. These worms can only live in fire,

and they build cocoons like silk-worms, which are unwound by the

ladies of our palace, and spun into cloth and dresses, which are worn

by our Exaltedness. These dresses, in order to be cleaned and washed,

are cast into flames.... When we go to war, we have fourteen golden

and bejewelled crosses borne before us instead of banners; each of

these crosses is followed by 10,000 horsemen, and 100,000 foot

soldiers fully armed, without reckoning those in charge of the luggage

and provision.



"When we ride abroad plainly, we have a wooden, unadorned cross,

without gold or gem about it, borne before us, in order that we may

meditate on the sufferings of Our Lord Jesus Christ; also a golden

bowl filled with earth, to remind us of that whence we sprung, and

that to which we must return; but besides these there is borne a

silver bowl full of gold, as a token to all that we are the Lord of

Lords.



"All riches, such as are upon the world, our Magnificence possesses in

superabundance. With us no one lies, for he who speaks a lie is

thenceforth regarded as dead; he is no more thought of, or honored by

us. No vice is tolerated by us. Every year we undertake a pilgrimage,

with retinue of war, to the body of the holy prophet Daniel, which is

near the desolated site of Babylon. In our realm fishes are caught,

the blood of which dyes purple. The Amazons and the Brahmins are

subject to us. The palace in which our Supereminency resides, is built

after the pattern of the castle built by the Apostle Thomas for the

Indian king Gundoforus. Ceilings, joists, and architrave are of Sethym

wood, the roof of ebony, which can never catch fire. Over the gable of

the palace are, at the extremities, two golden apples, in each of

which are two carbuncles, so that the gold may shine by day, and the

carbuncles by night. The greater gates of the palace are of sardius,

with the horn of the horned snake inwrought, so that no one can bring

poison within.



"The other portals are of ebony. The windows are of crystal; the

tables are partly of gold, partly of amethyst, and the columns

supporting the tables are partly of ivory, partly of amethyst. The

court in which we watch the jousting is floored with onyx in order to

increase the courage of the combatants. In the palace, at night,

nothing is burned for light but wicks supplied with balsam.... Before

our palace stands a mirror, the ascent to which consists of five and

twenty steps of porphyry and serpentine." After a description of the

gems adorning this mirror, which is guarded night and day by three

thousand armed men, he explains its use: "We look therein and behold

all that is taking place in every province and region subject to our

sceptre.



"Seven kings wait upon us monthly, in turn, with sixty-two dukes, two

hundred and fifty-six counts and marquises: and twelve archbishops

sit at table with us on our right, and twenty bishops on the left,

besides the patriarch of St. Thomas, the Sarmatian Protopope, and the

Archpope of Susa.... Our lord high steward is a primate and king, our

cup-bearer is an archbishop and king, our chamberlain a bishop and

king, our marshal a king and abbot."



I may be spared further extracts from this extraordinary letter, which

proceeds to describe the church in which Prester John worships, by

enumerating the precious stones of which it is constructed, and their

special virtues.



Whether this letter was in circulation before Pope Alexander wrote

his, it is not easy to decide. Alexander does not allude to it, but

speaks of the reports which have reached him of the piety and the

magnificence of the Priest-King. At the same time, there runs a tone

of bitterness through the letter, as though the Pope had been galled

at the pretensions of this mysterious personage, and perhaps winced

under the prospect of the man-eaters overrunning Italy, as suggested

by John the Priest. The papal epistle is an assertion of the claims of

the See of Rome to universal dominion, and it assures the Eastern

Prince-Pope that his Christian professions are worthless, unless he

submits to the successor of Peter. "Not every one that saith unto me,

Lord, Lord," &c., quotes the Pope, and then explains that the will of

God is that every monarch and prelate should eat humble pie to the

Sovereign Pontiff.



Sir John Maundevil gives the origin of the priestly title of the

Eastern despot, in his curious book of travels.



"So it befelle, that this emperour cam, with a Cristene knyght with

him, into a chirche in Egypt: and it was Saterday in Wyttson woke. And

the bishop made orders. And he beheld and listened the servyse fulle

tentyfly: and he asked the Cristene knyght, what men of degree thei

scholden ben, that the prelate had before him. And the knyght

answerede and seyde, that thei scholde ben prestes. And then the

emperour seyde, that he wolde no longer ben clept kyng ne emperour,

but preest: and that he wolde have the name of the first preest, that

wente out of the chirche; and his name was John. And so evere more

sittiens, he is clept Prestre John."



It is probable that the foundation of the whole Prester-John myth lay

in the report which reached Europe of the wonderful successes of

Nestorianism in the East, and there seems reason to believe that the

famous letter given above was a Nestorian fabrication. It certainly

looks un-European; the gorgeous imagery is thoroughly Eastern, and the

disparaging tone in which Rome is spoken of could hardly have been the

expression of Western feelings. The letter has the object in view of

exalting the East in religion and arts to an undue eminence at the

expense of the West, and it manifests some ignorance of European

geography, when it speaks of the land extending from Spain to the

Polar Sea. Moreover, the sites of the patriarchates, and the dignity

conferred on that of St. Thomas, are indications of a Nestorian bias.



A brief glance at the history of this heretical Church may be of value

here, as showing that there really was a foundation for the wild

legends concerning a Christian empire in the East, so prevalent in

Europe. Nestorius, a priest of Antioch and a disciple of St.

Chrysostom, was elevated by the emperor to the patriarchate of

Constantinople, and in the year 428 began to propagate his heresy,

denying the hypostatic union. The Council of Ephesus denounced him,

and, in spite of the emperor and court, Nestorius was anathematized

and driven into exile. His sect spread through the East, and became a

flourishing church. It reached to China, where the emperor was all but

converted; its missionaries traversed the frozen tundras of Siberia,

preaching their maimed Gospel to the wild hordes which haunted those

dreary wastes; it faced Buddhism, and wrestled with it for the

religious supremacy in Thibet; it established churches in Persia and

in Bokhara; it penetrated India; it formed colonies in Ceylon, in

Siam, and in Sumatra; so that the Catholicos or Pope of Bagdad

exercised sway more extensive than that ever obtained by the successor

of St. Peter. The number of Christians belonging to that communion

probably exceeded that of the members of the true Catholic Church in

East and West. But the Nestorian Church was not founded on the Rock;

it rested on Nestorius; and when the rain descended, and the winds

blew, and the floods came, and beat upon that house, it fell, leaving

scarce a fragment behind.



Rubruquis the Franciscan, who in 1253 was sent on a mission into

Tartary, was the first to let in a little light on the fable. He

writes, "The Catai dwelt beyond certain mountains across which I

wandered, and in a plain in the midst of the mountains lived once an

important Nestorian shepherd, who ruled over the Nestorian people,

called Nayman. When Coir-Khan died, the Nestorian people raised this

man to be king, and called him King Johannes, and related of him ten

times as much as the truth. The Nestorians thereabouts have this way

with them, that about nothing they make a great fuss, and thus they

have got it noised abroad that Sartach, Mangu-Khan, and Ken-Khan were

Christians, simply because they treated Christians well, and showed

them more honor than other people. Yet, in fact, they were not

Christians at all. And in like manner the story got about that there

was a great King John. However, I traversed his pastures, and no one

knew anything about him, except a few Nestorians. In his pastures

lives Ken-Khan, at whose court was Brother Andrew, whom I met on my

way back. This Johannes had a brother, a famous shepherd, named Unc,

who lived three weeks' journey beyond the mountains of Caracatais."



This Unk-Khan was a real individual; he lost his life in the year

1203. Kuschhik, prince of the Nayman, and follower of Kor-Khan, fell

in 1218.



Marco Polo, the Venetian traveller (1254-1324), identifies Unk-Khan

with Prester John; he says, "I will now tell you of the deeds of the

Tartars, how they gained the mastery, and spread over the whole earth.

The Tartars dwelt between Georgia and Bargu, where there is a vast

plain and level country, on which are neither cities nor forts, but

capital pasturage and water. They had no chief of their own, but paid

to Prester Johannes tribute. Of the greatness of this Prester

Johannes, who was properly called Un-Khan, the whole world spake; the

Tartars gave him one of every ten head of cattle. When Prester John

noticed that they were increasing, he feared them, and planned how he

could injure them. He determined therefore to scatter them, and he

sent barons to do this. But the Tartars guessed what Prester John

purposed ... and they went away into the wide wastes of the North,

where they might be beyond his reach." He then goes on to relate how

Tschengis-(Jenghiz-)Khan became the head of the Tartars, and how he

fought against Prester John, and, after a desperate fight, overcame

and slew him.



The Syriac Chronicle of the Jacobite Primate, Gregory Bar-HebrAus

(born 1226, died 1286), also identifies Unk-Khan with Prester John.

"In the year of the Greeks 1514, of the Arabs 599 (A. D. 1202), when

Unk-Khan, who is the Christian King John, ruled over a stock of the

barbarian Hunns, called Kergt, Tschingys-Khan served him with great

zeal. When John observed the superiority and serviceableness of the

other, he envied him, and plotted to seize and murder him. But two

sons of Unk-Khan, having heard this, told it to Tschingys; whereupon

he and his comrades fled by night, and secreted themselves. Next

morning Unk-Khan took possession of the Tartar tents, but found them

empty. Then the party of Tschingys fell upon him, and they met by the

spring called Balschunah, and the side of Tschingys won the day; and

the followers of Unk-Khan were compelled to yield. They met again

several times, till Unk-Khan was utterly discomfited, and was slain

himself, and his wives, sons, and daughters carried into captivity.

Yet we must consider that King John the Kergtajer was not cast down

for nought; nay, rather, because he had turned his heart from the fear

of Christ his Lord, who had exalted him, and had taken a wife of the

Zinish nation, called Quarakhata. Because he forsook the religion of

his ancestors and followed strange gods, therefore God took the

government from him, and gave it to one better than he, and whose

heart was right before God."



Some of the early travellers, such as John de Plano Carpini and Marco

Polo, in disabusing the popular mind of the belief in Prester John as

a mighty Asiatic Christian monarch, unintentionally turned the popular

faith in that individual into a new direction. They spoke of the black

people of Abascia in Ethiopia, which, by the way, they called Middle

India, as a great people subject to a Christian monarch.



Marco Polo says that the true monarch of Abyssinia is Christ; but that

it is governed by six kings, three of whom are Christians and three

Saracens, and that they are in league with the Soudan of Aden.



Bishop Jordanus, in his description of the world, accordingly sets

down Abyssinia as the kingdom of Prester John; and such was the

popular impression, which was confirmed by the appearance at intervals

of ambassadors at European courts from the King of Abyssinia. The

discovery of the Cape of Good Hope was due partly to a desire

manifested in Portugal to open communications with this monarch,[22]

and King John II. sent two men learned in Oriental languages through

Egypt to the court of Abyssinia. The might and dominion of this

prince, who had replaced the Tartar chief in the popular creed as

Prester John, was of course greatly exaggerated, and was supposed to

extend across Arabia and Asia to the wall of China. The spread of

geographical knowledge has contracted the area of his dominions, and a

critical acquaintance with history has exploded the myth which

invested Unk-Khan, the nomad chief, with all the attributes of a

demigod, uniting in one the utmost pretensions of a Pope and the

proudest claims of a monarch.



FOOTNOTES:



[19] Otto, Ep. Frising., lib. vii. c. 33.



[20] Persia.



[21] Media.



[22] Ludolfi Hist. A†thiopica, lib. ii. cap. 1, 2. Petrus, Petri filius

LusitaniA princeps, M. Pauli Veneti librum (qui de Indorum rebus

multa: speciatim vero de Presbytero Johanne aliqua magnifice scripsit)

Venetiis secum in patriam detulerat, qui (Chronologicis Lusitanorum

testantibus) prAcipuam Johanni Regi ansam dedit IndicA navigationis,

quam Henricus Johannis I. filius, patruus ejus, tentaverat,

prosequendA, &c.



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