Download PDF | (Cambridge Library Collection - Hakluyt First Series) Johannes Schiltberger, Philip Brunn (editor), J. Buchan Telfer (translator) - The Bondage and Travels of Johann Schiltberger, a Native of Bavaria, in Europe, Asia, and Africa, 1396-1427.
314 Pages
Travel and Exploration The history of travel writing dates back to the Bible, Caesar, the Vikings and the Crusaders, and its many themes include war, trade, science and recreation. Explorers from Columbus to Cook charted lands not previously visited by Western travellers, and were followed by merchants, missionaries, and colonists, who wrote accounts of their experiences.
The development of steam power in the nineteenth century provided opportunities for increasing numbers of ‘ordinary’ people to travel further, more economically, and more safely, and resulted in great enthusiasm for travel writing among the reading public. Works included in this series range from first-hand descriptions of previously unrecorded places, to literary accounts of the strange habits of foreigners, to examples of the burgeoning numbers of guidebooks produced to satisfy the needs of a new kind of traveller - the tourist.
Bondage and Travels of Johann Schiltberger The publications of the Hakluyt Society (founded in 1846) made available edited (and sometimes translated) early accounts of exploration. The first series, which ran from 1847 to 1899, consists of 100 books containing published or previously unpublished works by authors from Christopher Columbus to Sir Francis Drake, and covering voyages to the New World, to China and Japan, to Russia and to Africa and India.
This volume contains an English translation of the extraordinary story of Johann Schiltberger (1381– ?1440), who was captured in battle as a teenager and enslaved by Bayezid I. On the latter’s defeat by Timur (Tamburlane) in 1402, Schiltberger fell into the hands of the legendary Scourge of God, and in his service and that of his sons, he travelled to Armenia, Georgia and other Caucasian territories, down the river Volga, to Siberia and to the Crimea, eventually escaping and returning to his home in 1427.
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PREFACE.
"An editor, or a translator, collects the merits of different writers, and, forming all into a wreath, bestows it on his author's tomb."—SHENSTONE.
THE world is indebted to the late Professor Karl Friedrich Neumann, for having rendered the perusal of Johann Schiltberger's travels generally accessible. Until his edition of the Heidelberg MS. appeared, in 1859, there had been no publication of the interesting work, in its integrity, since the year 1700, the supposed date of an edition, sine anno, sine loco; so that, as a fact, the work had become scarce, and could be consulted in a few libraries only, or in private collections of rare books.
In 1813, and again in 1814, was published Abraham Jacob Penzel's edition of what was known as the Nuremberg MS. ; but its sole merit consisted in the insertion of Proper and Geographical names in their original orthography, the work being otherwise vitiated by its modern and paraphrased style, and by the introduction of passages, of which Schiltberger never could have been the author. Scheiger* condemns this book as being written in a very extraordinary and uncommonly empty style, in which the narrative of the honest old Bavarian drags itself along very uncouthly.
Toblerf stigmatises it as being an unhappy translation into modern German, with no Introduction; and Neumann,^ a still severer critic, says :—" This edition, in its modern garb, does honour to nobody. The additions to the original text are absurd, and testify to the editor's ignorance of Schiltberger's character, and of the times in which he lived. Take, for instance, the following sentence, with which Penzel concludes the author's address to the reader :—' Just as the doctor smears with honey the glass of physic prepared for a sick child, so have I also, as an agreeable pastime, introduced here and there some wonderful stories which, I flatter myself, will prove agreeable and instructive reading.'" Neumann might have added, that Penzel was not even the originator of the idea conveyed in this passage, evidently borrowed from Tasso .
In 1823 these travels were again published, in 8vo., at Munich ; but this is a copy of which it would seem that very little is known. Judging by the numerous editions of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, each issue being an almost exact transcript of the copy that preceded it, Schiltberger must have been a popular author during that period. One long blank occurs from 1557 to 1606, after which the book of travels was not again reprinted until 1700.
The version now offered is a literal translation of Neumann's edition in mittelhoch Deutsch, an exact transcript of the Heidelberg MS., with the exception of a few errors that have been rectified, and slight alterations in the headings of some chapters. Neumann believes his book to lie the first printed edition that faithfully represents what Schiltbcrger wrote, the wording in all previous editions having been changed to suit the language of the times. He has added an Introduction and Notes by himself, and Notes by Fallmerayer and Hammer-Purgstall; such of those Notes as are referred to in the new Notes at the end of this volume, appear in their proper places at foot in the text, each bearing the initial of the writer.
Koehler* finds fault very unsparingly with Neumann, whom he reproaches with neglect in not correcting and elucidating the wording of the text. Tobler, on the contrary, considers Neumann's work more acceptable than Penzel's unfortunate translation into modern German, because there is an Introduction, and the Oriental names employed by the author are explained. The travels of Johann Schiltberger had never been translated into any tongue until Professor Bruun's edition, in Eussian, appeared at Odessa in 1866; although a somewhat free interpretation of the original, it has been of no small assistance to me where passages in the old German seemed obscure, as also in the identification of names.
I am under a deep sense of gratitude to that learned gentleman, for having enriched my translation with a large number of most valuable and interesting Notes. They were supplied to me in French, and to ensure their faithful repro- duction, my MS. in the first instance, and the proofs afterwards, were sent to Odessa, for the Professor's corrections or alterations, and approval. I have to express my thanks to Aly Bey Riza, Cadri Bey, and Rassek Bey of Alexandria, for their kind aid in simplifying the Turkish and Arabic sentences that occur in various chapters; to Mr. Mnatzakan Hakhoumoff, of Shousha, for making clear to me the several phrases in Armenian ; and to Dr. Niccolo Quartano de Calogheras, of Corfu, for his explanation of customs and rites as they are now observed in the Greek Church.
I am also desirous of acknowledging the courtesy of those gentlemen who have been good enough to reply to my enquiries, for information that would assist me in compiling a Bibliography of existing editions of Schiltberger's travels ; and it gives me much pleasure to name the Rev. Leo Alishan, Venice; Dr. K. A. Barack, Strasburg ; the Rev. A. Baumgarten, at the Kremsmiinster near Wels ; Mr. A. Bytschkoff, St. Petersburg; Mr. E. Forstemann, Dresden ; Mr. A. Gutenseker, Munich ; M. Edouard Hesse, Paris ; Professor Heyd, Stuttgard ; Dr. M. Isler, Hamburg ; Mr. J. Kraenzler, Augsburg ; Professor Lepsius, Berlin; Dr. J. E. A. Martin, Jena; Dr. Noack, Giesscn ; Dr. Joh. Priem, Nuremberg ; Dr. E. Bitter von Birk, Vienna; Dr. G. T. Thomas, Munich; and Professor Karl Zangemeister, Heidelberg ; also the Principal Librarian of the public library at Frankfort, and of the Bibliotheca Medicea-Laurentiana at Florence. I have likewise to express my obligations to Colonel Yule, for some useful and timely hints, so readily given.
Many of the Proper and Geographical names that occur in the Notes, and they are very numerous, are spelled as they ordinarity appear in English works, the orthography of the rest being in accordance with their pronunciation by a Persian and an Armenian gentleman, who did me the favour to settle my doubts. It being impossible to produce certain sounds with vowels that are so variously pronounced in the English language, I have had recourse to giving a phonetic value to various letters, in some instances accentuating the word for the sake of stress, with the acute or grave accent as in the Greek. The apostrophe ' denotes an independent but rather soft breathing of a letter.
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