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PRESTER JOHN
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PRESTER See also: Indeed, it is not improbable that from a very See also:early date the See also:title was assigned to the Abyssinian king, though for a See also:time this See also:identification was overshadowed by the prevalence of the Asiatic See also:legend. At the bottom of the See also:double allocation there was, no doubt, that confusion of Ethiopia with India which is as old as See also:Virgil and perhaps older.
The first mention of Prester John occurs in the See also:chronicle of See also:Otto, See also:bishop of Freisingen. This writer states that when at the papal See also:court in 1145 he met with the bishop of Gabala (Jibal in See also:Syria), who related how "not many years before one John, king and priest (rex et sacerdos), who dwelt in the extreme Orient beyond See also:Persia and See also:Armenia, and was, with his See also:people, a Christian but a Nestorian, had made See also:war against the See also:brother See also:kings of the Persians and .Modes, who were called Samiards (or Sanjards), and captured See also:Ecbatana their See also:capital. After this victory Presbyter John—for so he was wont to be styled—advanced to fight for the See also: His empire extended over the three Indies, including that Farther India, where See also:lay the body of St Thomas, to the See also:sun-rising, and back again down the slope to the ruins of See also:Babylon and the See also:tower of See also:Babel. All the See also:wild beasts and monstrous creatures commemorated in current legend were to be found in his dominions, as well as all the wild and See also:eccentric races of men of whom See also:strange stories were told, including those unclean nations whom See also: The only conqueror whose career suits in time and approximates in circumstances is the founder of Kara-Khitai, which existed as a great empire in Central Asia during the latter two-thirds of the 13th century. This personage was a See also:prince of the Khitai or Khitaian See also:dynasty of Liao, which had reigned over See also:northern See also:China and the regions beyond the See also:Wall during a great See also:part of the loth and 11th centuries, and from which came the name Khitai (See also:Cathay), by which China was once known in Europe and still is known in See also:Russia. On the overthrow of the dynasty about 1125 this prince, who is called by the See also:Chinese Yeliu Tashi, and had gone through a See also:complete Chinese See also:education, escaped westward with a body of followers. Being well received by the Uighurs and other tribes See also:west of the See also:desert, subjects of his See also:family, he gathered an army and commenced a course of See also:conquest which eventually extended over eastern and western See also:Turkestan. He took the title of Gur Khan or Kor Khan, said to mean " universal " or " supreme " khan, and fixed at Balasaghun, north of the T'ian Shan range, the capital of his empire, which became known as that of Kara-Khitai (See also:Black Cathay). In 1141 the assistance of this Khitaian prince was invoked by the shah of Kharezm against Sanjar, the Seljuk See also:sovereign of Persia, who had expelled the shah from his See also:kingdom and killed his son. The Gur Khan came with a vast army of See also:Turks, Khitaians, and others, and defeated Sanjar near See also:Samarkand (See also:Sept. 1141) in a See also:battle which the historian See also:Ibn al-Athir calls the greatest defeat that See also:Islam had ever undergone in those regions. Though the Gur Khan himself is not described as having extended his See also:con-quests into Persia, the shah of Kharezm followed up the victory by invading See also:Khorasan and plundering the cities and treasuries of Sanjar. In this event—the defeat of Sanjar, whose brother's son, Mas'ud, reigned over western Persia—occurring four years before the story of the Eastern conqueror was told at Rome to Bishop Otto, we seem to have the destruction of the Samiardi fratres or Sanjar See also:brothers, which was the germ of the story of Prester John. There is no See also:evidence of any profession of See also:Christianity on the part of the Gur Khan, though the daughter of the last of his race is recorded to have been a Christian. The hosts of the Gur Khan are called by Moslem historians Al-Turk-al-Kuffar, the kafir or infidel Turks; and in later days the use of this See also:term " kafir " led to misapprehensions, as when Vasco da Gama's people were led to take for Christians the See also:Banyan traders on the See also:African See also:coast, and to describe as Christian sovereigns so many princes of the Farther East of whom they heard at See also:Calicut. How the name John arose is one of the obscure points. See also:Oppert supposes the title " Gur Khan " to have been confounded with Yukhanan or Johannes; and it is probable that even in the See also:Levant the stories of " John the patriarch of the Indies," repeated in the early part of this See also:article, may have already mingled with the rumours from the East. The failure in the history of the Gur Khan to meet all points in the story of the bishop ofGabala led See also:Professor Braun of See also:Odessa to bring forward another See also:candidate for identity with the See also:original Prester John, in the See also:person of the Georgian prince John Orbelian, the " sbasalar," or generalissimo under several kings of See also:Georgia in that See also:age. He shows instances, in documents of the 15th century, of the association of Prester John with the See also:Caucasus. In one at least of these the title is applied to the king of Abassia, i.e. of the Abhasians of Caucasus. Some confusion between Abash (See also:Abyssinia) and Abhas seems to be possibly at the bottom of the imbroglio. An abstract of Professor Bruun's See also:argument will be found in the 2nd edition of See also:Sir H. See also:Yule's Marco See also:Polo, ii. 539-542. As regards any real See also:foundation for the title of " Presbyter " we may observe that nothing See also:worth mentioning has been alleged on behalf of any candidate. When the Mongol conquests threw Asia open to See also:Frank travellers in the middle of the 13th century their minds were full of Prester John; they sought in vain for an adequate representative, nor was it in the nature of things that they should not find some representative. In fact they found several. Apparently no real tradition existed among the Eastern Christians of such a personage; the myth had taken shape from the clouds of rumour as they rolled westward from Asia. But the persistent demand produced a See also:supply; and the See also:honour of identification with Prester John, after hovering over one See also:head and another, settled for a See also:long time upon that of the king of the Nestorian tribe of Kerait, famous in the histories of Jenghiz under the name of Ung or Awang Khan.
In See also:Carpini's (1248) single mention of Prester John as the king,
great crosses made of gold and jewels were carried in wagons before him as his See also:standards, and each was followed by 1o,000 knights and roo,000 footmen. There were no poor in his dominions, no thief or robber, no flatterer or See also:miser, no dissensions, no lies, and no vices. His See also:palace was built after the See also:plan of that which St Thomas erected for the See also:Indian king Gondopharus. Of the splendour of this details are given. Before it was a marvellous See also:mirror erected on a many-storeyed See also:pedestal (described in detail); in this See also:speculum he could discern every-thing that went on throughout his dominions, and detect conspiracies. He was waited on by 7 kings at a time, by 6o See also:dukes and 365 See also:counts; 12 archbishops sat on his right hand, and 20 bishops on his See also:left, besides the patriarch of St Thomas's, the protopope of the Sarmagantians (Samarkand?), and the archprotopope of See also:Susa, where the royal See also:residence was. There was another palace of still more wonderful character, built by the presbyter's See also:father in obedience to a heavenly command, in the See also:city of Bribric. Should it be asked why, with all this power and splendour, he calls himself merely " presbyter," this is because of his humility, and because it was not fitting for one whose See also:sewer was a See also:primate and king, whose See also: There are also several renderings in old See also:German See also:verse. Many circumstances of the time tended to render such a letter accept-able. Christendom would welcome gladly the intelligence of a counterpoise arising so unexpectedly to the See also:Mahommedan power; while the statements of the letter itself combined a reference to and corroboration of all the romantic figments concerning Asia which already fed the curiosity of Europe, which figured in the See also:world-maps, and filled that fabulous history of Alexander which for nearly a thousand years supplanted the real
history of the Macedonian throughout Europe and western Asia. The only other surviving document of the 12th century bearing on this subject is a letter of which MS. copies are preserved in the See also:Cambridge and Paris See also:libraries, and which is also embedded in the See also:chronicles of several See also:English See also:annalists, including See also:Benedict of See also:Peter-See also:borough, See also:Roger Hovedon and See also:Matthew Paris. It purports to have been indited from the Rialto at See also:Venice by Pope Alexander III. on the 5th day before the calends of See also:October (Sept. 27), data which See also:fix the See also:year as 1177. The pope addresses it, carissimo in Christo filio Johanni, illustro et magnifico indorum regi [Hovedon's copy here inserts sacerdoti sanctissimo]. He recites how he had heard of the monarch's Christian profession, See also:diligence in See also:good See also:works and piety, by manifold narrators and See also:common report, but also more particularly from his (the pope's) physician and confidant (medicus et familiaris noster), Master See also: Peter and See also:Paul, and in the church of the Lord's Sepulchre at Jerusalem, and as to other reasonable See also:requests."
There is no See also:express mention of the title " Prester John " in what seem the more genuine copies of this letter. But the address and the expression in the italicized passage just quoted (which evidently alludes to the vaunting See also:epistle of 1165) hardly leave See also:room for doubt that the pope supposed himself to be addressing the author of that letter. We do not know how far the imaginations about Prester John retained their vitality in 1221, See also:forty-four years after the letter of Pope Alexander, for we know of no mention of Prester John in the See also:interval. But in that year again a rumour came out of the East that a great Christian conqueror was taking the hated Moslems in
of the Christians of India the Greater, who defeats the See also:Tatars by an elaborate stratagem, Oppert recognizes Jalaluddin of Kharezm and his brief success over the See also:Mongols in See also:Afghanistan. In the Armenian prince Sempad's account (1248), on the other hand, this Christian king of India is aided by the Tatars to defeat and harass the See also:Saracens, and becomes the See also:vassal of the Mongols. In the narrative of See also: But that his power and dignity were consider-able appears from the term " Padshah," which is applied to him by the historian Rashiduddin. We find Prester John in one more phase before he vanishes from Asiatic history, real or mythical. Marco Polo in the latter part of the 13th century, and See also:Friar John of Montecorvino, afterwards archbishop of See also:Cambaluc, in the beginning of the 14th, speak of the descendants of Prester John as holding territory under the great khan in a locality which can be identified with the See also:plain of Kuku-See also:Khotan, north of the great See also:bend of the Yellow river and about 28o m. north-west of See also:Peking. The prince reigning in the time of these two writers was named King See also:George, and was the " 6th in descent from Prester John," i.e. no doubt from Awang Khan. Friar See also:Odoric, about 1326, visited the See also:country still ruled by the prince whom he calls Prester John; " but," he says, " as regards him, not one-hundredth part is true that is told of him." With this mention Prester John ceases to have any pretension to See also:historical existence in Asia (for we need not turn aside to See also:Mandeville's fabulous revival of old stories or to the barefaced See also:fictions of his contemporary, John of Hese, which bring in the old tales of the miraculous body of St Thomas), and his connexion with that quarter of the world gradually died out of the memory of Europe .2 When next we begin to hear his name it is as an African, not as an Asiatic prince; and the personage so styled is in fact the Christian king of Abyssinia. See also:Ludolf has asserted that this application was an invention of the Portuguese and arose only in the 15th century. But this is a See also:mistake; for in fact the application had begun much earlier, and probably long before the name had ceased to be attached by writers on Asia to the descendants of the king of the Kerait. It is true that the Florentine See also:Simone Sigoli, who visited See also:Cairo in 1384, in his Viaggio at See also:Monte See also:Sinai still speaks of " Presto Giovanni " as a monarch dwelling in India; but it is the India which is conterminous with the dominions of the soldan of See also:Egypt, and whose lord is master of the See also:Nile, to close or open its See also:discharge upon Egypt. See also:Thirty years earlier (c. 1352) the Franciscan Giovanni de' See also:Marignolli, apostolic See also:legate in Asia, speaks in his Chronica of Ethiopia where the Negroes are, and which is called the See also:land of Prester John.' Going back still further, Friar See also:Jordanus It has been pointed out by Alexander See also:Wylie that Kushluk was son of a powerful king of the Naimans, whose name Ta-Yang-Khan is precisely " Great King John " as nearly as that could be expressed in Chinese. 2 The stories of Khitai as a Christian empire, which led the See also:Jesuits at the court of See also:Akbar to despatch Benedict Goes in See also:search of it (1601), did, however, suggest to See also:Jerome See also:Xavier, their chief, that the country in question " was the Cathay of Marco Polo, and its Christian king the representative of the famous Prester John "—a jumble of inaccuracy. In a See also:Spanish See also:work of about the same date, by an See also:anonymous Franciscan, we are told that the emperor called " Abdeselib, which means ` servant of the Cross,' is a prote tor of Preste Juan, who is the patriarch of See also:Nubia and Ethiopia, and is lord of many great lands, and many cities of Christians, though they be black as" See also:Catalani," who returned from the East before 1328, speaks di the emperor of the Ethiopians " See also:quern vos vocatis Prestre Johan." But, indeed, we shall have strong See also:probability on our See also:side if we go back much further still, and say that, however vague may have been the ideas of Pope Alexander III. respecting the See also:geographical position of the potentate whom he addressed from Venice in 1177, the only real person to whom the letter can have been sent was the king of Abyssinia. Let it be observed that the " honourable per-sons of the monarch's kingdom " whom the See also:leech Philip had met with in the East must have been the representatives ofsome real power, and not of a phantom. It must have been a real king who professed to desire reconciliation with the Catholic Church and the assignation of a church at Rome and of an altar at Jerusalem. Moreover, we know that the Ethiopic Church did long possess a See also:chapel and altar in the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and, though we have been unable to find travellers' testimony to this older than about 1497, it is quite possible that the See also:appropriation may have originated much earlier.4 We know from Marco Polo that about a century after the date of Pope Alexander's epistle a See also:mission was sent by the king of Abyssinia to Jerusalem to make offerings on his part at the Church of the Sepulchre. It must be remembered that at the time of the pope's letter Jerusalem, which had been taken from the Moslem in 1o99, was still in Christian See also:possession. Abyssinia had been going through a long See also:period of vicissitude and See also:distraction. In the loth century the royal See also:line had been superseded by a dynasty of Falasha See also:Jews, followed by other Christian families; but weakness and disorder continued till the restoration of the " See also:House of See also:Solomon " (c. 1268). Nothing is more likely than that the princes of the " Christian families " who had got possession of the See also:throne of northern Abyssinia should have wished to strengthen themselves by a connexion with European Christendom, and to establish relations with Jerusalem, then in Christian hands. We do not know whether the leech Philip ever reached his destination, or whether a reply ever came back to the Lateran.5 See also:Baronius, who takes the view for which we have been arguing, sup-poses it possible that the church in Rome possessed in his own time by the Abyssinians (St See also:Stephen's in the Vatican) might have been granted on this occasion. But we may be sure that this was a See also:modern concession during the attempts to master the Ethiopian Church early in the 16th century. Ludolf intimates that its occupancy had been taken from them in his own time after it had been held " for more than a century." In the legendary history of the See also:Translation of the three Blessed Kings by John of See also:Hildesheim (c. 1370), of which an account and extracts are given by Zarneke (Abhandl. ii. 154 seq.), we have an evident jumble in the writer's mind between the Asiatic and the African location of Prester John; among other matters it is stated that Prester John and the Nubians dug a chapel out of the See also:rock under See also:Calvary in honour of the three kings: " et vocatur ills See also:capella in partibus illis capella Nubiyanorum ad reges in praesentem diem, sed Sarracini . . . ob invidiam obstruxerunt " (p. 158).
From the 14th century onwards Prester John had found his seat in Abyssinia. It is there that Fra Mauro's great See also:map (1459) presents a See also:fine city with the"See also:rubric, " Qui it Preste Janni fa residentia principal." When, nearer the end of the century (1481–1495), King
See also:pitch, and See also:brand themselves with the sign of the cross in token of their See also:baptism " (Libro del conocimiento de todos reynos, &c., printed at See also:Madrid, 1877).
4 Indeed, we can carry the date back See also:half a century further by the evidence of a letter translated in Ludolf (Comment. p. 303). This is addressed from See also:Shoa by the king See also:Zara See also:Jacob in the eighth year of his reign (1442) to the Abyssinian monks, dwellers at Jerusalem. The king desires them to light certain lamps in the Church of the Sepulchre, including " three in our chapel." In the Pilgerfahrt See also:des See also:Bitters See also:Arnold von Harff (1496–1499: See also:Cologne, 1860, p. 175), we find it stated that the Abyssinians had their chapel, &c., to the left of the Holy Sepulchre, between two pillars of the See also:Temple, whilst the Armenian chapel was over theirs, reached by a See also: The first on the See also:south, i.e. the left looking from the body of the church, is " No. 35.—The See also:chappell of the Abisines, over which the chappell of the Armenians." A reference to Jerusalem, which we procured through the kindness of Mr See also:Walter See also:Besant, shows that the Abyssinians no longer have a chapel or privileges in the Church of the Sepulchre. Between the Armenians and the See also:Copts they have been deprived of these, and even of the keys of their See also:convent. The resentment of King See also:Theodore at the loss of these privileges was one of the indirect causes which led to the war between him and See also:England in 1867–68.
i Matthew Paris gives a letter from Philip, See also:prior of the See also:Dominicans in See also:Palestine, which reached the pope in 1237, and which speaks of a See also:prelate from whom he had received several letters, " qui praeest See also:omnibus quos Nestoriana haeresis ab See also:ecclesia separavit (cujus praelatio per Indiam Majorem, et per regnum sacerdotis Johannis, et per regna magis proxima Orienti dilatatur)." We have little doubt that Abyssinia was the " regnum " here indicated, though it was a mistake to identify the Abyssinian Church with the Nestorians.
See also:building was opened in 1893. Here is placed Dr Shepherd's library founded in 1761, of nearly 9000 volumes, as well as a collection of pictures, &c., valued at £40,000, bequeathed by the See also:late R. Newsham. The See also:Harris See also:Institute, bndowed by the above-named trustees with £40,000, is established in a building of classical See also:style erected in 1849, wherein are held See also:science and See also:art classes, and a chemical laboratory is maintained. For the See also:grammar school, founded in 155o, a building in the Tudor style was erected in 1841 by private shareholders, but in 186o they sold it to the See also:corporation, who now have the management of the school. The See also:blue-coat school, founded in 1701, was in 1817 amalgamated with the See also:national See also:schools. A See also:Victoria See also:jubilee technical school was established under a See also: There is also a See also:deaf and dumb school. See also:Preston is well supplied with public recreation grounds, including Avenham See also:Park, the See also:Miller Park, with a statue of the {4th See also:earl of See also:Derby (d. 1869), the See also:Moor Park, the See also:Marsh, and the Deepdale grounds, with an See also:observatory. Preston is one of the principal scats of the See also:cotton manufacture in See also:Lancashire. There are also See also:iron and See also:brass foundries, See also:engineering works, cotton machinery works, and See also:boiler works, and some See also:shipbuilding is carried on. In 1826 Preston became a See also:creek of See also:Lancaster, in 1839 it was included in the new See also:port of See also:Fleetwood, and in 1843 it was created an independent port. The See also:trade of the port was insignificant until the construction of spacious clocks, in See also:conjunction with the deepening of the river from the quays of Preston to its outfall in the Irish Sea, a distance of 16 m., was begun in 1884, and was carried out at a cost of over one million See also:sterling. The See also:main wet See also:dock, opened in 1892, is 3240 ft. long and 600 ft. wide. The See also:total quayage is over 8500 lineal feet. The channel of the river has been made straighter, and from docks to sea deepened, so that the dock is accessible for vessels of 17 ft. See also:draught on See also:ordinary See also:spring tides. A See also:canal connects Preston with Lancaster. The See also:parliamentary borough, which returns two members, falls between the See also:Blackpool and See also:Darwen divisions of the See also:county. The corporation consists of a See also:mayor, 12 aldermen and 36 councillors. See also:Area of municipal borough, 3971 acres. JJohn II. of See also:Portugal was prosecuting inquiries regarding See also:access to India his first See also:object was to open communication with " Prester ohn of the Indies," who was understood to be a Christian potentate in See also:Africa. And when Vasco da Gama went on his voyage from See also:Mozambique northwards he began to hear of " Preste Joham " as reigning in the interior—or rather, probably, by the light of his preconceptions of the existence of that personage in East Africa he thus interpreted what was told him. More than twenty years later, when the first See also:book on Abyssinia was composed—that of See also:Alvarez—the title designating the king of Abyssinia is " Prester John," or simply " the Preste." On the whole subject in its older aspects, see Ludolf's Historia Aethiopica and its Commentary, passim. The excellent remarks of M. d'Avezac, comprising a conspectus of almost the whole essence of the subject, are in the Recueil de voyages et de memoires published by the Societe de Geographie, iv. 547–564 (Paris, 1839). Two German works of importance which have been used in this article are the interesting and suggestive Der Presbyter Johannes in See also:Sage and Geschichte, by Dr Gustav Oppert (2nd ed., See also:Berlin, 187o), and, most important of all in its learned, careful and See also:critical collection and discussion of all the passages bearing on the subject, Der Priester Johannes, by See also:Friedrich Zarncke of See also:Leipzig (1876–1879). See also Sir H. Yule's Cathay and the Way Thither, p. 173 seq., and in Marco Polo (2nd ed.), i. 229-233, ii. 539-543. (H. Additional information and CommentsThere are no comments yet for this article.
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