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The Voiage and Travayle of Sir John Maundeville Knight / Which treateth of the way towards Hierusalem and of marvayles of Inde with other ilands and countreys cover

The Voiage and Travayle of Sir John Maundeville Knight / Which treateth of the way towards Hierusalem and of marvayles of Inde with other ilands and countreys

Chapter 55: CAP. XLVII.
By Sir John Mandeville
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About This Book

The narrator offers a medieval travelogue that traces routes toward Jerusalem and across regions of Asia, Africa, and India, blending eyewitness-style observations, borrowed reports, and fantastic tales. It catalogs cities, landscapes, animals, plants, trade goods, and unfamiliar customs, alternating itinerary notes with moral and religious commentary. Frequent digressions present marvels and monstrous races alongside practical details about pilgrim routes, local rites, and fortifications, producing a text that shifts between guidebook information and imaginative storytelling. The structure mixes descriptive chapters with episodic anecdotes, inviting readers to weigh veracity while encountering the era's geographical knowledge, commerce, and popular curiosities.

CAP. XLVII.

Of the yles and divers maner of people and of marvaylous beastes.

AND sithen I have devised before of the holy land and countreys there about, and many wayes thether, and to mount Synay, and to Babilon, and other divers places which I have spoken of, now will I tell & speake of iles and of divers bestes, and divers folke and countreys that be departed1 by the flouds that came out of Paradise terrestre. For Mesopotame and the kingdome of Calde and Araby are between two floddes, Tigre and Eufrace, and the kingedome of Media and Perce are betwene two flouds Tigre and Nyle, & the kingdome of Surrey, Palestine and Femines2 are betweene Eufrace and the sea Mediterranean, it is of length from Marroch on the sea of Spaine, unto the great sea, and so lasteth it beyonde Constantinople three M and xx3 myle of Lombardy and to the Occean sea. In Inde is the kingdome of Sichem,4 that is all closed among hils, and beside Sichem is the lande of Amazony, wherein dwell none but women.

And thereby is the kingdome of Albany, which is a great lande and it is called so bicause that men are more whiter there than in other places, & in this countrey are great houndes and stronge, so that they overcome Lions and slay them. And ye shall understande that to those countreys are many iles and landes, of the which were too long to tell, but of some I will speake more plainly afterwarde.

1:  Parted.

2:  Phœnicia.

3:  Others say 3,040.

4:  Scythia.