Civilization, Medieval; Great Britain -- Social life and customs -- 1066-1485
Five days' march, through Mignano, Ceprano, Anagni, and a place called
'Mulera,' which I cannot identify, brought them to Rome. At Rome they
spent Christmas. A doctor was called in to attend one of the grooms, and
medicine was obtained for a horse, possibly without avail, as two horses
were bought for thirty florins, from 'the merchants of the Ricardi.' On
Sunday, the 28th, the journey was resumed, Isola and Sutri forming the
first day's march, Viterbo and Monte Fiascone the second. Acquapendente
was reached on Tuesday, and here they spent 18_d._ on 'a small box
(_cofinello_) in which to carry eel pies.' Passing San Quirico, Siena was
reached on the 1st of January, their road after that leading through San
Cossiano, Pistoia, and Buggione, to Lucca. From Lucca they struck across
to the coast, through Avenza and Sarzana to Sestri, and so up by Rapallo
and Recco to Genoa, which they reached on Sunday, January 11. At Genoa
they found their companions, who had come round by sea. A house was hired
from Pucino Roncini, the galley was unloaded and paid off, its cost from
Trebizond to Genoa being £200, a sum more formidable in appearance than in
reality, as the Genoese pound was only about 3_s._ 6_d._ of English money.
Tamorace the Tartar was dismissed with the present of a silver cup, and
there remained only the leopard to link them with the East.
At Genoa the series of accounts terminates, but the dispatch of a
messenger to the Marquess of Saluzzo suggests that our travellers were
going through his territory, by the same road that Henry of Bolingbroke,
Earl of Derby and afterwards King of England, followed just a century
later on his return from Venice and the East, taking with him, by a
coincidence, a leopard. In that case they would have gone inland, past
Novi, Asti, and Turin to Chambéry in Savoy, then northwards to Châlons,
and by Beaune, Châtillon, and Nogent-sur-Saône to Paris. Thence they would
probably have made for Wissant, and so across to Dover, reaching England
about the beginning of September, 1293, or rather earlier, after two years
of almost continual travelling. Of the wonderful things that they saw, and
the yet more wonderful things that they heard--tales of monstrous men,
uncanny beasts, and evil spirits--of their adventures, perils of
shipwreck, and perils of robbers, no record has survived; but something
of their slow journeying, the trying desert marches, the vexatious delays
of contrary winds, pleasantly varied by the relaxation of a halt in some
great city, we have managed to piece together.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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