The Bondage and Travels of Johann Schiltberger, a Native of Bavaria, in Europe, Asia, and Africa, 1396-1427Schiltberger, Johannes
History
The Bondage and Travels of Johann Schiltberger, a Native of Bavaria, in Europe, Asia, and Africa, 1396-1427
Schiltberger, Johannes
Timur, 1336-1405 -- Early works to 1800; Turkey -- History -- Bayezid I, 1389-1403; Voyages and travels -- Early works to 1800
[the sign of] a cross, they do it with the left hand. And when one
is about to die, they baptise him again, and there are many who are
baptised every year. They have no font in their churches; and when
their bishop stands in the choir, he stands in the middle of the church
and in the choir, and the priests stand around him. Their bishop eats
no meat throughout the year, and during the fasts he eats no fish nor
anything that has blood, and all their clergy do the same. When they
baptise a child, they have X or more godfathers; men and women bring
to the child a christening shirt or a candle. They also say, that our
priests sin if they have a Mass every day, because they cannot always
be worthy. They also say, that our priests commit mortal sin when they
shave their beard, because it is not godly, because it happens from
unchastity, and to please the women. And when one dies, and prayers for
the dead are sung for him, boiled wheat to eat is given to the priests
and to the people, after an old usage, and this same wheat they call
coleba. They wash their dead before they bury them. Their priests sell
and buy like other merchants. They fast during Lent for fifty days;
and the priests and the laity also fast forty days in Advent, and for
the twelve holy apostles they fast thirty days; they also fast fifteen
days for our Lady’s Assumption; they have only three days in the year
for our Lady, because they do not keep Candlemas. Item, the Greeks do
not keep the resurrection of Jhesus xpi at the same time with us; they
keep it on the next Friday after Easter. Then they sing Xristos anesti,
which is as much as to say, Xristus is risen.(1)
60.—How the city of Constantinoppel was built.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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