Touring in 1600: A Study in the Development of Travel as a Means of EducationBates, E. S. (Ernest Stuart)
History
Touring in 1600: A Study in the Development of Travel as a Means of Education
Bates, E. S. (Ernest Stuart)
Europe -- Description and travel; Europe -- Social life and customs; Travel -- History
But just consider the sights in these streets! Passing over the
localisations of New Testament incidents (such as where the Apostles
composed the Creed and Christ the Lord's prayer) so exact and frequent
that one must have had to walk slowly to avoid missing them when
the guide pointed them out, there were besides the houses of Annas,
Zebedee, Caiaphas, Veronica, Dives, Mary Magdalen, Uriah the Hittite,
Pilate, where nightly were heard noises and whippings and sighs, and
of the school which Our Lady attended; the orchard where Bathsheba
bathed and the terrace from which David beheld her; the fountain where
Our Lady used to wash her baby-clothes; the stone on which the cock
stood to crow at St. Peter's downfall, and another which had been the
seat of the angel who told the Marys of Christ's resurrection, etc.,
etc.
These were every-day matters. To see Jerusalem at its best one had
to go at Easter, when the concourse of pilgrims was greatest for two
reasons: first, the only excursion to Jordan took place; secondly,
the descent of the Holy Fire from heaven into the church of the
Holy Sepulchre. The incidents of the season are described in detail
by George Sandys, Lithgow, Coryat and Della Valle, who were there
at Easter in the years 1611, 1612, 1614, and 1616 respectively. On
Palm Sunday the warden of the monastery set out for Bethphage in the
afternoon and returned riding on an ass, the people shouting "Hosanna,
etc.," and strewing the way with boughs and garments. When Lithgow
was there they made too much noise to please the Turks and therefore
returned black with bruises and somewhat bloody, the warden not
excepted. In the evening the warden had recovered far enough to give an
address to the Frank pilgrims, entreating the Protestants to refrain
from reviling what they did not agree with, and concluding with the
advice that three things were preëminently needful for a Jerusalem
pilgrim; Faith (to believe what was told him), Patience (with the
Turks), and Money.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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