More on millenarian Spain at time of Columbus

In the article Columbus, Magellan and the "Hidden King,"  the millennial environment that existed in Spain during the time of Columbus and Magellan was discussed.

The kingdom of Valencia, where I have suggested that Sayabiga elements had settled during Moorish times, turns out to be an epicenter of influence that created an environment in Spain favorable both the expeditions of both Columbus and Magellan.  Not only did Valencia host the Sayabiga, but it was also a center of post-Templar influence in Spain.

According to the theory presented here earlier, the "Gypsy" peoples known as the Zutt, who were possibly a Jat group from the Sindh in South Asia, and the Sayabiga from Zabag moved along with their rice farming and buffalo herding through the Middle East.  Probably they were the ones that introduced both rice and the buffalo to Egypt, and from there on to southern Spain.  The rice culture there involves a tidal wet system and the Japonica strain, and I have suggested this rice was farmed by the Sayabiga.


Adoration of the Magi, Northern Spain, 1125-40 (Source: http://www.artic.edu/aic/collections/artwork/50921)

Much of the agriculture in Moorish Spain did come from Egypt both dry and irrigated types.  Tidal rice was also planted by the Sayabiga in southern Mesopotamia, but they would have used regular wet rice agriculture in the Nile Valley before leapfrogging across North Africa to use the tidal system again in places like Lake Albufera in Valencia.

These Sayabiga in Spain, I have suggested, were an important link in the diplomatic efforts of "Prester John" of Zabag in Europe.  They would have been the "Indians" or "fairy people" mentioned by Wolfram von Eschenbach and other medieval writers, and linked with the Plantagenet family and the Holy Grail.


Gypsies in Spain 

The Gypsies in Spain are known as Gitano, a word that had been suggested to have been derived from "Jat," but most likely is a shortened form of Egyptiano "Egyptian."

Like the Romani Gypsies in other parts of Europe, the Gitano show linguistic traces of their origin from India.  Therefore it is quite likely that they are descendants at least partly of the aforementioned Zutt.  At one time, it was widely thought in Spain that the Gitano were descendants of Moriscos -- Muslims who had been converted to Catholicism.  However, after the language relationship with the Romani was discovered, many suggested that the Gitano had migrated into Spain after the Romani appeared in Eastern Europe.

However, researchers like Susan G. Drummond have shown that the evidence suggests two streams of Gypsies into Spain.  A Romani one in the north, and an older Gitano one in the south that dates to Moorish times.  The Calo language of the Gitano displays a large number of Hispano-Arabic words, and their Flamenco music shows similar influence, both of which are absent among the Romani.


Adoration of the Magi, Fuentiduena Chapel, Castilla-Leon, 1175-1200 (Source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/peterjr1961/2937556978/sizes/l/)

The presence of the Gitano can be seen as evidence of the migration of Zutt during Moorish times, and their ethnonym would agree with the suggestion that they came directly from Egypt.  Also the fact that they show no signs of Orthodox Christianity would suggest that they converted in Spain, i.e. that they were Moriscos or conversos.

Quite possibly the Gitano were once Zutt buffalo herders, which could explain their wandering ways.  The Zutt and their buffalo were moved to Syria and Anatolia to deal with the lion populations there -- a job that might have required a lot of movement from place to place.  Since the Zutt and Sayabiga tended to move around together, they probably migrated from that region to Egypt with the Sayabiga engaged mainly in farming.  The Sayabiga in Spain would have been rice farmers, and thus sedentary.  Also, the literary evidence would suggest, according to theory suggested here, that they were less endogamous as compared to the Gitano and freely intermarried.


Royal Morisco link from Valencia

Interestingly, both Ferdinand and Isabella, the monarchs of Spain who supported Columbus' voyage, both descend from a Morisca from Valencia.  Her name was Zaida, the daughter-in-law of al-Mutamid, the emir of Seville.  Zaida is sometimes referred to as the daughter of al-Mutamid in latter works, but contemporary Muslim sources state that she was his daughter-in-law of unknown ancestry. She lived in Denia in the Alicante, which was then part of the Kingdom of Valencia but now forms its own province. Like Valencia, Alicante is noted for its rice production.

Zaida, a contemporary of the first "fairy" count of Anjou, Fulk IV,  converted to Christianity and was either married to or was the concubine of Alfonso IV, king of Castile and Leon.  Both Ferdinand and Isabella descend from Zaida through Alfonso Fernandez, King of Castile, who descends through Constance de Hohenstaufen from Constance de Hauteville, the daughter of Elvira Alphonsez.  The latter was in turn was the daughter of Zaida.

Both monarchs may also descend from Zaida through Henry II's mother, a descendant of Zaida's other daughter Sancha Alfonsez,  but this genealogy is less secure.

A Valencian clan that claimed royal descent was the Borgia family, which rose to great heights during the Renaissance.   Accounts beginning in the early 17th century claim that the Borgias descend from King Ramiro of Spain, but the genealogies differ.  The actual documentation from Valencia and Aragon suggests instead that the Borgias trace their origins to one Gonzalo de Borja, who had no formal title.

The surnames Borja, Borge, Borgia, etc. come from the name of the Moorish town, and the surname is found on lists of Morisco surnames.  Evidence suggests that the Borgia clan, or at least their paternal ancestors, came originally from Borja in Aragon, but had been settled in the huerta of Valencia for some time before rising to prominence.

The first Borgia to gain fame was Alfonso from Canals, Valencia who became Pope Callisto III (Callixtus III) in 1455.  Alfonso had once served as an ambassador for the Aragonese kings.  He and the rest of his family became famed for their corruption and he appointed his nephew Rodrigo de Borgia, from Jativa, Valencia, as cardinal.

Rodrigo would become Pope Alexander VI in the same year that Columbus sailed on his first voyage.  As Pope, he granted the coveted rights to the Americas to Spain after a request from King Ferdinand, who had helped bring Rodrigo to power.

The children of Alexander VI and others in the Borgia clan quickly gained titles of nobility including Duke of Gandia in Valencia, and a number of titles in Italy.  Alexander VI's son Cesare Borgia became Duke of Valentinois, and inspired Machiavelli's work "The Prince."

Annio of Viterbo, possibly with the consent of Alexander VI, created a genealogy for the Borgias that claims the family descends from the Egyptian god-king Osiris -- interesting given the Zutt and Sayabiga's Egypt connection -- although Annio makes these links ancient and extends them to Italy.



The Borgia coat of arms with the bull representing Apis as an aspect of Osiris. (Source: Wikipedia)


Templars in Spain

When the Templars were disbanded, those in Portugal took refuge among the Order of Christ.  The Templars in Spain joined the Order of Montesa in Valencia.  Both of these orders play a part in the navigation to the Indies and the voyages of Columbus. Earlier in this blog, I suggested that the Templars had a political relationship with Prester John via Sayabiga/Assassin intermediaries. 

The Order of Christ knights were used by Prince Henry of Portugal, himself the Grandmaster of the organization, during his voyages of discovery.

An interesting possible direct connection between the Order of Montesa, which was located in the Kingdom of Valencia, and Columbus comes through Carlos de Viana (Charles of Viana). 

Carlos was a prince of Aragon, the son of the future John II, and himself the heir to the crown of Navarre. He also held the title of Prince of Viana.  According to one theory, Prince Carlos was actually Christopher Columbus' father!   A team of geneticists lead by Jose A. Lorente and Mark Stoneking had set out to test whether this theory was valid and they were expected to release results in 2005.  However, I have not seen anything further published on this research.

One of Prince Carlos' sons, Felipe, Count of Beaufort, and possibly a half-brother of Columbus, quit his position as Archbishop of Palermo in 1485 to become Grandmaster of the Order of Montesa.

A member of the Borgia family -- Don Pedro Luis Galceran de Borgia -- would become the last Grandmaster of the Order of Montesa in 1572.


Rise in millenarianism

In Columbus' "Book of Prophecies" (Libro de las profecias), the discoverer claims that he had found the Biblical lands of Tarshish, Cathyr and Ophir.

Likely one of the main reasons that both Columbus and Magellan were able to find fertile ground in Spain while failing elsewhere lies in the millennial environment that existed in the area at the time.  The Valencian alchemist Arnold of Villanova (1235-1311) was probably the first person responsible for popularizing the millenarian views of Joachim of Fiore in Spain.

He modified Joachimite prophecies combining them with earlier material from Pseudo-Methodius and others, and claiming that the Last Emperor who would reconquer Zion would come from Spain.  After Arnold of Villanova, another Valencian, Francesc Eixemensis further popularized these millennial views both in Valencia and throughout Spain.  Peter of Aragon, a member of the royal family and a Franciscan also helped promote the idea in the late 14th century that the King of Aragon would retake Jerusalem.

During the period of King Ferdinand V, the belief that this monarch was the prophesied one were widespread throughout Spain.  Given that Columbus himself was also deeply interested in prophecy, and also apparently considered himself a divine instrument in prophetic fulfillment, he was destined to eventually come to the monarchs of Aragon and Castile.

In the introduction to the Book of Prophecies, Columbus also mentions that the islands he had discovered were the same archipelago of 7,448 islands off the coast of South China (Manzi) mentioned by Marco Polo.  In the millenarian views of the time, islands were seen as important elements in the fulfillment of prophecy.  The conquest of the islands at the end of the earth was widely seen as an important mission of the millennial king in the last days.


Message from Prester John

The millenarian environment helped fuel the thirst for exploration, but it was information from the far east that provided the geographic knowledge necessary for Columbus to set off on his journey.

Nicolo di Conti and the eastern ambassador who came together with the entourage of papal envoy Alberto de Sarteano provided that knowledge.  Previously, I have suggested that the eastern delegate came from the kingdom of Prester John, which Conti claimed to have spent much time at during his Asian travels.  The ambassador claims to have come from a Nestorian kingdom in "Upper India" about 20 days from Cathay, i.e., the kingdom of Prester John.

The knowledge they provided completed a set of influences that appear to have convinced Columbus and others of the feasibility of the western voyages.  The other influences were:

• Marco Polo's account of the eastern islands off South China and their richness in gold, which Columbus apparently equates with Biblical gold of Ophir.
• The book attributed to John of Mandeville in the mid to late 14th century suggests that circumnavigation of the world is possible.  Columbus refers to Mandeville's work as having a great influence on him. Mandeville described Prester John's eastern realm as follows:
  
  

  "Toward the east part of Prester John's land is an isle good and great, that men clepe Taprobane, that is full noble and full fructuous...Beside that isle, toward the east, be two other isles. And men clepe that one Orille, and that other Argyte, of the which all the
  land is mine of gold and silver. And those isles be right where that the Red Sea departeth from the sea ocean."

  Orille and Argyte are the Chryse and Argye, the islands of gold and silver mentioned by Ptolemy who  locates them beyond the Golden Chersonese (Malaya Peninsula).
  
  At the extreme east of the kingdoms was the land of Eden:
  
  
  

  "And beyond the land and the isles and the deserts of Prester John's lordship, in going straight toward the east, men find nothing but mountains and rocks, full great. And there is the dark region, where no man may see, neither by day ne by night, as they of the country say. And that desert and that place of darkness dure from this coast unto Paradise terrestrial, where that Adam, our formest father, and Eve were put, that dwelled there but little while: and that is towards the east at the beginning of the earth. But that is not that east that we clepe our east, on this half, where the sun riseth to us. For when the sun is
  east in those parts towards Paradise terrestrial, it is then midnight in our parts on this half, for the roundness of the earth, of the which I have touched to you of before."

  Mandeville then describes the journeys on the 'other half' of the globe that involve "coasting" from the lands of Prester John:
  
  

  "From those isles that I have spoken of before, in the Land of Prester John, that be under earth as to us that be on this half, and of other isles that be more further beyond, whoso will, pursue them for to come again right to the parts that he came from, and so environ all earth. But what for the isles, what for the sea, and what for strong rowing, few folk assay for to pass that passage; albeit that men might do it well, that might be of power to dress them thereto, as I have said you before. And therefore men return from those isles above said by other isles, coasting from the land of Prester John."

Columbus learned of the testimony of Conti and the eastern ambassador at least from the letter of astronomer Paolo Toscanelli to Fernao Martins in 1474.  If the second letter of Toscanelli to Columbus is authentic, Columbus was also told to expect to find Christians on a journey to the East Indies.  Francis Millet Rogers has suggested that Columbus was additionally familiar with Conti through the work of Pero Tafur. If so, then he might easily have connected Prester John as mentioned in Tafur with the eastern ambassador from the Nestorian kingdom in Upper India.  Conti also mentions Nestorians in India, and in Tafur's account he describes the subjects of Prester John saying that "they know nothing of our Romish Church, nor are governed by it."

Tafur suggests that Prester John had an interest in the Christian world: "I learnt from Nicolo de' Conti that Prester John kept him continuously at his court, enquiring of him as to the Christian world, and concerning the princes and their estates, and the wars they were waging, and while he was there he saw Prester John on two occasions dispatch ambassadors to Christian princes, but he did not hear whether any news of them had been received."  Since the king was interested in making contact with Christendom logically he would have sent an ambassador along with Conti.

Upon analyzing the itinerary of Conti as supplied to papal secretary Poggio Bracciolini, Columbus probably noted that Conti's long sojourn with Prester John must have taken place sometime after the former had visited Champa.  That was the period before Conti began his journey back to India and Europe, and the one in which he spent most of his time in Asia. 

Therefore, Columbus quite logically would place Prester John's kingdom somewhere in Southeast Asia, in the same eastern archipelago mentioned by Marco Polo as lying off the coast of South China.  In this location, Columbus, venturing to an unknown part of the world, could expect to meet the friendly Nestorian Christians of Prester John's kingdom.   And Conti's testimony appears to have convinced many including Toscanelli and Columbus that the East Indies could be reached by sailing west from Europe around the globe.

Thus, Columbus' sailing course toward the equatorial latitudes, of which he expected to land in the East Indies, is not surprising.  Magellan also folllowed a similar course, and we know from his notes that he also appeared to be searching for the islands of Tarshish and Ophir.

By the time of Columbus, Valencia had become the commercial capital of the Crown of Aragon, and it was through the city's port that Spain controlled much of the trade that occurred in the European part of the Mediterranean.  Valencia provided the first round of funding for Columbus voyage as financiers like Jewish converso Luis de Santangel responded to Queen Isabella's call for financial backing.

After Prester John of Zabag sent letters to Western Christendom in the latter part of the 12th century, he became relatively quiet.  Maybe the conquests of the Mongols eased the urgency of dealing with expanding threats along the trade routes. However, by the mid-15th century Islam began to expand quickly in Southeast Asia with the establishment of the Sultanate of Aceh, and with Islamic kingdoms already existing in Kedah and Pasai by 1380.  At this time, the remnants of old Zabag were now consolidated into a kingdom known widely as Luzon. So the interest that "Prester John" showed Nicolo di Conti in the goings on of Christian nations in the West is logical.

Spain, for reasons that extend back to the original Prester John of Zabag, was the natural kingdom to have supported Columbus' millenarian plan to reach the fabled islands of Tarshish and Ophir.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Columbus, Christopher, Kay Brigham, and Kay Brigham. Christopher Columbus's Book of Prophecies. Barcelona, Spain: Editorial Clie, 1991.

Constable, Olivia R. Trade and Traders in Muslim Spain: The Commercial Realignment of the Iberian Peninsula, 900-1500. Cambridge studies in medieval life and thought, Ser. 4, 24. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994.

Dandelet, Thomas James. Spanish Rome, 1500-1700. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001.
Lorente, Jose A. DNA challenges posed in attempting to solve Christopher Columbus misteries [sic], http://www.promega.com/GENETICIDPROC/ussymp14proc/oralpresentations/Lorente.pdf, 2003.

Reeves, Marjorie. The Influence of Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages A Study in Joachimism. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969.

Rogers, Francis Millet. The Quest for Eastern Christians. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1962.

Tafur, Pero and Malcolm Letts (translator). Pero Tafur: Travels and Adventures (1435-1439), New York: Harper and Brothers, 1926.

Tompsett, Brian. Directory of Royal Genealogical Data, http://www3.dcs.hull.ac.uk/genealogy/GEDCOM.html, 2005.

Watts, Pauline Moffitt. "Prophecy and Discovery:  On the Spiritual Origins of ChristopherColumbus's 'Enterprise of the Indies'," American Historical Review, Feb. 1985, 73-102.

West, Delno C. "Medieval Ideas of Apocalyptic Mission and the Early Franciscans in Mexico," The Americas vol. XLV, Jan. 1989, no. 3, 292-313.

Apocalypse, Swan Knight and the Crusades

Turning a bit to more esoteric matters, the legend of the Swan Knight, it has been mentioned, was included in the genealogy of the famous leader of the First Crusade, Godfrey of Bouillon.

William of Tyre around the year 1170 was the first to mention this connection:

We pass over, intentionally, the fable of the Swan, although many people regard it as a fact, that from it he (Godfrey de Bouillon) had his origin, because this story seems destitute of truth.

From this quote we can surmise that the story of Godfrey's descent from the Swan Knight was already current and that there were "many people" who took it quite seriously; although William of Tyre was not one of them. The latter, who was archbishop of Tyre, was raised in Jerusalem when that city was co-ruled by Melisende, the daughter of Godfrey de Bouillon's cousin Baldwin II.

The legendary crusader histories, known as the Crusade Cycle, beginning shortly after William of Tyre wrote the statement above, appear to have been composed by those believers in the Swan Knight story.

Whether fictional or, at least party, based in truth, the Swan Knight origin of Godfrey de Bouillon can be shown to have links with the millenial thought that pervaded Europe in the period leading up to the First Crusade.


Apocalypse and the Crusades


There is some evidence that many people in Europe expected the apocalypse around the year 1000. The texts of Adso, Abbo and Glaber seem to indicate an increasing concern in this area in the lead up to the new millenium. Some believed the invasion of the Magyars heralded the beginning of the end-times.

When the year 1000 came and past, these millenarian feelings did not subside. These apprehensions were based as much on extra-biblical prophecies like the Sibylline oracles and Pseudo-Methodius, and their reworkings, as on the canonical works like Daniel or Revelations.

Pope Gregory VII in 1074 might be considered the first to, unsuccessfully, call for a crusade when he mentioned his plans to himself lead an expedition of 50,000 in liberating the Holy Sepulchre. It appears from Gregory VII's statements that he was casting himself as the Last Emperor mentioned in the Tiburtine Sibyl.

In 1086, Benzo, bishop of Alba, called on the emperor Henry IV to conquer Rome, Constantinople and Jerusalem, again mentioning the prophetic liberation of the Holy Sepulchre and reworking passages from the Cuman Sibyl into his message. In describing the Second Crusade, Otto of Freising quoted Sibylline works that mention the "pilgrim God" (peregrini Dei), and he describes the invading crusaders as "pilgrims" to the Holy Land.

H. Hagenmeyer's analysis of the Gesta Francorum, the anonymous chronicle of the First Crusade written by a member of Bohemund I of Antioch's expedition, gives an idea of the importance of the sibyls to crusader thought. Hagenmeyer found that the only written works referred to in the Gesta are the Bible and the "Sibylline prophecies."

Sibylline literature is known for its references to a savior "king from the east," a concept that I believe is important in both Godfrey's Swan Knight link and in the claims made in the letters of Prester John in the following century. Pseudo-Methodius, whose prophecies were also popular during this time, has his own version of the king from the east in Jonitus, the extra-biblical fourth son of Noah who settles in the "region of the Sun" (hiliu chora) to the East where we find the lands of Eden and Nod.

Pseudo-Methodius predicts one or two conquering Christian emperors in the last days. One will come from "the seed of Chuseth, the daughter of Phol, king of Ethiopia" arising as 'King of the Romans.' There is also a conquering king who descends, at least in collateral line, from Jonitus in the East. The prophecies do not clearly separate these two and that may be why latter writers wrote of two prominent Christian kings in the end-times. For example, Jacques de Vitry in the early part of the 13th century, wrote of a King of the West, who he equates with Frederick Barbarossa, and a King of the East, or Prester John, whom de Vitry identifies with the news trickling in of Genghis Khan's conquests.

We know from three prominent Benedictine historians of the period -- Guibert of Nogent, Baldric of Bourgueil and Robert the Monk -- that the crusades were viewed , in certain circles at least, as fulfillment of biblical prophecy. Another indication of the millenarian environment is the case of Count Emicho of Flonheim and leader of the "German Crusade" who claimed he was himself the Last Emperor who would lead his armies to the final battle.

The King of the East concept appears to be directly linked with Godfrey de Bouillon's descent from the Swan Knight in the Crusade Cycle and other medieval literature.


House of Bouillon and the Swan Knight

The three earliest versions of the story linking Godfrey de Bouillon with the Swan Knight are Dolopathos, Elioxe and Beatrix, generally dated between the last quarter of the 12th century and first half of the 13th century.

Dolopathos -- A king meets a fairy woman who claims to be queen of the forest. The two marry and produce seven children with golden chains around their neck. The sons become swans until all except one are changed back to humans. The brother that remains a swan pulls a knight, the Swan Knight, in a boat using his gold chain.

Elioxe -- King Lothair from 'beyond Hungary,' meets the fairy Elioxe who comes from inside a mountain. They have seven swan children including one who is said will become a "king of the orient," (un roi d'Orient). Again one brother remains a swan and pulls the boat of his Swan Knight brother.

King Oriant of Lillefort (Illefort) the "strong island," marries Beatrix and the rest of the story follows the same pattern with swan children, and the Swan Knight drawn in his boat by his swan brother. "Oriant" or "Oryant" is an archaic form of French "Orient," and this name has been linked by some with "un roi d'Orient" of Elioxe.

These early stories mention either a 'king of the east' or indicate a fairy kingdom, which might also be an indication of an eastern location. Elioxe places the scene vaguely "beyond Hungary." The late 13th century Lohengrin places the Swan Knight in India along with the Holy Grail.

From the 15th to 17th centuries, a series of works claiming earlier sources have the Swan Knight born in the terrestrial paradise, and founding the House of Cleves rather than that of Bouillon. In 1478 Gert van der Schuren, secretary of the first Duke of Cleves, says that the Swan Knight "comes from the earthly paradise, which some call the Grail." He claimed to have learned this from a lost 13th century work of Helinandus. Dutch historian John Veldenaer in 1480 also citing earlier sources says: "Some chronicles say that the Knight of the Swan came out of the ' Gral,' as the paradise on earth was earlier called."

In 1609, the tutor of the Duke of Cleves named Stephanus Vinandus Pighius claimed that: "Some ancient chronicles assert that this Helius came from a certain splendid earthly paradise called Grail and that he came in a boat."

The words gral, grail, graele, etc. in these accounts is thought to be the same "graal" first mentioned by Chretien i.e, the Holy Grail; and thus refers to the Grail Realm. In Parzival, Wolfram von Eschenbach writes:

Upon a silken cushion green
She bore the wish of paradise,
Root and branch before their eyes.
A thing it was they called the grail.
Earthly wishes' fullest tale...

The grail's a prize from Eden's shore,
Earthly pleasures' fullest store,
In much 'tis heaven's counterpart

The Swan Knight associated with the House of Cleves was not apparently the same one found in the legend of Godfrey de Bouillon as Pighius says that the knight arrives at Nimegen in 732. According to the legend, the Swan Knight is called forth on his mission by a bell located in the earthly paradise or in some mountain on his unknown home. Therefore, he is sent periodically over the ages to perform his calling, which seems linked with protecting the rights of women. In three cases, he defends the duchesses of Brabant and Cleves; and the countess of Bouillon -- all in the Low Countries that are today known as Benelux -- from marauding dukes intent on forcibly taking their inheritance.

Pighius, Hermann Stangefol (1656) and other later writers tended to dismiss the wondrous tales of an earthly paradise and gave other explanations, for example, that the Swan Knight came from a monastery called Paradise in Thurgau.

However, in the earlier accounts the concept of the terrestrial paradise places it squarely at the furthest East in the Indies. Even Parzival's Wasteland, the realm of the Grail, while appearing to refer to Jerusalem in part, also by analogy, points to the eastern paradise and it was there that Lohengrin, his Swan Knight, was born.



The Ebstorf Map (1234) of Gervase of Tilbury is a traditional "flat earth" type of map showing the world in the form of the Corpus Domini. Notice the head of Christ at the top of the map, which signifies the East, near Paradise; with the feet at the bottom, or West; and the hands in the directions North and South, or right and left respectively. Click on image for full scalable version.



Close-up showing Christ's head signifying the East, to the left of which is the Terrestrial Paradise in an inset with Adam, Eve, the Tree of Knowledge and the Serpent. Notice the word "India" below this depiction of the Garden of Eden near the right-hand corner.



Gervais crammed all the legendary places of the East and the Indies found in the Alexandrine and other romances in his mappa mundi. Click on image for full version detailing certain locations and peoples including Chryse, the Cynocephali, the Kingdom of Women and the Tomb of St. Thomas.


Now the Crusade Cycle generally has the Swan Knight coming in his boat to Nijmegen (Nymegen) or Mainz, drawn by a swan, to rescue the lady of Bouillon from the Duke of Saxony. Their daughter becomes the mother, so they say, of Godfrey of Bouillon.

We find the story of a child, Sceaf, coming on a rudderless boat to Scandea (Scandinavia) in Beowulf and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle both of the 8th century. Here it appears to be borrowed partly from Pseudo-Methodius as Sceaf is called, like Jonitus, the fourth son of Noah in the Anglo-Saxon genealogies and regnal lists. The European writers further made Sceaf the ark-born son of Noah from which idea apparently was derived the Swan Knight's boat.

Jonitus was closely associated in medieval Europe with Paradise, living himself in Nod to the east of Eden; and credited with having brought the seeds, fruit or branches of the Tree of Paradise from which was planted the tree used to make the cross of Christ.

Again, it was one of the lineage of Jonitus who would come in the end-times to conquer the Saracens and Jerusalem heralding the Second Coming. In Gerbert de Montreuil's continuation of Chretien's Conte du Graal written around 1226-30, Perceval is told in a vision that he will have a son from whose seed will descend the Swan Knight, who will in turn liberate Jerusalem and the Holy Sepulchre. Here again we find the Tiburtine Sibyl's prophecy of the Last Emperor who regains the tomb of Christ.

Whether fiction or (partly) truth, giving Godfrey the leader of the First Crusade a descent from the Swan Knight was to link him, at least through analogy, with Sibylline prophecies of the "king from the East," and with those of Pseudo-Methodius by suggesting lineage from Jonitus.

Swan Knight tales are centered in the multi-lingual areas of French Walloon, Flemish and Dutch speakers -- now known as Benelux -- and a bit southward into the German-speaking area of Mainz. Across northern France was the locus of fairy-related tales in Brittany and Anjou, also multi-lingual. This whole region between and including Brittany and the Netherlands contributed most of the participants in the First Crusade.

Interesting from an esoteric standpoint were the stories of the marriages of the Swan Knight and the Melusine, the female fairy type, with "humans." In the case of the Melusine, her husband was instructed never to look at her while she bathed. Inevitably the curious husband would succumb to curiosity discovering his wife's serpent form. The Swan Knight had the condition that his wife should never ask his true name or origin. Again, the wife would eventually break the agreement upon which the Swan Knight would take his leave on a swan-pulled boat headed for regions unknown.

In each case, there was a need to keep the real identity, the fairy identity, secret. Interesting also is the swan or bird identity of the male fairy, while the female fairy is serpentine -- a pattern that we have discussed here before.


The case of Prester John

In the century that followed the First Crusade, we find also that Prester John apparently makes claims in his famed letters based on the same concept of the millenarian "king from the east."

There have been attempts to analyze the internal evidence provided by the Prester John letters, one of the best undertaken by Vsevolod Slessarev.

Slessarev surmised, primarily due to the negative comments made against the Byzantine emperor, that the author of the letter to Manuel must have been a forgery by a Western Christian author. However, as noted by Sabine Baring-Gould, the slights against Rome appear even more intense in the same letter. Indeed, the eastern king says that one of his descendents would conquer Rome and all the Western Christian kingdoms!

In the letter addressed to the "Emperor of Rome" (Frederick Barbarossa) and the "King of France," Prester John only mentions his promise to retake the Holy Sepulchre and "all the Promised Land."

Nowhere does Prester John claim to be a member of, or the desire to be a member of, the Byzantine or Roman churches. Indeed, the importance given to St. Thomas and the titles of church officials attached to his kingdom give, as Baring-Gould notes, a solid indication of Nestorian bias. And in the message given by Hugh of Gabala earlier in the century, Prester John is expressely described as a Nestorian king.

The insults to Byzantine and Western Christian kingdoms make it unlikely also that the letters were sent by anyone living in those kingdoms. Yet, the knowledge of the political intrigues of Jerusalem, including those involving the Templars, hint that the letters were at least informed by someone living close to but not in the crusader kingdoms.

One manuscript of the letter to Emperor Manuel contains a note indicating it was translated from Greek into Latin by Archbishop Christian of Mainz. Versions of this letter do contain Greco-Latin forms such as "Romeon" instead of "Romanorum." Another manuscript claims to be translated into Latin from Arabic. Quite probably, the letters mentioned by Albericus in the Chronicon were in different languages -- the one to Emperor Manuel in Greek and that to Emperor Frederick in Latin -- for example.

There would have been little difficulty in obtaining translators for these letters. Many learned Arabs were very familiar with Greek, having helped preserved the ancient Greek corpus, and some were also versed in Latin. Aspects of the Alexandrine romantic literature, which pervade the Prester John letters, would have been widely familiar to scholars in the Muslim world.

As to the claim of forgery, we can note again as earlier in this blog that both letters mentioned here give indications of a previous meeting of envoys, who may also have aided in the composition of the letters between the monarchs.

In the letter to Manuel, we read:

Receive the dignity of our hierarch in our name and use it for they own sake, because we gladly use your vase of oil, in order that we mutually strengthen and corroborate our virtue.

Also according to Albericus:

Our Majesty has been informed that you hold our Excellency in love, and that the report of our greatness has reached you. Moreover we have heard through our treasurer that you have been pleased to send to us some objects of art and interest, that our Exaltedness might be gratified thereby.

Being human, I receive it in good part, and we have ordered our treasurer to send you some of our articles in return.

And in the letter to Frederick and Louie VII, Prester John states:

We beg you to keep in mind the holy pilgrimage, and may it take place soon, and may you be brave and of great courage, and pray, do not forget to put to death those treacherous Templars and pagans and, please, send us an answer with the envoy who brought the presents.

These statements indicate that envoys had been working behind the scenes and also suggest a previous exchange of gifts. Similar contact between envoys in found in Pope Alexander III's letter to Prester John. Obviously had such contact not taken place, the letters would be immediately revealed as fraudulent. Thus, a consistent tradition would indicate that such diplomatic contacts had taken place during the events recorded by Albericus starting in 1165. There must have been reasonable cause for the Pope, emperors and other kings to whom the letters were sent to have believed in their validity and in the integrity of the envoys. In addition, they must have had some reason to believe in the possibility of the self-described "Prester John" to fulfill some of the promises he offered in the correspondence.

However, the reason for mentioning these letters here is that both give indications that Prester John was appealing to the same millenarian yearnings that helped fuel the crusades, and which were likely linked with the Swan Knight legend.

In the letter to Frederick Barbarossa and Louis VII, Prester John promises to liberate the Holy Sepulchre and capture the entire Christian Holy Land -- a link with Sibylline prophecy. Furthermore he states that his own success was prophesied to his father:

Know that I had been blessed before I was born, for God sent an angel to my father who told him to build a palace full of God's grace and a chamber of paradise for the child to come, who was to be the greatest king on earth and to live for a long time.

The letter to Manuel also gives apocalyptic utterances:

These accursed fifteen nations will burst forth from the four quarters of the earth at the end of the world, in the times of Antichrist, and overrun all the abodes of the Saints as well as the great city Rome, which, by the way, we are prepared to give to our son who will be born, along with all Italy, Germany, the two Gauls, Britain and Scotland. We shall also give him Spain and all the land as far as the icy sea. The nations to which I have alluded, according to the words of the prophet, shall not stand in the judgment, on account of their offensive practices, but will be consumed to ashes by a fire which will fall on them from heaven.

Prester John was in effect claiming to be the promised "king from the east" of the pre-crusade prophecies.

As an aside it is worth mentioning that Prester John apparently had also requested Alexander III for permission to build a church in Rome and an altar in Jerusalem. Previously we have noted that the king of Zabag had engaged, as part of his policy of attraction, in building projects in India and China. Edrisi, writing around 1154, states that the king of Zabag was still actively trading along the African coast at that time. However, we hear nothing of the envoy sent by Alexander III to Prester John. Maybe this is not too surprising as Chinese annals record that the last envoys sent from this kingdom came in the year 1178, only a year after Alexander III's envoy was dispatched. The eastern king was named in transliterated Chinese characters Si-li-ma-ha-la-sha.

After the 1178 embassy, no more is heard of the kingdom during the remainder of the Sung dynasty or in the Yuan dynasty that followed.


Swan Knight as sleeping hero

In most versions of the Swan Knight tale, the hero comes sleeping on a boat from his mysterious homeland.

In the Wartburgkrieg written in the first half of the 13th century, we read:

How Arthur lives within the mount and many heroes bold,
Hundreds she to me did name;
With him from Britain's isle they came,
Nor may their names to any churl be told.

And Arthur too has sent forth knights
To Christendom since he departed mortal sight.
Hear how these a tocsin calls

Many thousand miles away,
Wherefrom a noble count hath lost his life in fray;
Hear how pride hath made him false,

Hear too the tale about this bell: all of Arthur's singers
Must leave their art and cease to sing,
For in their ears the bell doth ring,
Whence in the court no trace of pleasure lingers.

The Sibyl's child, Felicia,
With Arthur there both she and Juno are,
That from Saint Brandan's lips I know full well. Nor yet does Klinsor this explain,
Who is the knight whom Arthur has sent out again,
And neither does he say who 'tis who rings the bell. . . .

Canst thou to us in song explain
How Loherangrin by Arthur was sent forth again?"

Here King Arthur lives within a far-off hollow mountain together with Loherangrin, the Swan Knight, and other notables -- the Roman goddess Juno; Felicia, daughter of the Sibyl; and St. Brandon, who sailed east from Ireland to the "Island of Paradise" also called the "Promised Land of the Saints" never to be heard from again. This is the mountain of the "sleeping heroes" that appears so often in later medieval works.

Arthur probably first appears in a subterranean realm in Etienne's Draco Normannicus (1167-9) were he is described as 'King of the Underworld' in the far-off Antipodes. This is Avalon, or as called in Tristan, 'Avelun, the fairy land.'

Gervais of Tilbury and Caesarius of Heisterbach, both writing in the same period as the Wartburgkrieg also mention the underground realm of Arthur. However, rather than place the Arthurian underworld in the Garden of Eden, they rather place it in or on Mt. Aetna in Silicy, the entrance to Hell in some medieval traditions. Caesarius writes:

At the time when Emperor Henry had subjugated Sicily there was in the bishopric of Palermo a certain deacon who was, I think, a German. When one day he lost his best palfrey he sent his servant to look for it in various places. The servant met an old man who said to him: ' Where are you going and what are you looking for?' When the servant replied that he was hunting for his master's horse the old man rejoined that he knew where it was. ' And where?' asked the servant. ' In Mount Gyber [Aetna],' was the reply: ' there my lord King Arthur has it, and this mountain spits forth fire like Vesuvius.' To the astonished servant he said further, ' Tell your master that he come here in forty days to the court of King Arthur. If you neglect to tell him you will be heavily punished.' The servant went back and tremblingly told his master what he had heard. When the deacon heard he had been invited to the court of Arthur he laughed, but on the day set he was stricken and died. These things Godescalcus, canon of Bonn, told us, and said that they happened in recent times.

In this description, the domain of Arthur is described in volcanic terms as it "spits forth fire like Vesuvius."


Joe and the Volcano

The idea that the grail paradise of the Swan Knight was volcanic may also be seen in a latter tradition that equates this mountain home with the Venusberg of Tannhauser fame.

The Saxon Chronicle of Caspar Abel discovered in 1732 but dated to the 15th century says of Lohengrin "that he came from that mountain where Venus is in the grail." This hollow mountain of Venus is likened to hell and the fires of Vesuvius in the Tannhauser literature.

We can venture to the land of Prester John during medieval times for signs of active volcanoes near the area where most medieval geographers placed the Terrestrial Paradise.

In the mid-ninth century, we read in the Akbar al-Sin wa'l Hind: "...near Zabaj is a mountain called the Mountain of Fire, which it is not possible to approach. Smoke escapes from it by day and a flame by night, and from its foot comes forth a spring of cold fresh water and a spring of hot water."

Al-Mas'udi, writing about a century later, says:

There is no volcano on earth which makes a greater noise, nor any the smoke of which is more black, or the flames more copious, than that which is in the kingdom of the Maharaj [Zabag].

He further describes this volcano:

From these mountains issues fire, by day and night. By day it has a dark appearance, and at night it shines red. It rises to such a height, that it reaches the regions of the heaven (i.e. it ascends above the atmosphere). The explosion is accompanied with a noise like the loudest thunder. Sometimes a strange sound proceeds from these volcanos, which is indicative that their king will die; and, if the sound is lower, it foretells the death of one of their chiefs. They know the meaning of these sounds, by long habit and experience. This is one of the great chimneys (craters) of the earth. At no great distance is another island, from which, constantly, the sound of drums, lutes, fifes, and other musical instruments, and the noise of dancing, and various amusements, are heard. Sailors, who have passed this place, believe that the Dajjal (Antichrist) occupies this island.

Prester John's letters mention a river of stones and sea of sand that can also be interpreted as representing volcanic activity:

"Three days' journey from this sea are mountains from which rolls down a stony, waterless river, which opens into the sandy sea. As soon as the stream reaches the sea, its stones vanish in it, and are never seen again....In our territory is a certain waterless sea consisting of tumbling billows of sand never at rest. None have crossed this sea -- it lacks water all together, yet fish of various kinds are cast up upon the beach, very tasty, and the like are nowhere else to be seen."

The river of stones is part of a quite unusual reference to the Sambatyon River that sequestered the Lost Ten Tribes of Israel. The references to the Sambatyon in Jewish literature appear to describe volcanic events. We also find in Prester John's letter to Emperor Manuel, mention of the salamander and the fire-proof cloth that it was supposed to spin:

In one of our lands, hight Zone, are worms called in our tongue Salamanders. These worms can only live in fire, and they build cocoons like silkworms, which are unwound by the ladies of our palace, and spun into cloth and dresses, which are worn by our Exaltedness. These dresses in order to be cleaned and washed are cast into flames.

Similar tales are told in Chinese works at least by 520 CE in the Liang Si Gong Zhi where we hear of the "Island of Fire" and "Burning Mountain" located near Fusang, the Cynocephali and the Kingdom of Women. These latter kingdoms are linked to very much the same region that is later known as Sanfotsi and Toupo i.e, the lands of Zabag and Wakwak, although the Liang Si Gong Zhi gives exaggerated distances between these lands.

Upon the summit of the mountain Yen- kuen [Burning Mountain] there live fire rats (ho-shu), the hair of which serves also for the fabrication of an incombustible stuff, which is cleansed by fire instead of by water.

Berthold Laufer thought the material described was not asbestos, as sometimes suggested, but instead a type of barkcloth made of "a certain wood, which, laid in the fire, burns, sparkles, and flames, yet consumes not, and yet a man may rub it to powder betwixt his fingers."

He quotes the Liang annals contemporary with the previous source: "On Volcano Island there are trees which grow in the fire. The people in the vicinity of the island peel off the bark, and spin and weave it into cloth hardly a few feet in length. This they work into kerchiefs, which do not differ in appearance from textiles made of palm and hemp fibres...".

Curiously, Sung Dynasty writings do not mention the volcanic eruptions given for the 100-year period between the 9th and 10th centuries found in Muslim works. Ma Tuan-lin does mention volcanic islands in the region concerned, but he appears to be copying much earlier works.

If we take that this volcano mentioned is Pinatubo, the documented eruptions are either too early or too late to match the related time period. However, J.C. Gaillard has noted that wood samples dating from 1670-1802 bp related to the filling of the paleo-shoreline of the Pampanga Bay may indicate an undocumented eruption phase. A vast area of the Pampanga Bay was filled with sediment, and Gaillard rightly notes that this likely did not happen after the last pre-Pinatubo eruption known as the Buag phase (800-500 bp), since Spanish chronicles make no mention of the phenomenon.

The wood sample dated at 1670 bp (WW-4685) would put the event very close to the eruptive activity indicated in the Liang Dynasty records. And there is evidence that the sedimentation mostly ended by 1000 bp when sea levels reached their present state. We could then postulate that instead of one massive explosive eruption, there was a long eruptive phase likely consisting of periodic eruptions that gradually filled in the Pampanga Bay between 1800 bp and 1000 bp.

Such eruptive activity and filling in of the Pampanga Bay could account for the river of stones and the sea of sand mentioned in Prester John's letter that would have been written about a century after the shoreline stabilized. However, either some minor activity may have continued or else the long history of volcanic eruption had worked its way into local tradition.

Additionally we find that both Prester John's letter and the Chinese notices of Sanfotsi (Zabag) contain references to subterranean regions.

From Prester John:

Near the wilderness trickles between barren mountains a subterranean rill, which can only by chance be reached, for only occasionally the earth gapes, and he who would descend must do it with precipitation, ere the earth closes again.

And from Zhao Rugua's description of Sanfotsi:

There is an old tradition that the ground in this country once suddenly gaped open and out of the cavern came many myriads of cattle, which rushed off in herds into the mountains, though the people all tried to get them for food. Afterwards the crevice got stopped up with bamboo and trees and disappeared.

We can see then a good match between the volcanic, underworld paradise of the Swan Knight and Arthur, and the historical eastern kingdoms of Zabag-Sanfotsi; and I would also suggest the kingdom of Prester John.

Here we have the same region where Iranian legend places Kangdez the hollow mountain fortress of sleeping heroes waiting for the apocalypse, and the Sea of Milk where Visnu's sleeping avatars await the end of the old era before awakening.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Baring-Gould, S. Curious Myths of the Middle Ages. London: Rivingtons, 1867.

Collins, John Joseph. The Apocalyptic Imagination: An Introduction to Jewish Apocalyptic Literature. The biblical resource series. Grand Rapids, Mich: William B. Eerdmans, 1998.

Frassetto, Michael. The Year 1000: Religious and Social Response to the Turning of the First Millennium. New York: Palgrave/Macmillan, 2002.

Gaillard, J.C. "Mt Pinatubo and the Kapampangan region before 1991," IN: K-list: Kapampangan List, 2005, http://groups.yahoo.com/group/k-list/message/11263.

Gaillard, J.C., F.G. Delfin, Jr., E.Z. Dizon, J.A. Larkin, V.J. Paz, E.G. Ramos, C.T. Remotigue, K.S. Rodolfo, F.P. Siringan, J.L.A. Soria, J.V. Umbal. "Anthropogenic dimension of the eruption of Mount Pinatubo, Philippines, between 800 and 500 years BP," L’anthropologie. 102(2), 2005: 249-266.

Laufer, Berthold. "Asbestos and Salamander: An Essay in Chinese and Hellenistic Folklore," T'oung-pao XVI, 1915, 299-373.

Myers, Geoffrey M., Emanuel J. Mickel, and Jan Nelson. La Naissance Du Chevalier Au Cygne. The Old French Crusade cycle, v. 1. University: University of Alabama Press, 1977.

Schein, Sylvia. Gateway to the Heavenly City: Crusader Jerusalem and the Catholic West (1099-1187). Church, faith, and culture in the medieval West. Aldershot, Hants, England: Ashgate, 2005.

Schwartz, Hillel. Century's End: A Cultural History of the Fin De Siècle--from the 990s Through the 1990s. New York: Doubleday, 1990.

Slessarev, Vsevolod. Prester John; The Letter and the Legend. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1959.

Soria, J., Siringan, F., Parreno, P. "Compaction rates and paleo-sea levels along the delta complex north of Manila Bay, Luzon Island, Philippines," Science Diliman, North America, 17, jun. 2007. Available at: http://journals.upd.edu.ph/index.php/sciencediliman/article/view/63/14. Date accessed: 09 May. 2009.

More on Prester John

A few decades after the exchange of letters between Pope Alexander III and Prester John, the Mongols began to erupt from their homeland on conquests across Asia.

The Mongols destroyed both the Seljuk empire and the Assassin strongholds in Iran and Syria.

Not surprisingly, there were many in Europe who wondered if the Mongols might be linked with the earlier overtures of Prester John. The confused accounts of Jacques de Vitry and others helped to fuel this speculation. From this point onward, two developments occurred with reference to the perception of Prester John.

Firstly was that the Christian king was based somewhere in "Tartary" i.e. in the region around the Altai mountains and the Mongol homeland. The other line of thought, that developed more in latter times, was that Prester John was the same as the Negus, the emperor of Ethiopia.

When first approached about Prester John, the Mongols ridiculed the ambassador of Pope Innocent IV. However in 1248, a Persian khan who had converted to Christianity sent an embassy to Louis IX at Cyrpus. They reported that the present Great Khan of the Mongols had married the daughter of Prester John. Interestingly, the work attributed to John Mandeville published more than a century later claimed that it was traditional for the Great Khan and Prester John to exchange their daughters in marriage. Both the king of the Naimans and the king of the Keraites evidentally claimed to be Prester John during this period. However, the rise of Timur (Tamerlane) and the Islamization of the Mongols turned European hopes in Prester John toward Ethiopia. The idea of an Ethiopian Prester John dates at least to Friar Jordanus in 1328 and maybe goes back, in part, to Jacques de Vitry.

However, the first papal embassy occurs in 1441 in which the Negus apparently accepts his identification as Prester John. During the great explorations of the 15th and 16th centuries, the Portuguese equated Prester John with the Emperor of Ethiopia.

Despite the rise of the Mongol and Ethiopian versions of Prester John, the original idea of a Prester John of the Indies never totally died out. Marino Sanuto, for example, an early 14th century Venetian statesman advocated the establishment of a papal fleet in the Indian Ocean and located Prester John in the far East Indies. The text of John Mandeville has the same opinion in the middle of the 14th century. The location of this Christian king in the Indies of the extreme East was also nearly the exclusive interpretation of the medieval romance literature including the Grail cycle.

We have to wait though until the middle of the 15th century to find what appears to be another major embassy from a Prester John of the Indies.

Di Conti and the Eastern Ambassador

Fra Alberto de Sarteano, a papal envoy to Ethiopia, returned to the Council of Florence in 1441 with a great foreign contigent consisting of Copts, Ethiopians from Jerusalem and two important individuals -- the Venetian traveler Nicolo di Conti and an unnamed ambassador from an unnamed Nestorian kingdom in "Upper India."

As discussed previously, Nicolo di Conti had, as told by Pero Tafur, spent many years in the service of Prester John who lived in somewhere in the Indies of the East. According to Tafur, this Prester John had a great interest in Christian Europe and had attempted to send embassies to the West during di Conti's sojourn.

Quite naturally, one could expect that when di Conti decided to return to Europe that Prester John would have seen an excellent opportunity to send an emissary along with the Venetian traveler. The envoy that came with di Conti in de Sarteano's group though is never identified, nor is his kingdom. The papal secretary Poggio Bracciolini describes the ambassador's kingdom as located in "Upper India to the north" about 20 days from Cathay (northern China).

"Upper India" during this period meant the Indies beyond the Ganges sometimes including South China. Vespucci and Magellan, for example, considered Maluku, the Spice Islands, as belonging to the region of Upper India.

The very mention of a Nestorian kingdom in Upper India should have conjured up images of Prester John in the minds of at least some informed persons of the time. Conti also mentions Nestorians near Cathay but without further specifics on location. However, it was during this period that the Pope was actively seeking relations with the Negus of Ethiopia who had the formal title of "Prester John." So the silence in Poggio's account of 1447 is understandable.

Also, the Prester John of the Indies during this time becomes more generally known as "Emperor Thomas of the Indians" after St. Thomas, the supposed evangelizer of the East, as opposed to "Emperor Prester John of the Ethiopians." Pope Eugenius IV in 1439 addressed identical letters to these two emperors.

Di Conti's testimony is widely believed to have created the idea that the East Indies and Cathay could be reached by sailing west from Europe. And Paolo Toscanelli, who directly influenced Columbus, also claimed to have spoken with the mysterious ambassador who came with De Sarteano's retinue. Columbus himself copied one of Toscanelli's letters that mentions the testimony of di Conti.

Indeed when Columbus set out on his fateful first journey, he carried a credential letter from Ferdinand and Isabella to be delivered to Prester John, the Great Khan and any other Eastern monarchs he encountered. Here is a translation of the letter:

Ferdinand and Isabella, to the King ____________

The Spanish Sovereigns have heard that You and Your Subjects have a great affection for them and for Spain. They are further aware that you and your subjects are very desirous of information concerning Spain ; they accordingly send their Admiral, Christopher Columbus, who will tell you that they are in good health and perfect prosperity.

Granada, April 30, 1492

Both Columbus, and Magellan after him, intended on sailing to the East Indies off the coast of South China. The difference was that Columbus was not aware of the great distance and continents that lie between him and his destination. On his second voyage, Columbus had heard from his men of Taino Indians dressed in white cloaks. The navigator concluded that he must have reached the land of Prester John!

Now it makes sense that Columbus like Magellan would seek a friendly king on the other side of the earth, particularly a Christian one, so we are taken back to the Nestorian ambassador who came along with di Conti to the Council of Florence and whose testimony was published some 45 years earlier. Toscanelli had written to Columbus about the Christians in the East, and we know that Columbus himself had notions of a grand alliance between these Christians, or those to be converted to Christianity, in his desire for a reconquest of Jerusalem. The gold of Ophir that Columbus assigned to the same region, would finance this great project -- in fulfillment, Columbus thought, of biblical prophecy.

So it is from the Eastern ambassador and di Conti that we have the last record of these friendly Christians in the East before Columbus' first journey. Di Conti, described by Tafur as a once-subject of Prester John and the ambassador who very likely came from the same kingdom.

The "Christian" conquest of Jerusalem though did not occur until 1917 when the British captured the city from the Ottomans after the Battle of Jerusalem. The British eventually though surrendered the city to Israel and Jordan in 1949, and the rest of course is history.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Hastings, James, John A. Selbie, and Louis H. Gray. Encyclopædia of Religion and Ethics, Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, 1908, see entry for "Prester John."

Heat Moon, William Least. Columbus in the Americas. Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley, 2002, 118.

Rogers, Francis Millet. The Quest for Eastern Christians, Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1962, 39-40, 44.

Tarducci, Francesco, and Henry F. Brownson. The Life of Christopher Columbus, Detroit: H.F. Brownson, 1891, 114.

Prester John and the Assassins

In 1145, Otto of Freising wrote that in the previous year Hugh, bishop of Jabala in Syria, came as an emissary of Prince Raymond of Antioch to the court of Pope Eugene III in Viterbo to call for the Second Crusade.

He told Otto, in the pope's presence, that Prester John had routed the brother monarchs of the "Medes and Persia" and captured the city of Ecbatana "not many years ago."

Scholars have generally attributed Hugh's news to the victory of the Karakhitai empire over the Great Seljuk Sultan Sanjar near Samarkand.

However, this interpretation has also been rightly criticized on various grounds. First, the Karakhitai victory occurred a good thousand miles away, as the crow flies, from Ectabana, which is identified as the modern Hamadan in northwest Iran. Hamadan was never in any danger from the Karakhitai. Also, Hugh's account does not mention the victories in the areas where the fighting actually took place between Sultan Sanjar and the Karakhitai.

Sultan Sanjar's brothers were dead by 1141 when the battle with the Karakhitai occurred, so there was no question of any brother monarchs. P. Bruun has rightly suggested that the brother monarchs mentioned by Hugh must have been the Hamadan Seljuk Sultan Mas'ud and his brother Sultan Da'ud.

Mas'ud became sultan in Hamadan and ruled most of the territory of the ancient Medes.

In 1143, the Assassins killed Sultan Da'ud and defeated Mas'ud's army at Lamasar and other areas in the Rudbar. They also assassinated the qadis of Hamadan, Tiflis and Quhistan.

Bishop Hugh may have been referring to these victories, although they would have occurred just the year before his visit. Possibly Sultan Mas'ud after his defeat may have even temporarily withdrawn from Hamadan allowing the Assassins to claim a brief hold over the city. Certainly the Assassin victories come much closer geographically to Bishop Hugh's relation even if the event occurred more recently than suggested by Otto's account.


Assassins and Sayabiga

Now previously in this blog it was suggested that there was a link between the Assassins and the Sayabiga, who would have originated from Zabag. This latter kingdom, according again to the theory laid out here, was the actual realm of "Prester John" as known during this period.

The Assassins belonged to the Nizari sect of the Isma'ili branch of Shi'a Islam. The Isma'ilis had apparently adopted many "dervish" elements that are thought to have come from the East and have been linked by some with the Zutt and Sayabiga peoples who were present in the region when Muslims overthrew the Sassanian empire.

Interestingly, one etymology for the word "assassin" comes from "al-sasani." Farhad Daftary mentions a saying in Tripoli, not far from former Assassin strongholds, that suggests such an origin. However, "sasani" here refers not to the Sassanian rulers but to the Banu Sasan, the Islamic underworld.

The Sasan here is the ancient one, the son of Bahman, who was forced to raise sheep after his father bequeathed his kingdom to his sister. From that point onward, sasan became a word denoting beggars, street entertainers, con-artists and the like.

As noted earlier in this blog, the Banu Sasan had their own jargon that contained words believed to be of "dervish" origin and which have also been linked to the Zutt and Sayabiga. Thus, the same types of spiritual and cultural undercurrents can be found in both among the Isma'ilis, and thus the Nizari Assassins, and the Banu Sasan.

In the One Thousand and One Nights, we hear that one of the main characters, Shariyar, is called "King of Kings of the Banu Sasan, the Isles of India and of China." The term "king of the isles of India" was often used to describe the Mihraj, the ruler of Zabag, who was not of course also the ruler of China. However, if we look at the latter dominion as literary exaggeration, the link of the "King of the Banu Sasan" with the "King of the Isles of India" could be explained by the presence of the Sayabiga as an important element of the Banu Sasan.

In this regard we can also take the text of John Mandeville, whether such a person existed or not, as evidence of a confirming tradition. Mandeville states that the "Old Man of the Mountain," the European term for the ruler of the Assassins was under the "lordship of Prester John." Bruun notes that a German text of this period, latter than that of Otto, calls Prester John the "King of Armenia and India" with Armenia located in the ancient region of the Medes.


Silence of texts

Besides the possible origin of the word "assassin" and the curious account of the Arabian Nights, one might wonder why no Isma'ili or Sunni texts mention a relationship between the Nizaris and the Mihraj.

However, according to the position taken in this blog, the silence is not that problematic. The King of Zabag (Mihraj), known in Europe as Prester John, became involved in the region to protect his interests on the old sea trade routes from Sunni Muslim expansion.

The Shi'ite Nizari Assassins were natural enemies of the Sunnis as were the Christians. The Mihraj then would have naturally desired to acquire these two as allies to help curb Sunni expansion.

As this included bringing on another crusade, it was natural that any such conspiracy be kept secret by the Nizaris. Even though there was no love loss between Sunni and Shi'a, it still may have been viewed as unacceptable to openly cooperate with "infidels" against fellow Muslims.

Previously in this blog it was also suggested that Prester John attempted to work partly through the Knights Templar in reaching Christian Europe. The Templars likewise would wisely have to conceal any relationship that would have involved cooperating with the Assassins, for which they were in fact often under suspicion.

Prester John, the Isma'ilis and Templars all stood to benefit by curbing Sunni expansionism, but the latter two also needed to work secretly.

Islamic merchant ships headed eastward normally sailed from Basra stopping at the port of Daybul in the Sind (modern coastal Pakistan) before venturing on to other parts of India, Southeast Asia and China. The Sind is an important area because of its connection with both the Zutt and Sayabiga. The Fatimid had established an Isma'ili presence in the Sind in 883, which has lasted to this day.

Bernard Lewis has suggested that the Fatimid Isma'ili intended on monopolizing the eastern sea trade by diverting shipping from the Persian Gulf to the Red Sea. He states that the Fatimids had sent agents to attempt gaining control of the coasts of Baluchistan and Sind for this purpose. Although they did not appear to win over the actual coastlines, a Fatimid Isma'ili principality was established in Upper Sind with its capital at Multan. Ibn Hawqal mentions that Baluchis of Kirman and Sijistan also had accepted the Isma'ili faith. Prester John may have offered the Isma'ili an opportunity to realize their dream of trade dominance at a time when the Fatimid empire had been reduced to the confines of Egypt and when the Nizaris were under heavy persecution.

Now as suggested earlier in this blog, Prester John would have been a patron of Nestorian Christianity along with other religions, and he had no qualms in representing himself as a "Christian king" especially as this also suited his mundane ambitions. A Metropolian of Dabag, the Nestorian name for Zabag, had been established since at least 410 CE.

Possibly Prester John's Christian overtures through Sayabiga-Assassin agents may account for the curious testimony of both William, Archbishop of Tyre (c. 1130 – 1185) and Jacques de Vitry, Bishop of Acre. (c. 1160/70 – 1240 or 1244). Both had claimed that the chief of the Assassins had converted to Christianity. Daftary believes this confusion may have arose from the authors' misunderstanding of the doctrine of qiyama, which relieved believers from the tenets of shari'a law. However, another explanation is that the two clergymen were aware of Templar dealings with the Assassins and had assumed or been led to believe in the latter's conversion.

Now it is worth noting that Raymond of Antioch, who sent Bishop Hugh as his emissary to the Pope, had granted the Amanus Mountains in his territory to the Knights Templar, and John Kinnamos records Templars fighting for Raymond when he was attacked by Byzantine emperor John Comnenus. Raymond apparently was not much liked by his enemies as Nur ed-din had his skull, after the prince was killed in battle, covered with silver and sent as a present to Baghdad's Sunni caliph. Sayabiga families had been previously specifically relocated to Antioch with their water buffaloes to help curb the lion population problem.

Wolfram von Eschenbach directly connects Prester John and the Templars in his historical romance possibly obtaining his information at the Angevin archives, which he claimed to have researched. The Angevins, of course, were heavily-involved both in Jerusalem and directly with the Templars. Albericus of Tres-Fontaines records that in 1165 envoys of Prester John brought letters to the courts of both the Byzantine and Holy Roman emperors. In 1177, Pope Alexander III writes in Indorum regi sacerdotum santissimo of a letter brought to him by his physician Philippus who had encountered emissaries of Prester John while traveling somewhere in the "East." In these letters, Prester John actually claims to have Templars in his service, although he criticizes them or those unfaithful among them who have allied themselves with the Muslims.

There are Frenchmen among you, of your lineage and from our retinue, who hold with the Saracens. You confide in them and trust in them that they should and will help you, but they are false and treacherous...may you be brave and of great courage and, pray, do not forget to put to death those treacherous Templars.

We might view Prester John's disclaimer of the Templars "who hold with the Saracens" as a strategic deception to avoid any appearance of his own connection with the Nizaris.

So to sum up, the Sayabiga had established themselves on the coasts of the Persian Gulf in pre-Islamic times and after the Muslim conquest converted to Shi'a Islam. Many found work as mercenaries while some others drifted into the underworld groups known as the Banu Sasan. Still others later became associated with the Nizaris. These Sayabiga likely still communicated with their former homeland of Zabag via the maritime spice routes.

As the fortunes of the Fatimid Isma'ili empire waned seriously in the late 11th century, the Sayabiga may have helped initiate contact with the Zabag empire and its king. The latter kingdom had already been involved in making alliances with China and India-Tibet as sea changes were occurring along the old maritime trade corridors.

Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Daftary, Farhad. The Ismāʻı̄lı̄s: Their History and Doctrines, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007.

Howarth, Stephen. The Knights Templar, New York: Dorset Press, 1991.

Maclean, Derryl N. Religion and Society in Arab Sind, Monographs and theoretical studies in sociology and anthropology in honour of Nels Anderson, publication 25. Leiden: E.J. Brill, 1989.

More on Tantric Influence in Grail Legend

Let's take a deeper look at the suggestion of "Tantric" influence on the Holy Grail legend.

Much research exists on the "Oriental" influences in Grail literature. German scholars have long supported the idea that the Grail epic was modeled on one or more Persian tales. Most of the theories involved pre-Islamic influences. One of the champions of direct Islamic influence was P. Ponsoye in his book L'Islam et le Graal.

Various etymologies were suggested, all open to question, for the unusual names in the Grail legend. The 19th century German writer Josef von Gorres suggested that Parzival was derived from Arabic Parsi-fal meaning "Pure Fool," a suggestion later followed by the composer Richard Wagner. Fridrich von Suhtshek explained the true form of the name as Parsi-wal meaning "Persian flower" or "pure, chaste flower."

Suhtshek also offered Persian prototypes for just about every other character in the Grail epic. Max Unger and Theodore Baker suggested that word "grail" was derived from Persian gohar "pearl" compounded with al "coruscating color." The latter also identify the location of the Grail Castle with the Persian fortress of Kou-i Kouadja. Swedish scholar Lars Ivar Ringbom suggested the Takht-i-Suleyman "Throne of Solomon" in Azerbaijan, which closely matched the descriptions given by Albert von Scharfenburg in Jüngere Titurel written around 1270.

Henry Corbin and Pierre Gallais have done an enormous amount of work equating the Grail with the Iranian Xvarenah jewel, and seeking roots of Grail concepts in Persian dervish-inspired Islamic mysticism.

Other Near Eastern influences have been suggested, but possibilities from further East are treated only more rarely. Alfred Nutt in the 19th century explored the possibility that the Holy Grail originates from the Patra, the Buddha's alms dish. Scholars though have generally avoided comparisons of Grail mysticism with Tantric beliefs except to mention such possibilities. There is however a fair amount written on this subject in popular and "New Age" literature.

One though can piece together two different areas of research to construct a framework for such influence. The area of origins and exchange between Islamic mysticism and Tantra is dealt with fairly thoroughly. In the same sense, the links between Shi'ite, Sufi, Ismaili and similar Muslim groups with European culture at the advent of Grail literature and the direct impact on the latter is equally well-studied.


Indian Influence on Dervishes

Many a scholar has suggested that the Persian dervish, rather strange to ancient Iranian religion, originates from the begging ascetic of India.

W. Ivanow suggested that the group known in Islamic literature as Zutt, originally from the Sind in India, helped spread these practices throughout the Middle East. The Zutt are thought to be related to the present-day Jats and are almost always mentioned in the literature together with the Sayabiga, a group thought to have originated in Zabag but to have domiciled in the Sind and along the Persian Gulf.

The Zutt have been linked both with the Islamic underworld group of entertainers, artisans and con artists known as the Banu Sasan, and with the origin of the Dom Gypsies. Ivanow found an element of Dervish jargon words used both among the Banu Sasan and all Middle Eastern Gypsy groups. The Qasida Sasaniyya of Abu Dulaf mentions that the Zutt were members of the Banu Sasan and we see a number of Indian words mixed in with this jargon speech.

Groups of Zutt and Sayabiga were relocated to the region of Antioch by the Islamic Caliphate, just north of the area that would later become the stronghold of the Syrian Assassins. This fact will become important when we examine the time frame of the first Grail stories.

Previously in this blog, it was suggested that the people of Zabag, or Suvarnadvipa as it was known in India, were deeply involved with groups in Tibet and India in the development of the Kalacakra Tantric doctrine. Thus, the Sayabiga along with the Zutt would have played a role in diffusion of Tantric-like ideas in the Middle East.

In India, where the Sind region was the early major stronghold for Islamic mysticism in South Asia, the mingling of Tantrism with both Sufi and Ismaili sects is historical and beyond doubt, but the early story in the Middle East is more fuzzy.

We find that one of the most important elements in Tantric doctrine in India is the importance of the feminine principle as compared to the situation in the previous brahmin-dominated system. In the Mahacinatantra, it states:

According to the Brahmayamalatantra, after meditating for a thousand years on the shore of the ocean Vasistha was visited by Devi who told him "he had adopted an altoghter wrong path; her worship was unknown in the Vedas; it was known only in the country of Mahacina; and that Vasistha would gain his object if he received instruction from Vishnu now residing there as Buddha.

The word "Devi" above refers to the female divinity, which in the Tantric view was not sufficiently recognized in Vedic religion. In Tantrism we also find a more important place for women in ritual, and just an overall better treatment of women in general.

We can see then that the most powerful male Tantric deities, including the supreme Kalacakra Deity, appear in icons embraced together with their female consorts. In addition, there are important independent female deities like Tara and Prajnaparamita, and a host of lesser goddesses like the Dakinis that are considered important for spiritual development. In many places in India associated with Tantrism, the worship of the goddess Sakti prevails especially among the royal families and in the villages.

While the place of women in Tantric religious ritual has declined, due probably to the "shocking" nature of some rites, a few more politically-correct remnants survive. For example, among the Newars of Kathmandu we find the ritual marriage of the specially-chosen goddess-child known as Kumari to the King of Nepal was practiced until very recently. Also found among the Newars is the symbolic marriage of young virgin girls known as Gauris to Suvarna-kumara of Suvarnabhumi (Golden Land), the latter represented by a bel tree fruit or a golden coin.

While there was no universal dictate against the disabilities that existed for women at the time, in many areas women achieved rights nearly equal to men in areas where Tantrism dominated. However, in some other areas, only marginal changes were made despite the increased stature of women in religious life in which all areas of initiation and worship were open to them.

Further to the West, we find that the Sufi mystics focused much more attention on the feminine principle in theology than was previously the case. Sufism produced great women saints like Rabia, a tradition that continued for centuries. The importance of marriage for both men and women was stressed less than in orthodox Islam. However, it was among the Ismaili sects that we witness some of the most marked developments in divine feminine thinking. Here we see the recognition of the dual principles -- the Kuni as the female and the Qadar as the male principle. Kuni was predominant and she is said to actually create Qadar from her own light. Ismaili women in many areas can lead prayers and religious ceremonies, and they pray and worship alongside their men.

Now even farther to the West, with the advent of the romance cycles we find that the Holy Grail, that was seen by some as a relic of Christ or as a manifestation of Divine Grace, was tended by Grail Maidens and borne in procession by a female Grail Bearer. Even the Grail itself as a cup, chalice, bowl, platter or stone had a decided female imagery. Even more important may be the identity of Cundrie, the woman from the East Indian kingdom of Tribalibot, as the Grail Messenger. Cundrie teaches, chastises, guides and even at times sustains not only the quester Parzival but also the entire Grail company.

Although this outlook as found in Grail literature had little impact on the role of women in the Catholic Church, the rise of "courtly love" and chivalry as present in medieval epics did signal a generally more favorable position and better treatment at least for women of the noble classes.


Human Body as Microcosm of Cosmos

Earlier in this blog, the Kalacakra belief that cosmic time cycles were mirrored in the human body was discussed. This is part of a strong Tantric belief that the human body represents the universe in microcosm.

We find the same sentiments in Islamic mystic tradition. Corbin discusses various beliefs that can be categorized as pantheistic, panentheistic, monist, etc. among the Dervish-inspired sects. Self-realization can be described as discovering one's own Oneness with the Cosmos and even with the Deity.

Among the Ismaili we find a belief in a pattern of history that is both cyclic and linear. There are seven Ismaili eras, each inaugurated by a prophet known as Natiq. Each era was further subdivided into periods related to a Samit "Silent One" and seven Imams, the last of which becomes the Natiq of the new Era. The seventh Imam of the seventh Era is the Mahdi or Qa'im who ushers in the Resurrection. The six previous Natiqs are Adam, Nuh, Ibrahim, Musa, 'Isa, and Muhammad.

In Kalacakra Tantrism, although there is an underlying belief in infinitely repeating time cycles as found in classic Buddhism and Hinduism, the predominant focus is in the progression of Kulika Kings each connected with a century long period. The final Kulika King or "Rigden" conquers the evil forces of the world bringing in a new Golden Age.

Both the Kalacakra and Ismaili cycles are rife with astrological linkages. In Kalacakra thinking, the planetary cycles are further mirrored within the human body. The Muslim astrologer Abu Ma'shar al-Balkhi, known in Europe as Albumasar, developed a concept of world ages based on conjunctions of Saturn and Jupiter. These ideas were translated into European languages from Muslim Spain beginning in the mid-12th century with the works of John of Seville, not long before the first Grail stories appeared.

In Wolfram von Eschenbach's Parzival, one of the most highly-lauded scenes occurs when Cundrie relates Parzival's destiny through the seven planets using Latino-Arabic nomenclature.

"Mark now, Parzival:
The highest of the planets, Zval,
And the swiftly moving Almustri,
Almaret, and the bright Samsi,
All show good fortune for you here.

The fifth is named Alligafir.
Under there the sixth is Alkiter,
And nearest us is Alkamer.

I do not speak this out of any dream. These are the bridle of the firmament and they check its speed; their opposition has ever contended against its sweep.

"For you, Care now is an orphan. Whatever the planets' orbits bound, upon whatever their light is shed, that is destined as your goal to reach and to achieve. Your sorrow must now perish. Insatiety alone will exclude you from that community, for the Grail and the Grail's power forbid false friendship. When young, you fostered Sorrow; but Joy, approaching, has robbed her of you. You have achieved the soul's peace and waited amid sorrow for the joys of the flesh.

These verses have been interpreted widely as applying to everything from the announcement of a new age marked by the World Year to the declaration of world dominion for the new Grail King. More to the point for this work, Cundrie's words are thought by some to imply that Parzival's destiny represents a microcosm of events in the greater cosmos. Whatever the case, given that Wolfram admits his use of an Oriental source from Toledo, it seems likely that at least there are some connections with the ideas of Albumasar if not with those of the Ismailis.

Now is a good time to return to the theory offered here for the transmission of the Grail legend, or at least the related source materials, from East to West.


Sources for the Grail Epics

Three authors are connected with the beginning of the Grail literature -- Chretien de Troyes, Robert de Boron and Wolfram von Eschenbach.

All three appear to have been contemporaries to some extent as they all wrote their works around the end of the 12th and the beginning of the 13th century. Chretien's work is generally thought to be the oldest, and Wolfram mentions it in his own book. However, some scholars have suggested that Boron had no knowledge of Chretien and he does not mention either of the other two authors.

All three attribute their works to external sources. Chretien states that he based his version on a book given to him by Philip, Count of Flanders. Boron states that he received a "great book" from "great clerics." Wolfram mentions the bard Kyot who obtained the story from Flegatanis, a "heathen" from Toledo. He also claims to have researched the archives of the House of Anjou.

There is some linkage between Chretien's source and Wolfram's research in Anjou. Earlier it was already suggested that von Eschenbach's tale contained veiled references to the House of Anjou with Gahmuret representing Geoffrey Plantagenet with Parzival as his son Henry II. Gahmuret was an Angevin not in the line of succession who becomes a king through his marriage to the emperor's widow.

There was of course one historical Angevin who fits this description -- Geoffrey Plantagenet.

As it turns out, Philip the Count of Flanders was the son of Sibylla de Anjou, Geoffrey's sister. Philip ventured to Jerusalem to visit his first cousin, Baldwin IV, the last King of Jerusalem from the House of Anjou, a leper with no male heir. He came with the express purpose of marrying his vassals to Baldwin IV's daughter but was rejected and insulted by competitors among the nobility of Jerusalem. He left the city to fight the Muslim enemy in the principality of Antioch instead.

When Philip returned to Europe, he employed Chretien to render his mysterious source book into verse. Using the hypothesis offered here, Wolfram's Anfortas, the Grail King of Montsalvat (Jerusalem) would be Baldwin IV's father, Amalric I of Jerusalem. Baldwin IV, the heir-less king and last Angevin to rule the city would then be represented symbolically by the wounded leg of Anfortas. Wolfram probably threw in some inconsistencies as to maintain a degree of deniability that his story applied to real people. Thus, it is Gahmuret rather than his wife who is a sibling of Anfortas.

Parzival states that the celibate knights who guarded the Grail are Templars and that the first Grail King Titurel established the order. Thus it would have been Baldwin II of Jerusalem, who first accepted the Knights Templar, who answers to Titurel. The latter's son Frimutel is Fulk V, who in reality was the son-in-law of Baldwin II becoming the Angevin King of Jerusalem through his marriage to Melisende.

When Chretien wrote his Grail work between 1180 and 1191, Baldwin IV may have already died and Jerusalem may have fallen to Saladin (1187), although the fall of the city is never hinted at in any of the three early Grail books. Instead we find the development of a cycle of literature that introduces a new concept -- that of the Holy Grail.

Grail kingship is linked originally with the title of King of Montsalvat-Jerusalem, and King of the Grail Temple/Palace in the same location. The Grail was guarded by Templars and previously in this blog it was noted that the object had some of the same characteristics of the pusaka or sacred heirlooms of Southeast Asia tied to the succession of royalty, chiefs and clan leaders. The Grail kingship had hereditary components but was not entirely linked to male primogeniture. One fascinating similarity is the animistic character of both the Grail and the pusaka heirlooms.

Like the talking jars of the sultans and datus of Insular Southeast Asia, the Grail communicated with and guided those in the Grail company. This is one facet that did take hold as much in South Asia or the Middle East. However, it may be that such ideas were retained by the Sayabiga who along with the Zutt were relocated to Antioch. These Sayabiga may have maintained some contact through the trade routes with their former home of Zabag. The Templars appear to have borrowed much in terms of their own organization and structure from the Ismaili Assassins of Syria located directly to the south of Antioch principality. They also maintained unusually close political relations with the Assassins. In 1165, emissaries from Prester John, who is linked here with the King of Zabag, delivered a letter from the latter king to the Pope and Christian emperors. Parzival and other Grail legend authors closely connect Prester John with the Holy Grail, albeit anachronistically.

Even Chretien seems to have borrowed from Prester John's letter, which mentions a table in the king's palace with legs of ivory. Parzival and Jüngere Titurel describe the table bearing the Holy Grail in the Grail Castle as having ivory legs. Chretien says the same table has ebony legs and an ivory top. The palace of Prester John, like that of the King of Shambhala and the Grail Castle, have strong mystical links.

The round churches of the Templars were said to have been modeled on the Dome of the Rock, the Al-Aqsa Mosque, sometimes referred to as the 'Temple of Solomon.' The Templar headquarters was originally located in or next to this mosque in Jerusalem. Ringbom has shown, quite conclusively I think, that the Grail Temple as described in Titurel was inspired by the Takht-i-Suleyman, the "Throne of Solomon" in Azerbaijan. In both cases, we find round, domed and lavish buildings with the stars, marked by rubies in the Takht and red jewels in Titurel, and heavens displayed on the domed ceiling. In both cases, the buildings have only three entrances, and the outer circle of the building is divided into 22 parts each marked by an ornamental tree. The temple described in Titurel was probably inspired by the Takht as partially rebuilt by the Shi'ite and heavily Sufi-influenced Ilkhanate dynasty in the 13th century.

Ringbom has also shown that both the Grail Temple and the Takht are types of mandalas. A mandala is a representation of the universe used in Tantric ritual. It usually consists of a circular design on the outside with usually a square design within, but also at times another circle. There usually is at least one instance in a mandala where an outer design is replicated in smaller form within the mandala, an example of the macrocosm-microcosm principle.



Grail Temple plan after Ringbom (A. A. Barb, 1956: 34) following descriptions in Titurel. Note mandala-like replica of building structure at central sanctum where Holy Grail was kept. The domed ceiling was said to display the celestial vault further giving the idea of a cosmic representation. Ringbom also found mandala-like features in the sanctuary of the Ismaili "Old Man of the Mountain," the leader of the Assassins at Alamut.

Now with the Grail acting as the token of the holy kingship, even the looming loss of Jerusalem would allow a 'sacred lineage' to prevail at least in the eyes of those closely connected with the House of Anjou. Thus, it may not be entirely by coincidence that Henry II's son and heir (by force) Richard I would lead the efforts of the Third Crusade to retake Jerusalem, although he was forced by election to accept Conrad of Montferrat as King of Jerusalem. When the latter was killed by Assassins before his coronation, Richard was widely suspected in the plot. He married his nephew Henry II of Champagne to the widow Isabella eight days after the death making Henry II the pretender King of Jerusalem. Angevin hopes for the Holy City though ended as they could not persevere against Saladin's forces.

Quite likely some type of Holy Grail really existed, maybe first among the Templars who had shown they were quite amenable toward Eastern mysticism. However, such ideas may not have been strange either to the House of Anjou.

Robert de Boron's "great clerics" who authored the source of his Grail book may very well have been Templar clerics. The Templar bond with the House of Anjou in Jerusalem was natural. The sources found by Wolfram at the county seat in Anjou may have consisted of the same or similar works as found with Boron. Philip, Count of Flanders, who gave Chretien his source book had obvious enough ties with Anjou through his mother Sibylla. He also helped mediate disputes between Henry II, on the one hand, and Louis VII of France and Thomas Beckett on the other. Henry II of course in addition to being the English king was also the Count of Anjou at the time.

Philip had shown keen interest in establishing marital ties with the Angevins in Jerusalem, at which time he could have easily come across the same source materials as Boron and Wolfram. It might be worth noting also that Henry II had close relations with the Templars and was the first to grant them land in England, and that Guy de Lusignan, the king who succeeded Baldwin IV in Jerusalem was Henry II's vassal.

From the Angevin and Templar connections, we can suggest that the eastern links of the Grail literature are quite likely. The Tantric influences would have come from the same sources that influenced Ismaili and other Islamic mystic traditions.




Regards,
Paul Kekai Manansala
Sacramento

References

Barb, A. A. "Mensa Sacra: The Round Table and the Holy Grail," Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes, Vol. 19, No. 1/2. (Jan. - Jun., 1956), pp. 40-67.

Bosworth, C. E. The Mediaeval Islamic Underworld: The Banu Sasan in Arabic Society and Literature, Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1976.

Corbin, Henry. Temple and Contemplation, translated by Philip Sherrad & Liadain Sherrad, London: KPI & Islamic Publications, 1986.

__, The Voyage and the Messenger, translated by Joseph Rowe, Berkeley, California: North Atlantic Books, 1998.

Daftary, F. The Ismailis. Their History and Doctrines, Cambridge, 1989.

Galais, Pierre. Perceval et l'Initiation, Paris: Editions Sirac, 1972.

Ivanow, Wladimir. "On the Language of the Gypsies of Qainat (in Eastern Persia)," J(R)ASB, N.S. 10/11, 1914, 439-55. Idem. "Further Notes on the Gypsies in Persia," J(R)ASB, N.S. 16, 1920, 281-91. Idem, "An Old Gypsy-Darwish Jargon," J(R)ASB, N.S. 18, 1922, 375-83. Idem, "Jargon of Persian Mendicant Darwishes," J(R)ASB, N.S. 23/1, 1927, 243-45.

Nutt, Alfred. "The Legend of the Buddha's Alms Dish and the Legend of the Holy Grail," Archaeological Review 3 (1889), 267-71.

Ponsoye, Pierre. L'Islam et le Graal étude sur l'ésotérisme du Parzival de Wolfram von Eschenbach, Éditions Arché, 1976

Ringbom, L. A. Graltempel und Paradies. Beziehungen zwischen Iran und Europa im Mittelalter, Stockholm, 1951.

Suhtshek, F. von. La Traduction du Parsiwalnama par Wolfram d'Eschenbach," Forschungen und Fortschritt, nr. 10, Berlin, 1931.

Woodroffe, John. Shakti and Shakta, Madras: Ganesh & Co., 1975.