The occasional quotations given in the notes will indicate the quality of the author’s Latin. The French editor is unwilling to believe that episcopal Latinity could be so bad, and suggests that his vernacular was Latinized by some humbler scribe, and probably extracted from a larger work. In support of this, he adduces the abrupt commencement, and the “but” with which he plunges in—“Inter Siciliam autem et Calabriam.” But he gives a fac-simile of the beginning of the MS., and the words seem to me (all inexpert I confess) almost certainly to be “Inter Siciliam atque Calabriam,” so that this argument is null.
One must notice the frequent extraordinary coincidences of statement, and almost of expression, between this and other travellers of the same age, especially M. Polo. At first one would think that Jordanus had Polo’s book. But he certainly had not Ibn Batuta’s, and the coincidences with him are sometimes almost as striking. Had those ancient worthies, then, a Murray from whom they pilfered experiences, as modern travellers do? I think they had; but their Murray lay in the traditional yarns of the Arab sailors with whom they voyaged, some of which seem to have been handed down steadily from the time of Ptolemy—peradventure of Herodotus[40]—almost to our own day.
And so I commend the simple and zealous Jordanus to kindly entertainment.
London, June 27th, 1863.
Nota Bene. The English edition of Marco Polo, so often referred to in my notes, is Mr. Hugh Murray’s fourth edition; Edinburgh, Oliver and Boyd, (no date; more shame to Oliver and Boyd).
In my absence on the continent my friend Mr. Badger has undertaken the correction of the press. The revise sheets have been sent to me, but in the absence of my manuscript and references I fear some errors may still inevitably escape correction.
The numbers to chapters and paragraphs have been attached by me,
H. Y.
FOOTNOTES
[22] I have to regret that unavoidable circumstances have interrupted my pleasant task, and have compelled me to leave this preface, and some part of the commentary, in a cruder state than I should have allowed, had time permitted of the search for further particulars or illustrations of the author’s life, mission, and descriptions.