[319] Introduction to Oxford Edition, p. xxxiv.
[320] La Escatologia musulmana en la “Divina Commedia.” Discorso leído en el acto de su recepción, par D. Miguel Asín Palacios ... Madrid, Estanislao Maestre, 1919.
[321] Les sources Orientales de la Divina Comédie. Paris, E. Blochet. Paris, Maisonneuve, 1901.
[322] Koran, chap. xvii. (xv.) init. “Praise be unto him who transported his servant by night, from the sacred temple of Mecca to the further temple of Jerusalem, the circuit of which we have blessed, that we might shew him some of our signs; for God is he who heareth and seeth.” (Sale’s translation). On this passage a most elaborate story was built up by subsequent legend-makers.
[323] Ireland is undoubtedly the focus in Europe of legends Persian in origin. Appropriate to our subject are not only the St. Brendan Legend, but also the Purgatory of St. Patrick and the Descent of St. Paul. Blochet, op. cit., p. 117 sqq.
[324] Ib. p. 161.
[325] Ib. p. 172.
[326] Bulletino della Società dantesca italiana, Nov. Ser., fasc. 4, (Dec., 1919), pp. 163-181.
[327] See above, p. 131, note 4.
[328] Bulletino ut supra, p. 166.