As I said before, regarding Mandeville it must be a question of faith. If Weever is to be relied on, he was a physician, and from the fact of his wearing a beard, probably acquired in his eastern travels, he received the sobriquet of "ad Barbam." This title, however, is claimed for a certain "Jehan de Bourgoigne dit à la Barbe," but the bare fact of anyone wearing a beard in France, in the clean-shaven fourteenth century, was sufficient to make him remarkable.
If, again, Weever and others are to be relied on, he died in 1371, and it is a curious fact that the earliest French, or Romance, manuscript known in this country is one of that date, and, moreover, it is circumstantially dated, as will be shown hereafter. This MS. is in the Earl of Ashburnham's collection (catalogued Barrois 24), which every lover of literature will regret was not secured for the nation in its entirety. Its text is most beautiful, and the few illuminations are fine examples of fourteenth century French art. But what I want particularly to point out, is the curious coincidence of dates—absolutely contemporaneous. Whether there were any MSS. published before then I cannot tell, but here is a book published the year of his death, when inquiry would have proved easily whether such a man had ever lived, but the whole style of the MS. shows that he was well known as a traveller, and it is evidently copied from an earlier edition, as at the end it says, "Ce livre cy fist escrire honorables homes sages et discret maistre Gervaise crestien, maistre en medicine, et premier phisicien de tres puissant noble et excellent prince Charles, par la Grace de Dieu, roy de France, Escript par Raoulet dorliens lan de grace mil ccclxxj le xviij jour de Septembre."
Here we have an authentic date, which there could be no earthly reason to falsify, and this MS. was written—unless Weever and others are liars—during the man's lifetime. For, according to their authority, he did not die until November of that year, and we must not fail to remember that Liege was not a very far cry from Paris, and that his fame must have been great, or his book would never have been written as a present for the king, as it probably was.
This manuscript, being the earliest known, is also useful in another way. By some singular chance, all the English versions make out that Mandeville wrote his book first in Latin, then in French, and afterwards in English. But this manuscript settles the point, as it says, "Et sachies q̃ je eusse cest livret mis en latin pour plus briefment deviser. Mais pour ce que pluseurs entendent mieulx rom̃ant que latin je lay mis en rom̃ant par quoy q̃ chacun lentende." Which I translate: "And know that I should (or might) have written this book in Latin, for the sake of brevity. But, because more people know the Romance (or French) tongue, than Latin, I have written it in Romance, so that anyone may understand it." And this translation is endorsed by E. M. Thompson, Esq., the head of the MS. department in the British Museum. It all depends on the words "je eusse." They do not mean I had; and, even in modern French, might be used for I should have, although of course j'aurais would be better.
For many years he has been called the "father of English Prose," but this title, after the above, is doubtful, even if his existence is granted, and belongs of right to Wyclif.
Another book, and a very rare and curious one it is, is attributed to Mandeville. There is a copy of this book in the British Museum (C. 27, f. 2), which, although in Gothic letter, gives no clue as to its date, or place of birth, nor do any of the bibliographical authorities which I have consulted (and they are all that can be found in the British Museum) throw any light upon it. The museum authorities catalogue it as Lyons? 1530? Its title is "Le Lapidaire en francoys compose par messire Jehan de mandeuille chevalier." Its contents are of little worth, except that they contain a store of legendary lore relating to precious stones, such as are met with in most medieval treatises on jewels and it winds up with a prayer. The authorship of this book, too, must be a matter of faith, since it has nothing to guarantee it but its title-page.
It is somewhat singular too, that the Latin letter supposed to be written by Mandeville to King Edward the Third, and which is apropos of nothing, only exists in the French edition.
In the appended Travels of Oderico, the Minorite Friar, I have italicized many of the passages which are identical with Mandeville's description in order that the reader may have easier reference.
[1:] "And there were in our company two friers minours of Lombardy, & sayd, if any of us wold go in, they wold also, as they had sayd so, and upon trust of them we sayd that we wold go, & we dyd sing a masse, and were shriven & houseled, and we went in xiiii men, and whē we came out we were but x."
[2:] Havergal's Fasti Herefordenses, p. 161.
[3:] "Ancient Funerall Monuments, &c. Composed by the Travels and Studie of John Weever." Lond. 1631. It is exceedingly singular that a book published at Antwerp in 1584, "The Itinerarium per nonnullas Galliæ Belgicæ partes Abrahami Ortelii et Joannis Viviani," confirms Weever, in such almost identical words, that it is not worth while to append a translation. Ortelius, or Ortell, writes (p. 16):—"Est in hac quoq. regione Gulielmitarũ Cœnobium in quo epitaphiũ hoc Joannis à Mandeuille excepimus: Hic iacet vir nobilis dn͠s Joẽs de Mandeville al' dc͠vs ad barbam, miles dn͠s de Cãpdi, natus de Anglia, mediciẽ p̃f̃essor devotissimvs orator et bonorum largissimvs pauperibus erogata qui toto quasi orbe lustrato leodii diem vite sue clavsit extremum a͠no dn͠i Mo CCCo LXXI mensis novẽbre' die XVII.
"Hæc in lapide, in quo cœlata viri armati imago, leonem calcantis, barba bifurcata, ad caput manus benedicens, & vernacula hæc verba: Vos ki paseis sor mi povr lamovr deix proies por me. Clypeus erat vacuus, in quo olim laminam fuisse dicebant æream, & eius in ea itidem cœlata insignia, leonem videlicet argenteum, cui ad pectus lunula rubea, in campo cœruleo, quem limbus ambiret denticulatus ex oro. Eius nobis ostendebãt & cultros, ephippioque, & calcaria, quibus usum fuisse afferebãt in perigrando toto fere terrarum orbe, vt clarius eius testatur Itinerarium, quod typis etiam excusum passim habetur."
[4:] "Otherwise called the Bearded Knight."
[5:] An order founded by Sir William of Maleval—a hermit—who died 10th Feb., 1157. The order was somewhat austere, as the members went barefoot, and their fasts were almost continual. They have nearly all been absorbed into the Augustines.
