Tatars who take the dam of Gog and Magog for a cobweb
Editorial contextAs Hulagu closed on Baghdad, the last Abbasid caliph, told that the Mongol vanguard had crossed the Hamrin hills, asked how that could be. The answer, in Wassaf's ornate rhymed prose (rendered by Hammer in rhyme), paints the Tatars as a sea flood flying over peaks like eagles, for whom the legendary dam of Gog and Magog, Alexander's barrier against the peoples of the north, is no more than a cobweb. Hammer then describes how the Mongols ringed Baghdad with a hastily raised earthen rampart.
The army of the Tatars, who come on like the floods of the sea, flies over the mountain tops like flocks of eagles; since they regard the dam of Gog and Magog as a cobweb, what else should rise from their hooves on the heights of Hamrin but dust, what else should come out of the storm in which they ride but fire and plunder
Working translation
Original wording
Das Heer der Tataren, die wie die Meeresfluthen einherfahren, überfliegt der Berge Gipfel wie der Adler Schaaren; da sie den Damm von Gog und Magog für Spinngeweb' ansehen, was soll auf des Hamrin's Höhen aus ihren Hufen wohl anders erstehen, als Staub, was soll aus dem Sturme, in dem sie daherfahren, wohl anders aufgehen, als Feuer und Raub
About Hulagu's Mongol army ('the Tatars'); the caliph al-Musta'sim
Keep in mind
Literary rhetoric written decades later, not a record of what was said to the caliph.
A horse on a pole for the dead lord
Editorial contextRiccoldo describes Tartar funerals: cooked meat, clothes and money buried with the dead, and for a great lord a horse ridden to exhaustion, killed, stuffed with green grass and hung up on a stake, told to be ready whenever its master rises again. He adds that they once buried up to twenty living slaves with a lord until Christians shamed them out of it, and that Tartars even paid bishops to be buried in Christian cemeteries.
and the horse falls, and he guts it and empties everything from the horse's belly and fills it with green grass, and then drives a great stake in from behind and makes the stake come out at the mouth, and so leaves the horse impaled, and hangs it up and orders it to be ready whenever its lord wishes to rise
Working translation
Original wording
et equus cadit, et ipse exenterat eum et euacuat omnia de ventre equi, et implet herba viridi, et postea infigit palum magnum per posteriora, et facit palum exire vsque ad os, et ita dimittit equum impalatum, et suspendit eum et mandat ei, quod sit paratus, quandocumque wlt dominus surgere
About Tartars (Mongols of the Ilkhanate)
Keep in mind
He does not say he watched a funeral; this is presented as general custom. The horse-on-a-pole rite matches steppe burial practice reported by other travellers.
A shaman who seemed to fly
Editorial contextRiccoldo says the Tartars honour above all men certain 'boxitae' (bakhshis), priests of idols from India, wise and grave, who practise magic with the help of demons, show many marvels and foretell the future. One of their leaders was said to fly, but, Riccoldo reports, it was found that he only walked just above the ground without touching it and sat on nothing solid.
For one of the greater among them was said to fly, but according to the truth it was found that he did not fly, but walked close to the ground without touching it, and when he seemed to sit he was held up by nothing solid.
Working translation
Original wording
Nam et vnus maior inter eos dicebatur volare, sed secundum veritatem repertum est, quod non volauit, sed ambulabat iuxta terram et eam non tangebat, et quando videbatur sedere, nulla re solida sustentabatur.
About Tartars and their 'baxitae' (Buddhist or shamanic priests)
Keep in mind
Hearsay about a wonder, which Riccoldo half-debunks (not flying) and half-repeats (levitating).
Execution called 'sleep', and a blank space for the lord's name
Editorial contextTwo sharp details of Mongol court manners. When writing to a superior, a Tartar leaves a gap where the lord's name belongs and writes the name out in the margin. When a man is condemned, the lord says 'cut him and make him sleep', because they do not call death death, and the condemned simply holds out his arms to be bound.
When they write to their superiors they keep such reverence that they do not write their superior's name in its place, but leave an empty space and afterwards write the name outside, in the margin, in another place.
Working translation
Original wording
Cum scribunt suis maioribus, tantam reuerenciam habent et seruant, quod non scribant nomen sui maioris in suo loco, sed dimittunt spacium vacuum et postea scribunt nomen de foris in margine in alio loco.
About Tartars (Mongols of the Ilkhanate)
Continue in this sourceFriar Riccoldo's pilgrimage book, with chapters on the Tartars of Persia and Baghdadc. 1288 to 1300 · 11 passages