A khan's grave hidden in a sacred mountain
Editorial contextMustawfi records that the Ilkhan Arghun was buried on the mountain of Sujas and that, following Mongol custom, the grave was concealed and the whole mountain made a forbidden sanctuary (qurugh). His daughter later revealed the grave and founded a dervish lodge there, a Muslim practice laid over a steppe one.
The sepulchre of Arghun Khan was made in the mountain of Sujas, and according to Mongol custom, they concealed the place, making the whole mountain an inviolable Sanctuary (Qurugh), so that people could not without difficulty pass that way. Arghun's daughter, Uljay Khatun, however, made manifest her father's grave, founding a Darvish-house, and settling a community here.
About Mongols (Ilkhan Arghun and his daughter)
Continue in this sourceMustawfi's Delight of Hearts: a geography of Mongol Iran1300 to 1333 · 4 passagesThe Assassins' paradise
Editorial contextDescribing the Ismaili state the Mongols destroyed in 1256, Chang De repeats the story that its soldiers were all assassins, trained by being drugged, shown music and women in a hidden chamber, and told they would enjoy such bliss after death. It is the Chinese version of the 'Old Man of the Mountain' legend that Marco Polo tells, and it is hearsay.
The soldiers of that country are all assassins. Their custom is that when they see a brave, strong man, they lure him with gain and make him kill his own father or elder brother with his own hand; then he is enrolled as a soldier. They make him drunk, carry him into a cave chamber and entertain him with music and beautiful women, indulging his desires for several days, then put him back where he was. When he wakes, they ask what he saw and teach him that if he can become an assassin, at death he will enjoy bliss like that.
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Original wording
其國兵皆刺客俗見男子勇壯者以利誘之令手刄父兄然後充兵醉酒扶入窟室娱以音樂羙女縱其慾數日復置故處既醒問其所見教之能爲刺客死則享福如此
About Ismailis (Mulahida), conquered by Hulegu's Mongols
Keep in mind
A hostile legend about the Ismailis, told by their conquerors; not an eyewitness account.
A Mongol capital and a tomb of cut stone
Editorial contextMustawfi credits the founding of Sultaniyyah to the Mongol Ilkhan Arghun and its completion to his son Uljaytu, who named it after himself. He gives the circuit of the walls built and planned, and describes a castle of cut stone at the centre that is Uljaytu's tomb. Elsewhere on the page he says the new capital drew settlers of all nations and that only Tabriz had as many great buildings.
The city was founded by Arghun Khan, grandson of Hulagu the Mongol, and his son Uljaytu Sultan completed it, naming it Sultaniyyah after himself … The walls which Arghun built were 12,000 paces in circuit … In the centre stands a Castle built of cut stone, which is the tomb of Uljaytu Sultan
About Mongols (Ilkhans Arghun and Uljaytu)
Keep in mind
Mustawfi served the dynasty and knew the city well; the 'castle' is the great domed mausoleum still standing today.
A captive Tartar prince who galloped home from Isfahan
Editorial contextChardin tells the court story of 'Abouel-Kazi', a prince of Khwarazm captured in a Persian victory over the Uzbeks. Shah Safi treated him as royalty in Isfahan for ten years, until he feigned illness, went to a spa, and rode off with twenty Uzbek horsemen sent to fetch him. He became khan and stayed a friend of Persia. This is Abu'l-Ghazi Bahadur, khan of Khiva, later author of a famous history of the Turks.
To whom the Yusbeck Prince thus briskly answer'd; I am highly oblig'd to the King of Persia, but I owe more my own Country and Relations that call me back. 'Tis my Father that sends me these Men, to facilitate my return to my Native soil
About Uzbeks of Khwarazm (Khiva)
Keep in mind
Court gossip retold decades later; details such as the role of the prince's father may not match other accounts.
How a Turkmen tent is built
Editorial contextFraser says no one had yet described exactly how the 'portable wooden houses' of the Turkmens are made, and does so: a folding lattice of thin laths pinned with rawhide that opens out like a child's toy, curved roof poles, black felt (numud) coverings, a reed screen outside and a broad woven band holding it all together.
The frame is curiously constructed of light wood, disposed in laths of about an inch broad, by three quarters thick, crossing one another diagonally … and pinned at each crossing with thongs of raw hide, so as to be moveable ; … over which is thrown a covering of black numud, leaving in the center a large hole to give vent to the smoke, and light to the dwelling
About Goklen and Yomut Turkmens
Continue in this sourceJames Baillie Fraser's journey into Khorasan and the Turkmen frontier1821 to 1822 · 18 passagesA 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
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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.
Turkmen roadside grave mounds
Editorial contextRiding with a sayyid near the Caspian, Burnes asked about mounds of earth with a pole in the centre. They were 'yoozka', marking where someone had died or been laid out, and Turkmen said a blessing as they passed. Burnes remarks that they were not graves but barrows raised in honour of the dead, and suspects the custom was 'Tatar'.
They are not graves, but mounds or barrows raised in honour of the dead. I entertain an impression that the usage is Tatar; but I had no opportunity of further investigation.
About Turkmen
Keep in mind
Burnes's 'Tatar' origin is an untested hunch, as he admits.
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.
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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).
Rey, 'the Market of the Universe', brought to nothing
Editorial contextNear Saveh Chardin passed the scattered traces of Rey, once, the Persian histories said, the greatest city in Asia, with incredible numbers of streets, baths and mosques. He blames its fall on sectarian wars together with Tartar incursions, and notes that a later prince tried to rebuild it after making peace with 'Cazan-Can, King of Persia, of the Race of the Tartars' (the Ilkhan Ghazan), but failed.
These Wars, together with the Incursions of the Tartars, destroy'd the Potent Rey, and reduc'd it to nothing before the end of the sixth Age of the Mahumetan Epoche.
About Tartars (Mongols) and warring Muslim factions
Keep in mind
Taken from Persian and Arabic histories; the huge figures for Rey on the previous page Chardin himself doubts.
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.
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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'The Tatars are exceedingly numerous'
Editorial contextWhen a large Mongol army under Chormaghun crossed the Oxus, Sultan Jalal al-Din of Khwarazm, though on bad terms with the caliph and the rulers of Anatolia and Syria, sent envoys to each of them. Rashid writes 'Mughul' (Mongol) in his own voice, but gives the substance of the warning as 'the Tatars are exceedingly numerous'. The same army is Mongol in the narrative and Tatar in the alarm.
He sent an envoy to each of them and gave news of the Mongols' coming; the substance of the message was that the Tatars are exceedingly numerous, and this time more than ever before.
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Original wording
پیش هریك رسول فرستاد و از حال وصول مغول خبر داد و مضمون پیغام آنك تاتار بغایت بسیارند و این نوبت زیادت از هر بار
About Mongols (Chormaghun's army), called Tatars
Keep in mind
Reported speech summarised by Rashid some seventy years later.
Transcribed from the page image (corpus OCR for this Persian text is garbled).
A 'magician' who dug up a jewel and won the Ilkhan's trust
Editorial contextIn a footnote from the Syriac chronicler Bar Hebraeus, d'Ohsson tells of Abd al-Rahman, a slave's son who escaped the sack of Baghdad, worked as a carpenter in Mosul, and then claimed spirits had taught him magic. Taken to the Mongol ruler Abaqa, he asked to be brought to the treasure castle of Tala, paced the ground, pointed to a spot, and there a ring with a precious stone was dug up. From then on he was believed to command demons, and under Ahmad he ran the whole kingdom.
he began to measure the ground this way and that; then he pointed to a spot where they should dig, and himself stood some distance away. Digging, they found a ring set with a stone of great value; it was taken to Abaqa. This having confirmed the words of the so-called magician, everything he said was believed
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il se mit à mesurer le sol de côté et d'autre; puis il indiqua un endroit où l'on devait creuser, et se tint lui-même à quelque distance. En creusant on trouva un anneau, où il y avait une pierre d'un grand prix; on le porta à Abaca. Ce fait ayant confirmé les paroles du prétendu magicien, on ajouta foi à tout ce qu'il disait
About Mongols of the Ilkhanate (Abaqa and Ahmad Tegüder)
Keep in mind
A hostile anecdote from a Christian chronicler about a Muslim favourite; d'Ohsson calls him a 'so-called' magician.
Why the Tartars became Muslims
Editorial contextRiccoldo explains the Ilkhanate's conversion to Islam from a missionary's frustrated point of view: the Tartars had neither law nor prophet, found Islam an easy law, and Muslims gave them rich gifts to convert, so that now 'for the most part' they have become Saracens. He adds that many still like Christians but find Christianity too hard and are offered no presents.
they took up the law and became Saracens, above all because the Tartars had neither law nor prophet. So now for the greater part the Tartars have become Saracens. For the Saracens buy them and give them very great gifts so that they will become Saracens.
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Original wording
acceperunt legem, et facti sunt Sarraceni, maxime quia ipsi Tartari nec legem nec prophetam habebant. Vnde modo pro magna parte Tartari facti sunt Sarraceni. Nam et Sarraceni eos emunt et dant eis maxima dona, vt ipsi efficiantur Sarraceni.
About Tartars (Mongols of the Ilkhanate)
Keep in mind
A partisan explanation; the Ilkhan Ghazan converted in 1295, within Riccoldo's stay.
Licking fingers and wiping hands on their shoes
Editorial contextAfter describing how Persians eat sitting on the ground, several from one dish, Jordanus says they lick their fingers instead of using a napkin and wipe the leftover grease on their shoes. The Tartars, western and eastern, do exactly the same, he adds; only the Indians eat cleanly, though also with their hands. A fastidious European's table report.
they lick their fingers with tongue and lips and clean them instead of with a napkin, and afterwards, if any grease is still left on their hands, they wipe them on their shoes; and so do the western and eastern Tartars in everything, except the Indians, who alone eat quite cleanly, though with their hands.
Working translation
Original wording
ligant digitos cum linguâ et labris, et mundant loco manutegnii, et posteà, si adhuc superest de pinguedine in manibus, mundant eas super calceos suos; et sic faciunt, per omnia, Tartari occidentales atque orientales, Indis exceptis, qui soli comedunt, licèt cum manibus, satis mundè.
About Persians and Tartars, western and eastern
Keep in mind
'ligant' is the printed spelling (for lingunt, 'lick').
OCR normalized against the page image.
