Zhang Dehui's journey to Mongolia, 1247 to 1248
A Chinese envoy's travel notes on the road from Beijing to the Mongol court, in Palladius's 1867 Russian translation.
Full title Travel notes of the Chinese Zhang Dehui during his journey to Mongolia in the first half of the 13th century (Russian translation, 1867)
Путевые записки китайца Чжан Дэ-хой во время путешествия его в Монголию в первой половине XIII столетия
Zhang Dehui; Archimandrite Palladius (Kafarov)
In 1247 to 1248 the Chinese official Zhang Dehui travelled from Beijing north into Mongolia, as far as the Kerulen and the Karakorum region, and wrote notes on the road and its stations. Archimandrite Palladius (Kafarov) translated them into Russian in 1867 and added his own identifications of places. The card lists a web text of that translation on vostlit.info. The atlas does not hold the text of this edition: no copy was harvested into the corpus, so nothing from it was read for this guide.
- How they knew
- Eyewitness
- Who “Tartar” means here
- Not recorded. The card names the Mongols of Mongke's court, along with the Onggut and Kitan remnants met on the way. Whether Palladius's Russian uses Tatars is not recorded.
- Why read it
- It is a firsthand Chinese itinerary to the Mongol homeland from the same decade as Carpini and Rubruck, giving a route and stations from the Chinese side.
- Watch out
- Palladius's translation of 1867 predates modern editions such as Bretschneider 1888, and the web text lacks the page numbers of the printed notes.
What it says
No quotes from this one yet. Its text is out of reach for now, or the scan could not be read.
The fine print
How we know
mixed Part firsthand observation, part drawn from other sources.
translation of a firsthand 1247-1248 itinerary
Research notes
- Palladius's 1867 translation predates modern editions (Bretschneider 1888; Yao Congwu); web text lacks the printed notes' page numbers.
Why it matters
Russian-language access to the Lingbei jixing route, with Palladius's identifications of stations; relates to the Yutang jiahua record.
Places named
Beijing to Mongolia (Kerulen, Karakorum region)
Peoples named
Mongols (Möngke's court); Onggut; Kitan remnants