In The Book of Marvels and Travels, Sir John Mandeville describes Mt. Sinai and its surrounding area in detail. Eager to court an audience of would be pilgrims, he reports on the popular pilgrimage destination of St. Catherine’s monastery on the mountain. He gives a short description of the monastery itself and its inhabitants, and quickly moves on to relating fantastic stories about the place. For instance, Mandeville says that the monks’ supply of oil for their lamps and food comes from birds miraculously bringing olive branches to the remote monastery. This, he says, shows how holy the place is and that if birds make pilgrimage there in honor of St. Catherine, so too must humans. Mandeville also claims that each monk has a lamp which both foretells their own death as well as choosing the next abbot when one dies. The bones of St Catherine too are miraculous. Apparently they exude a substance similar to oil or balm, but blacker. Mandeville assures his readers that many more relics are on display. All these stories emphasize the holiness of St. Catherine’s monastery, showing how miracles abound in its vicinity because of the many relics stored there.  The point of this emphasis is to promote pilgrimage. Religious travelers were on the look out for any holy site to pay homage, and Mt. Sinai and its monastery seem to be prime locations. Mandeville, surely working from earlier descriptions of the place, reinforces the holy reputation of this location for his readers who were looking to fill their itineraries.

Another theme in Mandeville’s description of Mt. Sinai is its Biblical history, and connection to Moses in particular. Of primary importance is the location of the Burning Bush which the prophet saw and could still be seen in the monastery of St. Catherine, but there are many more. At its gate is the spring Moses made with his staff, and even the route Mandeville describes from Egypt is purportedly the same one which Moses and the Israelites  took. Walking in these footsteps surely deepened a pilgrim’s faith and increased the spiritual desires which prompted their travels. Interestingly, Mandeville says that in this region travelers must know Latin before the local language, showing that to him this is Christian territory not Muslim. Its famous monastery serves as an outpost of Christendom and Europe by extension (never mind the actual ethnic composition of the monks). Mt. Sinai itself has many sites relating to Moses. Moses’ Chapel stands where the prophet hid when he saw God, the rocks of which still bear his outline. Nearby is the place where Moses received the Ten Commandments, and where he fasted for forty days and forty nights. Mandeville wants his audience to think of Moses’ stories when reading about Sinai. Again this can be explained by his audience. For people traveling so far and risking so much, a trip to Mt. Sinai allowed them to see all these important sites from the Bible in a relatively concentrated area. Following in the footsteps of Moses, an important Biblical character, shows great piety, and being in the presence of such holy sites only deepened such piety.