Legend:
Light blue = Ulm
Light green = Memmingen
Pink = Innspruck
Orange = Balzano
Dark blue = Ad Scalam
Yellow = Bassano
Dark green = Treviso
Purple = Venice
Category: Felix Fabri (Page 4 of 6)
Initially, I had some trouble locating my points on the Hereford Mappamundi because the writing isn’t readable on the map. However, once I found out how the countries were laid out, I was able to approximate where they would’ve most likely landed on the Hereford map. I wasn’t able to include all of the points that I plotted on the modern map. Unfortunately, the points became too close together as Fabri’s route entered Italy to plot on the Hereford Mappamundi which could’ve contributed to some of the differences in the shape of Fabri’s route. The first major difference I noticed between the modern map and the Hereford map was that on the Hereford map, Fabri’s route looks much more direct than it does on the modern map. On the modern map, Fabri’s route is less direct and winds through the mountains. Because of the lack of physical features and details on the Hereford map, it was harder to depict the more specific aspects of Fabri’s journey and the route appears to be an almost perfectly straight line from Ulm to Venice. The Hereford map depicts rivers and lakes, with debatable accuracy, but it doesn’t illustrate any mountain ranges. Considering that nearly half of Fabri’s journey takes place within the Alps between Austria and Italy, the lack of mountains contributes to how different his journey looks on the Hereford map compared to the modern GIS map. The lack of mountains also made it more difficult to illustrate an accurate depiction of Fabri’s route and contributed to how straight the route looks on the Hereford map. Additionally, on the Hereford map, Fabri’s route looks horizontal because East is positioned at the top where North would be on a traditional modern map. On the modern map, Fabri’s journey looks vertical, as if his journey is taking him down the map. However, this is mostly due to each map’s differences in orientation, as the modern map is oriented with North towards the top, unlike the Hereford map.
Fabri and his party rode on horses from the village of Nova to Trent on April 21st during the year of his second pilgrimage. They stayed the night and left after Mass and dinner on the 22nd to journey to Persa. In his account of their stay in Trent, Fabri writes about the structure of the city, in terms of its geography, architecture, and demographics, characteristics of the German people, the religious history of Trent, and the instance of a flutist and singer entertaining his party at supper.
According to Fabri, Trent is “one of those very ancient cities which were founded in these mountains by the Trojans,” and therefore has a rich history (18). The river Adige, which serves as the boundary between Italy and Germany, “runs past its walls,” adding to its qualifications for being what Fabri calls “in a most beautiful, airy and healthy position” (18). Within the city walls, Fabri notes that Trent is split into an upper city and a lower city “on account of the two races which inhabit it,” with Italians living in the upper city and Germans in the lower (18). Referring to Germans and Italians as races in this section shows that Fabri categorizes people and perceives a difference in their value in accordance with the language they speak or the broad sense of nationality they may adhere to. Fabri distinguishes the Germans and Italians from each other by commenting that “[t]hey are at variance both in language and habits of life, and seldom are at peace with one another; indeed, before our own times the city was often ruined sometimes by the Italians out of hatred for the Germans, and sometimes by the Germans out of hatred for the Italians” (18). From this, we note that language and culture are different between the two groups of people, and that they are as opposed in violence as in nationality. Their equal hatred of the other group, however, is a strong similarity between Germans and Italians in the city of Trent.
In speaking about the presence of Germans in Trent, Fabri highlights the shift in their population over time by noting that “[n]ot many years ago the Germans were but a few strangers in that city; now they are the burghers and rulers of the city,” further predicting that “[the] day will soon come-indeed, has virtually come” when the Duke of Innspruck will add Trent to “his dominions and to Germany” (18). That Trent can shift from being ‘Italian’ to being ‘German’ so quickly and based on demographics rather than boundaries or territory demonstrates the loose sense of countries, nationality, and borders in the time of Fabri’s travels. Even though he describes the border between Italy and Germany as the river Adige, he has no qualms about absorbing Trent into Germany based on the demographic composition of the city. Fabri muses on why “the number of Germans there increases daily” and “why [the German] race should spread over other people’s countries instead of theirs spreading over [the Germans’],” which he admits that he “[has] never learned” (18). Fabri offers the possibilities that Germans flee Germany “on account of [Germany’s] poverty and sterility” or “on account of the fierceness of the Germans” that drives other peoples out of their own lands, but does not confirm either one, possibly because they go against his view of Germans being superior to all other ‘races’ (18).
Illustrating the religious history of Trent, Fabri writes that in 1475, “the holy child Simeon was martyred by the Jews with great torture” and that “[he himself] beheld [the Jews’] accursed bodies” (19). By labeling the Jews as evil torturers of holy children, Fabri shows his negative view of them. If the situation he writes about is similar to the story of the boy drowning in the cesspool in a Jewish neighborhood in England, it illustrates an inherent bias against Jews and will to blame them without knowing the full story. We would need more information about this occurrence to determine if the situations are similar.
While Fabri and his party were at supper, a flutist and singer entertained them. When his party was unsure whether to pay them or not, as it is a mortal sin “either to give or to receive money in such cases,” they asked Fabri to settle the question, which he did “not without fear” (19). By relying on Fabri, his party asserted his superior knowledge in what is sinful and what is not, although Fabri showed hesitation and an unusual self-doubt when he “searched the writing of learned casuists to see whether [he] had decided rightly” upon returning home (19-20).
Felix Fabri has finally arrived in Joppa after a long sea voyage. It’s the fourth of July and the sun has just risen. Fabri describes the fish swimming “on top of the sea” and mentions that one fish looks like it has the face and ears of a dog (36). Fabri spends a lot of time in this passage focusing on describing his physical surroundings. He spends almost a whole page describing the way the ocean glistened, how the towers looked against the sky, the color of the land, the people, etc. His attention to detail is staggering, almost overwhelming at some points. Fabri also spends some time describing the people he sees. He calls the locals Saracens and seems to observe them almost as you would an animal. His tone is similar to that he used when describing the local Italians before.
Fabri describes to us the preparations that are being made for his journey to the Holy Land. He’s waiting on the boat in which he arrived until he can meet with the Moorish lords of Joppa. He’s waiting with several of his traveling companions, as they cannot leave the boat until they are officially greeted and welcomed by the Moorish lords. However, the Moorish lords have yet to arrive and have sent their servants ahead of them to prepare the area. Fabri is quite intrigued by these servants (the same men he calls Saracen). However, he doesn’t portray them in a very flattering light. Instead, he uses descriptions and anecdotes that portray them as different and suspect.
When the Saracen servants first arrived, Fabri notes that they “skirmished with one another in sport, mounted on their mules, as if they were fighting” and ran frantically “to and fro” (36). His descriptions of the Saracens seem detached and almost condescending. He writes as if he is seeing some strange creature instead of a group of human beings. For example, at the end of the passage, Fabri begins telling an anecdote. He notices that the Saracens are going in and out of some caves above the seashore. Fabri writes that these are the caves into which he and his companions “will be driven” after the Saracens officially welcome them (36). He is puzzled by the behavior of the Saracens and says that he and his companions watched them go in and out “all day long” but they could not guess what was going on (36). That is, until “to the offense of our noses, we discovered; for they had defiled those places with ordure” (36). Now, Fabri is staying on a ship that is hundreds of feet from the shoreline. He observes the Saracens from afar, unable to approach them or even yell to them from his position on the ship. The likelihood of him being able to smell some offensive odor al the way from the shore is very low. Fabri, throughout his travel narrative, has consistently painted people he’s found foreign or different from himself in unflattering lights. This passage seems to be an extension of that.
Felix Fabri describes his party’s journey through Ower, Italy in the account of his second pilgrimage to the Holy Land. In the account, Fabri writes that his party left the previous town, Feltre, in the evening of the 24th of April, crossed a “great river” and passed through a “Venetian guard-house” before stopping for the night in Ower (19). They left Ower for Treviso, Italy after Mass on the 25th of April. Fabri’s account of Ower focuses on the geography around the town, the history of nearby castles and towns, and the festival of St. Mark’s Day. Additionally, the interaction between Fabri and his lords sheds light on their relationship from Fabri’s point of view.
The first thing that Fabri writes about the town of Ower is that it “lay at the foot of a delightful grassy hill,” which Fabri and his party decide to climb in order to see the Mediterranean (19). Fabri notes that the Mediterranean Sea is directly south of them at this point in their journey, beyond mountains and the “plain country” of Italy. In writing about the appearance of the Mediterranean on that day, Fabri highlights that the journey ahead of them is ominous, as most of the Mediterranean in their view is covered by a “lofty, thick black cloud, of the colour of darkling air (19). Their turning away from the ominous omen of the dark sea faces Fabri’s party towards more of the surrounding mountains that encircle the plain Ower is situated in.
In viewing the surrounding mountains, Fabri notes that they can see “many ancient castles in ruins,” and follows with a recounting of the history of the placement of the castles and other ruins (19). According to Fabri, the castles were built in the hills by Antenor the Trojan’s army to defend the city of Padua, which was located on the plain, from the people who lived beyond the surrounding Alps. Fabri highlights that the people who lived beyond the Alps “at that time were still savages, dwelling in the woods like wild beasts” (19). Fabri’s syntax shows that he supports Antenor the Trojan over the people living beyond the Alps and also hints that the people who live beyond the Alps may no longer be the savages that he depicts them as. At this point, the reader may start to question how Fabri seems to know the history of many of the towns his party passes through, especially because he notes little interaction with the people of the towns.
Fabri’s interactions with his lords in the town of Ower paint him as the guide he is meant to be on this journey. When looking over the Mediterranean Sea, Fabri characterizes his lords as “delicately-nurtured youths” that could only imagine the “dangers which awaited them at sea,” which Fabri, the wizened guide, “was something cast down at the sight of it, albeit [he] had already had a good taste of its bitterness” (19). The syntax Fabri uses when describing his lords in particular both gives them an excuse for being so frightened of the sea and patronizes them a little, although it is probably completely warranted by their lack of experience with travel.