Ritratto di Sir John Mandeville. Tratto da un manoscritto del 1459
Jehan de Mandeville (tradotto in inglese con sir John Mandeville) è il nome del supposto compilatore di un libro di viaggi, scritto in antico francese e pubblicato tra il 1357 ed il 1371.
Autore e protagonista di un libro di viaggi del sec. 14º (Voyage d’outre mer), identificabile, secondo le notizie (quasi certamente veritiere) ricavabili dal libro stesso, con un nobile inglese originario della regione di Saint Albans, che avrebbe compiuto, tra il 1322 e il 1356, un lungo viaggio in Oriente e si sarebbe poi ritirato a Liegi dove sarebbe morto nel 1372 (secondo un epitaffio presente in una chiesa della città e scomparso con la Rivoluzione francese). Pubblicato in francese tra il 1357 e il 1371, il Voyage d’outre mer, che è per lo più una vasta compilazione da varie fonti (Guglielmo di Boldensale, Odorico da Pordenone, Vincenzo di Beauvais, ecc.), sia pure con alcune notizie di prima mano soprattutto per quanto riguarda i Luoghi Santi dall’autore sicuramente visitati, ebbe larghissima fortuna: fu tradotto in latino, in tedesco, in italiano (con ben 27 edizioni nel solo sec. 15º: 1a ed. it. 1480) ed esiste in inglese in tre diverse redazioni (The buke of John Maundeuill being the travels of Sir J. Mandeville knight 1322-56; o, con altro titolo, The voiage and travaile of Sir J. M. knight). L’opera fu nota a Leonardo (che la cita in un foglio del Codice Atlantico tra i libri posseduti: Giovan di Mandinilla) e a C. Colombo (secondo alcuni avrebbe fatto parte delle letture in base alle quali Colombo concepì la sua impresa).
Il racconto raccolse una straordinaria popolarità, anche grazie alla traduzione in molte altre lingue. Molti esploratori successivi, tra i quali Cristoforo Colombo, furono notevolmente influenzati da quest’opera, nonostante vi siano descrizioni di cose irreali e di natura fantastica.
Nella prefazione del racconto dei viaggi l’autore si definisce un cavaliere ed afferma di essere nato e cresciuto in Inghilterra, nella città di St Albans.
Un trattato delle cose più meravigliose e più notabili che si trovano al mondo. Mandeville non si mosse mai da casa ma per la sua composizione adopera il meglio della letteratura odeporica a disposizione.
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(MAUNDEVILLE, MONTEVILLA)
The author of a book of travels much read in the Middle Ages, died probably in 1372. The writer describes himself as an English knight born at St. Albans. In 1322, on the feast of St. Michael, he set out on a journey that took him first to Egypt where he participated as mercenary in the sultan’s wars against the Bedouins. He next visited Palestine, then, by way of India, also the interior of Asia and China, and served for fifteen months in the army of the Great Khan of Mongolia. After an absence of thirty-four years he returned in 1356, and at the instance and with the help of a physician, whose acquaintance he had made in Egypt at the court of the sultan, he wrote in Lüttich an account of his experiences and observations. In the manuscripts 1372 is given as the year of his death. Later investigation, however, made it clear that the real author was Jean de Bourgoigne, or à la Barbe, a physician from Lüttich, to whom several medical works are also attributed. He really lived for some time in Egypt, and during his sojourn may have conceived the idea of describing a journey to the Orient. Having visited no foreign country except Egypt, he was compelled to make use of the descriptions of others and to publish his compilation under a pseudonym. He discloses, in the situations borrowed often word for word from various authors, an extraordinarily wide range of reading, and he understood how to present his matter so attractively that the work in manuscript and print had a wonderful popularity.
His chief sources are the accounts of the travels of the first missionaries of the Dominican and Franciscan orders (see GEOGRAPHY AND THE CHURCH), who were the first to venture into the interior of Asia. He describes Constantinople and Palestine almost entirely according to the “Itinerarius” of the Dominican William of Boldensele written in 1336; he made use moreover of the “Tractatus de distantiis locorum terræ sanctæ” of Eugesippus, the “Descriptio terræ sanctæ” of John of Würzburg (c. 1165), and the “Libellus de locis sanctis” of Theodoricus (c. 1172). He was able out of his own experiences to give particulars about Egypt. What he has to say about the Mohammedan is taken from the work “De statu Saracenarum” (1273) of the Dominican William of Tripolis. His account of the Armenians, Persians, Turks, etc., is borrowed from the “Historia orientalis” of Hayton, the former Prince of Armenia and later Abbot of Poitiers. For the country of the Tatars and China he made use almost word for word of the “Deseriptio orientalium” of the Franciscan Odoric of Pordenone, and in parts of the “Historia Mongolorum” of the Franciscan John of Plano Carpini. Apart from books of travels he plagiarised from works of a general nature, the old authors Pliny, Solinus, Josephus Flavius, and the comprehensive “Speculum Historiale” of Vincent of Beauvais. The numerous manuscripts and printed editions are enumerated by Röhricht (“Bibliotheca Geographica Palestinæ”, Berlin, 1890, pp. 79-85). The oldest impressions are: in French (Lyons, 1480); German (Augsburg, 1481, 1482); English (Westminster, 1499). Modern editions: “The voinge and travaile of Sir Mandeville”, with introd. by J. O. Halliwell (London, 1839); “The Buke of John Maundeuill”, ed. by G. F. Warner (Westminster, 1889), in Roxburghe Club, Publications, No. 30; “Travels of Mandeville. The Version of the Cotton Manuscript in Modern Spelling” (London, 1900).
Consult SCHÖNBORN, Bibliogr. Untersuchungen über die Reisebeschreibung des Sir John Mandeville (Breslau, 1840); NICHOLSON in The Academy, 11 Nov., 1876, and 12 February, 1881; NICHOLSON AND YULE in Encycl. Brit., s. v. MANDEVILLE, JEHAN DE; NICHOLSON in The Academy, 12 April, 1884; BOVENSCHEN, Untersuchungen über Johann v. Mandeville und die Quellen seiner Reisebeschreibung in Zeitschr. der Ges. E. Erdkunde zu Berlin, XXIII (Berlin. 1888), pp. 177-306; MURRAY, John de Burdeus or John de Burgundia otherwise Sir John de Mandeville and the pestilence (London, 1891).
O. HARTIG
Catholic Encyclopedia
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