Pilgrimage to Jerusalem and the Holy Land, 1187û1291

by Pringle,Denys

• ISBN13: 9780754651253
• ISBN10: 0754651258
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2012-05-28
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

This book will present a fairly comprehensive selection of translated Latin and French (and one Greek) pilgrimage texts relating to the years between the fall of Jerusalem to Saladin in 1187 and the fall of Acre to the Mamluks in 1291. It therefore complements and extends the translations already available, which deal with the periods from Late Antiquity up to Saladin. These pilgrimage texts provide a wealth of information not only about the business of pilgrimage itself, but also on church history, topography, architecture and the social and economic conditions of Palestine in different periods.The texts of the 13th century have not yet been studied as a group in this way and, because the existing editions of them are scattered across a variety of rather obscure publications, they tend to be under-used by historians though they are of considerable interest. In the first place they tend to be more detailed than the texts of the 12th century. They are also more original, more often representing first-hand accounts of travellers than simple reworkings of older texts. Taken together, they document the changes that occurred in the pattern of pilgrimage after the fall of Jerusalem in 1187, during its brief reoccupation by the Franks between 1229 and 1244, and during the period from 1260 onwards when the Mamluks gradually took military control of the whole country. For example, because of the difficulty experienced by pilgrims in reaching Jerusalem itself, in the 1250s-60s there developed an alternative set of holy sites offering indulgences in Acre. The bringing of Transjordan, southern Palestine and Sinai under Ayyubid and, later, Mamluk control also encouraged the pilgrimage to St Catherine's monastery on Mount Sinai to develop in this period.The translations will be accompanied by explanatory footnotes where necessary. An introduction will discuss the context and dating of the texts, and the light that they shed on the development of Holy Land pilgrimage in this period. The book will end with a comprehensive list of pilgrimage texts from this period (including those not translated), and a detailed index.