Stephen of Bohemia

Stephen of Bohemia was a Franciscan friar and a member of the Papal mission to the Mongol Empire in 1245–1247.[1][2]

Stephen set out from Lyon with John of Pian del Carpine on 16 April 1245.[1] They travelled through Bohemia to the territory of Duke Bolesław II of Silesia, where they were joined by Benedict the Pole at Wrocław.[1][2] A certain Ceslaus, also from Bohemia, is mentioned once in the Tartar Relation, but this may be the same person as Stephen.[2] Stephen fell ill not far beyond Kiev.[3] As a consequence, he was left behind in Mongol-occupied Cumania, possibly as a hostage. Ill health prevented him from ever going further. He did not visit the court of Batu, khan of the Golden Horde, or that of the Great Khan Güyük.[2]

Stephen seems to have been picked up by the mission on its return. He was used as a source by the author of the Tartar Relation.[4]

Notes
  1. Phillips 2014, p. 28.
  2. Czarnowus 2014, pp. 487–488.
  3. Michetti 2001.
  4. Ruotsala 2002, pp. 41–42.

Bibliography
  • Czarnowus, Anna (2014). "The Mongols, Eastern Europe, and Western Europe: The Mirabilia Tradition in Benedict of Poland's Historia Tartarorum and John of Plano Carpini's Historia Mongalorum". Literature Compass. 11 (7): 484–495. doi:10.1111/lic3.12150.
  • Michetti, Raimondo (2001). "Giovanni da Pian del Carpine". Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani, Volume 56: Giovanni Di Crescenzio–Giulietti (in Italian). Rome: Istituto dell'Enciclopedia Italiana.
  • Phillips, Kim M. (2014). Before Orientalism: Asian Peoples and Cultures in European Travel Writing, 1245–1510. University of Pennsylvania Press.
  • Ruotsala, Antti (2002). Europeans and Mongols in the Middle of the Thirteenth Century: Encountering the Other. Finnish Academy of Sciences.
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