How Many Miles to Babylon?: Travels and Adventures to Egypt and Beyond, From 1300 to 1640

329 Pages·2003·7.34 MB·English

by  Anne Wolff

How Many Miles to Babylon?
Filippo Pigafetta’s map of Africa
How Many Miles to Babylon?
Travels and Adventures to Egypt and Beyond,
1300 to 1640
ANNE WOLFF
LIVERPOOL UNIVERSITY PRESS
First published 2003 by
Liverpool University Press
4 Cambridge Street
Liverpool L69 7ZU
Copyright © 2003 Anne Wolff
The right of Anne Wolff to be identified as the author of this work has been
asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act,
1988
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a
retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic,
mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written
permission of the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication data
A British Library CIP record is available
ISBN 0-85323-658-5 cased
0-85323-668-2 limp
Typeset by XL Publishing Services, Tiverton
Printed and bound in the European Union by
Biddles Ltd, Guildford and King’s Lynn
For Edwin
How many miles to Babylon?
Threescore miles and ten.
Can I get there by candle-light?
Yes, and back again.
If your heels are nimble and light,
You may get there by candle-light.
Songs for the Nursery(1805)

Contents
Preface ix
Permissions x
List of Illustrations xi
List of Abbreviations xv
Glossary xvi
Introduction 1
1 The Mamluk Rulers of Egypt 14
2 Egypt Imagined and the Realities of the Voyage 40
3 The Maritime Port of Alexandria 61
4 Sailing Upstream to Cairo 97
5 Cairo: ‘Meeting Place of Comer and Goer’ 112
6 Venetian Diplomacy and the Arrival of the Ottomans 151
7 Exploring the Pyramids and Mummy Fields 167
8 Pilgrims to the Monastery of St Catherine 195
9 Adventures with the Mecca Caravan 233
10To the South 250
Appendices 285
Bibliography 287
Index 297