Table Of ContentThe African Prester John and
the Birth of Ethiopian-European
Relations, 1402-1555
From the 14th century onward, political and religious motives led Ethiopian trave
lers to Mediterranean Europe. For two centuries, their ancient Christian heritage
and the myth of a fabled eastern king named Prester John allowed Ethiopians to
engage the continent's secular and religious elites as peers. Meanwhile in Ethiopia,
the nobility came to welcome European visitors and at times even co-opted them
by arranging mixed marriages and bestowing land rights. The protagonists of this
encounter sought and discovered each other in royal palaces, monasteries, and
markets throughout the Mediterranean basin, the Red Sea, and the Indian Ocean
littoral, from Lisbon to Jerusalem and from Venice to Goa. Matteo Salvadore's
narrative takes readers on a voyage of reciprocal discovery that climaxed with the
Portuguese intervention on the side of the Christian monarchy in the Ethiopian
Adali War. Thereafter, the arrival of the Jesuits in the Hom of Africa turned the
mutually beneficial Ethiopian-European encounter into a bitter confrontation over
the souls of Ethiopian Christians.
Matteo Salvadore is Assistant Professor of History at American University of
Sharjah, United Arab Emirates.
The African Prester
Transculturalisms, 1400-1700
Series Editors: John and the Birth of
Mihoko Suzuki, University ofM iami, USA,
Ann Rosalind Jones, Smith College, USA, Ethiopian-European
Jyotsna Singh, Michigan State University, USA
Relations, 1402-1555
This series presents studies of the early modem contacts and exchanges among
the states, polities and entrepreneurial organizations of Europe; Asia, including Matteo Salvadore
the Levant and East India/Indies; Africa; and the Americas. Books will investi
gate travelers, merchants and cultural inventors, including explorers, mapmakers,
artists and writers, as they operated in political, mercantile, sexual and linguistic
economies. We encourage authors to reflect on their own methodologies in rela
tion to issues and theories relevant to the study of transculturism/translation and
transnationalism. We are particularly interested in work on and from the perspec
tive of the Asians, Africans, and Americans involved in these interactions, and on
such topics as:
Material exchanges, including textiles, paper and printing, and technologies
of knowledge
Movements of bodies: embassies, voyagers, piracy, enslavement
Travel writing: its purposes, practices, forms and effects on writing in other
genres
Belief systems: religions, philosophies, sciences
Translations: verbal, artistic, philosophical
Forms of transnational violence and its representations.
Also in this series:
The Chinese Impact upon English Renaissance Literature
A globalization and liberal cosmopolitan approach to Donne and Milton
MingjunLu
Commedia dell' Arte and the Mediterranean
Chartingjoumeys and mapping 'Others'
Erith Jaffe-Berg
Early Modern atholics, Royalists, and o mopolitans
Engli h lran nalionali 111 and Lhc hri Lian ommonwcallh I~~ ~o~l!!n~~~up
Brian . lo k•
LONDON AND N W YORK
English olonial ~ xls on Tan~icr, 1661- 1684
l1111r rialism ond th · politi ·s ol',. . sist:111 · •
K/lri111 lh:jjit
First published 2017
by Routledge
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© 20 I 7 Matteo Salvadore
The right of Matteo Salvadore to be identified as author of this work
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Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or
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Trademark notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or
registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation
without intent to infringe.
British library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
A catalog record for this book has been requested.
ISBN: 978-1-4 724-1891-3 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-61229-4 (ebk)
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Contents
List of illustrations viii
Preface
lX
Introduction
PART I
The Mediterranean way 19
Ethiopians in the lagoon, 1402-1459 21
2 The Crown of Aragon, 1427- 1453 36
3 Rome via Jerusalem, 1439-1484 54
4 Lisbon, 1441- 1508 82
PART II
The Indian run 105
5 Beyond the sea, 1509- 1520 107
6 Shewa, l 400s- l 526 128
7 A tale of three cities, 1527- 1539 153
8 Ending the war and the encounter, 1540- 1555 180
Conclusion 203
Appendix 210
Bibliography 212
Index 229
Illustrations Preface
Maps I wrote the vast majority of this volume over the past three years in Kuwait, but
this being my first book, the list of people to whom I owe my gratitude traces
1.1 The world of the encounter· The Mediterranean, 1400- 1550 20
all the way back to when I began developing an interest in history as a teenager.
4.1 The world of the encounter: The Indian run, 1400-1550 87
I distinctly remember perusing, as a 15-year old, my father's copy ofRamusio's
5.1 The world of the encounter The Indian Ocean and Red Sea
Navigationi et Viaggi and being fascinated with the whole notion of travel and
worlds, 1400-1550 111
exploration. Little did I know that one day that very volume would become one
5.2 The world of the encounter· The Christian Kingdom of Ethiopia,
of my sources. To this day, my father has a larger historical library than I have,
1400-1550 120
and I think I wanted to be a historian ever since I would see him reading in the
little spare time he had left after spending most of the day running his company.
Figures Although I was a terrible high school student with limited interest in reading,
my father's insistence that history was very important ultimately struck a chord
1.1 The Kingdom of Ethiopia according to Fra Mauro
with me.
Mappamondo di Fra Mauro (1450 ea.) 29
Like most of my students today, in school I thought history to be a rather boring
1.2 Cosmographical sketch from Zorzi's manuscript 31
subject, but only until my third year of high school, when Prof. Lanfranco Mag
2.1 Alfonso's memorandum 41
gioli, an extraordinarily gifted teacher, turned the subject into the most captivating
3.1 Copy of the letter of indulgence bestowed to the Ethiopians in
I had ever studied. At the very beginning of college, I took a general contemporary
Constance 57
history course dreaded by freshmen, and I became fascinated with the instructor,
3.2 Antonio di Pietro Averlino (aka Filarete), "Porta del Filarete,"
Prof. Fulvio Cammarano. From the moment he walked into the first class with his
St. Peter's Basilica, 1445 61
unlit cigar and started lecturing, I began dreaming of becoming a historian. One
3.3 View of Santo Stefano deg Ii Abissini in the 17 50s 72
day I went to visit him to ask what must have sounded like a rather silly question:
7 1 Title page of Legatio David Aethiopiae ( 1533) 157
what I needed to do to become a professor - in my mind, how to be like him. He
8.1 Title page of Modus Baptizandi (1549) 188
graciously entertained me by pointing at his assistants and explaining what they
8.2 Title page of Missa qua Ethiopes (1549) 189
were doing as part of their training, and then he told me what I had heard from my
8.3 Title page of Testamentum Novum (1549) 190
father for most ofmy life: read, a lot. A couple of years later, Anna Maria Gentili
8.4 Exan1ple of correspondence between Tesfa Seyon and Roman
introduced me to African history, and when I asked her the same question - how
personalities 191
does one become a professor? - she told me something that a few years later
8.5 Ritratto dell 'Imperatore Atana de Dinghel 192
I would hear almost verbatim while watching Marco Tullio Giordana's family
8.6 Example of correspondence between Giovanni and Tesfa Seyon 196
epic The Best of Youth: if you have any ambition, leave this country. I did, and
ultimately I lost touch with these acquaintances who marked my coming of age,
but I have always felt indebted to them, and I promised myself! would thank them
in the preface of my first book.
I am al o grateful to a variety of people from my days in Philadelphia, and in
particular to the fi llowing exceptional individual : Te hale Tibebu was the best
doctoral advisor I u Id have hoped fi r. I le upp rtcd me by fTerin a balanced
x Preface Preface x1
mixture of praise and criticism and, more important, he trusted me with the free who six years ago as Vice President of Academic Affairs at GUST offered me the
dom to find my own research interest. Howard Spodek taught me how to be a position and midwifed a new fantastic chapter in my nomadic life.
world historian inside and outside of the classroom. At the African Studies Center I also owe a great deal of gratitude to those who helped me make sense of sources
of the University of Pennsylvania, Lee V. Cassanelli introduced me to issues of in foreign languages, among them my father, who assisted with early modem Italian
transcultural encounters between Africans and Europeans that would keep me vernaculars, and my good friends and colleagues Thorsten Botz and Mana! Hosny,
s
busy for the ensuing decade and assigned me David Northrop's Africa Discovery who helped with French and Arabic. The citations from Latin, Portuguese, and
of Europe. I am deeply indebted to Prof. Northrup not only because his volume Spanish sources were translated by, respectively, Jessica Wright, Sara Nogueira,
is the piece of scholarship that provided the most inspiration for what eventually and Marlene Dias de Sousa.
became this book but also because first as my reader and then time and again over Additionally, I feel particularly indebted to three exceptional individuals. James
the years, he generously shared with me excellent scholarly advice. Toward the De Lorenzi has been discussing Ethiopian history with me for the last decade and
end of my doctorate, as I began teaching African history at Rowan University has read my work many times over, never failing to provide me with both moral
and grappling with the joys and pains of academic life, I also looked up to two support and exceptional scholarly insight. Martin Rosenstock has not only given
good friends who never failed to cheer me up, David Applebaum and Jim Abbott. me precious feedback on my work but also has taught me a lot about narrative
In Italy, I am indebted to Irma Taddia, whom I first met as an inexperienced and strategies. If, as I hope, I succeeded in telling an intriguing story, this is because
mostly lost graduate student at the 2007 International Conference of Ethiopian of what I learned from him over countless cups of good Turkish coffee. Thorsten
Studies-her enthusiasm for my work grounded me and kept me going. Botz has been nourishing my soul with exceptional piano playing, cosmopolitan
My research benefitted from the Gulf University for Science and Technology food, and artisan tea; more important, he has set an example as a writer that I can
(GUST)/University of Missouri-St. Louis Summer Faculty Fellowship, which only aspire to emulate and made me understand the importance of daily discipline
allowed me to work with Ruth Iy ob, whose profound understanding of the African for scholarly productivity.
diaspora greatly helped me develop my theoretical approach. I also would like to Finally, my wife Silvia: with her loving support, she went far beyond what
thank Sarah Fekadu-Uthofffor the generous invitation to discuss my work at the can be expected, even imagined. She has been the most caring, forgiving, and
Volkswagen Fellows Interdisciplinary Symposium at Washington University of unflinching partner anyone could dream of. I wrote this volume on my home desk
St. Louis, which occasioned one of many productive conversations with Wendy in Salmiya, oftentimes with my young sons Elia and Carlo making a variety of
Belcher, whose innovative work on early modem Ethiopia and drive to deprovin noises in the background. At times, I confess, I found myself wondering whether
cialize the field has long been a source of inspiration for my own work. I am also the world would not be a better place if children of academics came equipped with
grateful to the late Jerry Bentley as well as to Allison Kavey, Jonathan Miran, time-to-write off switches. Yet I do not think I would have found the energy to
Gabriella Romani, and Tom Taylor for trusting me as a contributor to the journals complete this project had it not been for the thought that hopefully one day while
and collections they edited over the past years. My publications there represented spending time in a good academic library and walking through the stacks they will
meaningful steps toward this project. Of course, this volume would have never chance upon their daddy's book.
seen the light of day had it not been for the patient support of my editor, Erika This volume is dedicated to my parents, who never objected to their only child
Gaffney. When five years ago I naively told her I thought I had a manuscript ready leaving home in his early twenties to go, in my mother's words, "further and fur
for publication, she offered a very tactful answer, knowing - I think - that I would ther away." Almost 20 years later, as a father, I realize how hard it must have been
soon realize the enormity ofmy misconception. Today, as I look at an altogether for them, and I am immensely grateful.
different text written almost entirely from scratch, I cannot but be thankful to her
for having graciously pointed me in the right direction. I am also thankful to my
production editor Megan Hiatt, for patiently walking me through the last stages
of my Jong journey.
Having worked with sources from dozens of institutions, I am unfortunately
unable to list all the gracious archivists and librarians who helped me retrieve rare
t t , but I must thank those who went beyond their duties to help me: Andreina
Rita at the Biblioteca Apo tolica Vaticana, Gianfranco Armando at the Archivio
S' ,rcto Vaticano, and Ro alba uarnieri at the Biblioteca Comunale di Palenno.
/\I GUST I must al thank my ncrou and upJ ortivc dean, Ali Ansari, for
prnvicling me with the nc ssary n xibilily I hat all wed me to mplcte my man
us ·ript while hcadin, on' of' his departments. I musl also thank R b rt ook,
Furopc.in ,·ncotmll'r into hitl<'r confronl,llion
M.atko S.1h-adore
Introduction
"We who profess Christianity ought to be ashamed of ourselves, since the Ethiopi
ans seem to surpass us in regard to the cult and observance of the religion."
Adamus Carolus to Damiiio de G6is, 28 October 15401
In 1291, Giovanni Mauro da Carignano was appointed rector of the church of San
Marco al Molo in Genoa's old port, the Madraccio. As the priest began to attend
to his flock of seafarers, he must have looked for ways to increase his alms and
quickly realized the potential of his location. Located at the very center of Genoa's
burgeoning thalassocracy, whose tentacles stretched throughout the Mediterra
nean and beyond, Carignano started to offer his patrons navigational material and
information, turning his privileged position into a business so lucrative it attracted
the ire of the city's bishop. Inspired by conversations with mariners and traders
who had been to faraway places, at some point in the 1320s Carignano must have
decided to formalize his geographical knowledge by producing a portolan of the
Mediterranean.2 His chart departed significantly from the copycat mapmaking
style of medieval Europe, one that had been recycling ancient knowledge with
little basis in reality. On the contrary, the priest included an impressive degree of
novel details on the Nile Valley, where he located a "Terra Abaise" [Abyssinia]
inhabited by "Christiani Nigri" [Black Christians].3
Some clues as to Carignano's source of information on what was at the time
a very remote place in the European mind would be found, almost two centu
ries later, in Jacopo Filippo Foresti's (1434- 1520) Supplementum Chronicarum
(1483):
A priest of Genoa, provost of San Marco and famous man indeed, published
a tractate, which he named "The Map," wherein, writing much about the
condition of this people, he reported that Prester John ruled over them like a
patriarch, and that 127 archbishops were subordinate to him, each of whom,
he said, had 20 bishops. in the period of [Pope] Clement V, in the year of
our salvation 1306, this same Emperor [Prester John] sent 30 ambassadors
to the King of Spain, and offered him help against the infidels. Approach
ing Avignon and Clement V Pontifex Maxim us with reverence, and having
2 Introduction Introduction 3
been thoroughly instructed by many apostolic letters, they came to Rome to that Ethiopian pilgrims would visit time and again in the following centuries. Had
visit the thresholds of the apostles Peter and Paul. After visiting these, they the Ethiopians been pilgrims, they could have hailed not from Ethiopia but from
returned joyfully to their own [lands]. But, since they had remained at Genoa Jerusalem, where an Ethiopian clerical community had existed at least since the
for many days awaiting the season for sailing, they left in writing, according Middle Ages and through which in the ensuing centuries countless Ethiopians and
to request, many things (as it happened) about their own rites, customs, and Europeans transited as they undertook the journey to and from Ethiopia.
lands, having written [a bout these], they left [w hat they had written], which All in all, there can be no type of conclusive interpretation of the Ethiopian
the same author reported.4 transit through Genoa; yet, it remains extremely significant because it is the first
recorded case of an Ethiopian visit to Europe and, if accepted as an embassy, also
On any given day in 1306, Carignano can be imagined in the Madraccio, peering the first recorded African embassy to a European sovereign. The few toponyms
down at the docks from his rectory's window. The port must have been teem Carignano included in his map, along with the alleged commentary, documented
ing with activity as galleys were loading and unloading goods and passengers: not only the first timid Ethiopian steps into Europe but also the equally timid
in many cases the two were one and the same, as the Genoese were among the European attempts to move past a variety of myths and misconceptions of ancient
most rapacious slave traders of the Mediterranean and Genoa was a prime hub for and medieval derivation as to the existence, identity, and location of Christian
the trade. Genoa's slave trade targeted mostly Arabs and Eastern Europeans, but communities beyond the Middle East. More generally, the visit adumbrates the
chained Africans were not an uncommon sight: already in 1286, the city's slave emergence of an encounter between the Kingdom of Ethiopia and various poli
population had motivated the Dominican Giovanni Balbi (n.a.-1298) to include ties in Western Mediterranean Europe. It presents tropes that will appear in simi
considerations on both slavery and color in his Latin dictionary.5 What must have lar guises time and again in the ensuing centuries: Ethiopian embassies seeking
been exceedingly uncommon to Carignano was the sight of a peculiar group of Christian allies, pious Ethiopian monks defying the odds of early modern travel to
Africans, neither wearing chains nor wretched in their appearance walking about find salvation and knowledge at the heart of Western Christendom, European trad
on their own and making inquiries about sailing to the East, probably to Alexan ers seeking commercial opportunities, and lay and ordained intellectuals, chroni
dria. As the maritime republic enjoyed special relations with the Mamluk sultan clers, and mapmakers grappling with the notion of a country to be found in the
ate, the visitors were in the right place and likely found the transport they sought, Indies and populated by Black Christians.
but not before entertaining Carignano with their story. However, as much as the visit is significant and anticipates things to come,
It can be speculated that the party had found its way to Europe by embarking it remains an outlier: no other Ethiopian mission to Europe was recorded until
on one of the many Venetian and Genoese galleys that connected Alexandria and almost a century later, and neither the transit through Genoa nor the possible visit
various Levantine ports to multiple ports on the Italian peninsula. Upon reaching to Avignon produced any relevant consequence for later interactions.7 To the con
Italy and learning that Pope Clement V (1305- 1314) was in fact in Avignon - trary, starting in the early 1400s and specifically with the Ethiopian embassy to the
where he would later move his court and start the eponymous papacy- they trave Republic of Venice in 1402, Ethiopian and European agents entertained relations
led to France, later they visited Rome, and finally they reached Genoa in search of grounded on recurring and, to a certain degree, predictable dynamics of interac
a safe passage back east. As to the purpose of the mission, the Ethiopian emperor tion that connected disparate events, personalities, and locales over a complex
Wedem Arad (1299-1314) came to be known for his aggressive expansionist matrix that encompassed 150 years of exchanges over three continents. This vast
policies, which attracted much scorn from neighboring Muslim communities.6 and translocal body of exchanges and its cultural by-products are the subject of
One could speculate that upon learning of the ongoing conflicts between Chris this volume.
tians and Muslims in the Mediterranean basin, the sovereign probably wondered I define the early modem Ethiopian-European encounter as the combined expe
whether he could find worthy allies against the common enemy and opted to dis rience of lay and ordained Ethiopians and Europeans who, either on behalf of the
patch a mission to Europe. polities to which they belonged or as independent agents, traveled, either with
It is more likely, however, that Carignano's visitors were simply monks making their feet or with their mind, beyond the Arab world to seek power, profit, or
pilgrimage to the same European locales that in the ensuing centuries attracted knowledge. Some Ethiopian and European agents went so far as to create diasporic
scores of Ethiopians: a clerical identity and purpose would be in line with their communities, embracing transcultural practices and identities and, at times, even
visit to the pontiff. If so, claiming to be on a mission on behalf of their sover undergoing a rather extensive metamorphosis by fully embracing life in the new
eign could have simply been a ploy to elicit support: they could have represented host society. The experience of Ethiopian pilgrims and representatives as active
themselves as "ambassadors" for the sake of convenience or been mistaken for agents of transcontinental discovery is particularly remarkable because, in spite
such by their interlocutors. As to what Foresti refers to as their visit "to the King of their physical appearance, they were welcomed as intellectuals and diplomats
of Spain" [ad regem Hispaniarum}, the monk could have dressed in diplomatic in a variety of European locales. The same societie that were quickly becom
garb their pilgrimage to antiago de omp tela, one of many loci of devotions ing familiar with the callou trade in African bodies and the related categories
