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Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books
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The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.2 |
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which, being defective from the middle of chap. xxii. has been completed with the Royal MS. 20 B. X. Indeed the Egerton MS. 1982 is the only complete English manuscript of the British Museum,* as, besides seven copies of the defective text, three leaves are missing in the Cotton MS. after f. 53, the text of the edition of 1725 having been completed with the Royal MS. 17 B.†
Notwithstanding its great popularity, Mandeville's Book could not fail to strike with its similarity with other books of travels, with Friar Odoric's among others. This similarity has been the cause that occasionally the Franciscan Friar was given as a companion to the Knight of St. Albans, for instance, in the manuscripts of Mayence and Wolfenbüttel.‡ Some Commentators have gone too far in their appreciation and the Udine monk has been treated either as a plagiarism or a liar! Old Samuel Purchas, in his address to the Reader printed at the beginning of Marco Polo's text (p. 65), calls his countryman! Mandeville the greatest Asian traveller next (if next) to Marco Polo, and he leaves us to understand that the worthy knight has been pillaged by some priest!§ Astley uses strong language; he calls Odoric a great liar! ||
Others are fair in their judgment. Malte-Brun, for instance, marked what Mandeville borrowed from Odoric, and La Renaudière is also very just in the Biographie Universelle. But what Malte-Brun and La Renaudière showed in a general manner, other learned men, such as Dr. S. Bormans, Sir Henry Yule, Mr. E. W. B. Nicholson,¶ Dr. J. Vogels,** M. Léopold Delisle, Herr A. Bovenschen,†† and last, not least, Dr. G. F. Warner, have in our days proved that not only has the book bearing Mandeville's name been compiled from the works of Vincent de Beauvais, Jacques of Vitry, Boldensei, Carpin, Odoric, etc., but that it was written neither by a Knight of St. Albans, by an Englishman, or by a Sir John Mandeville, but very likely by the physician John of Burgundy or John a Beard.
In a repertory of La Librairie de la Collégiale de Saint Paul à Liège au XVe. Siècle, published by Dr. Stanislas Bormans, in the Bibliophile Belge, Brussels, 1866, p. 236, is catalogued under No. 240: Legenda de Joseph et Asseneth ejus uxore, in papiro. In eodem itinerarium Johannis de Mandevilla militis, apud guilhelmianos Leodienses sepulti.
Dr. S. Bormans has added the following note: “Jean Mandeville, ou Manduith, théologien et mathématicien, était né à St. Alban en Angleterre d'une famille noble.
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