The Submission of the Emperor Frederick Barbarossa to Pope Alexander III - Federico Zuccari (The Getty Center)
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There is a story that I’ll start with here. It’s a little bit vague, there’s not much of an ending, and the truth of the whole thing is very much open to question. It is of course a Prester John story, and it goes like this.
The way this is generally told is that this was a natural continuation of what we covered last episode, a consequence of the letter of Prester John, a “what comes next.” And what came next was also a letter. Which makes sense. If you received a letter, and you were interested in knowing more about the person, you had questions to ask, advice to give, and demands to make, you might be quite likely to send a letter of your own.
The story goes that Pope Alexander III wrote a direct reply to that letter from Prester John, that he read Prester John’s letter, a text that some historians now read as a work of propaganda directed against him, and he answered it. It’s an account that’s gone around for quite a while, was in that passage from Sabine Baring-Gould that I quoted at the beginning of this series and was in the 1970s works of Igor de Rachewiltz, in his Papal Envoys to the Great Khans and Prester John and Europe’s Discovery of East Asia.
In tellings such as Rachewiltz’s, it was a man named Master Philip who carried the letter, and this was not Rachewiltz’s invention. It was there in the letter itself, written there that Phillip was a personal physician to Alexander. In September of 1177, he began his journey, sailing from Venice.
As Rachelwiltz put it, Philip was departing on a task “both hazardous and delicate.” He was bound for “the unknown territory beyond the Tower of Babel,” carrying that document addressed to “the very dear John, illustrious and magnificent king of the indies.” He made land somewhere around Palestine, and, quote, “the ill-fated envoy probably lost his way in the desert and met with an untimely end, as nothing was ever heard from him again.”
Man receives letter. Man writes reply. Man’s courier presumably dies. It’s not the best of storylines, but then, that may indeed have been how it happened. Or maybe not. Not exactly.
Hello and welcome. My name is Devon, and this is Human Circus: Journeys in the Medieval World, a podcast that follows medieval history through the stories of its travellers, and a podcast that is supported by a Patreon, maybe already supported by you, in which case, thank you very much. This is all a one-person effort, as you’ve probably noticed by now, and the Patreon really helps to make it a sustainable project for me. If you are interested in signing up, you can enjoy ad-free listening and other perks over at patreon.com/humancircus.
And now, back to the story. To the story of a letter, not from Prester John this time, but to him.
This will be a bit of a shorter episode. That’s just how it works out sometimes. I generally try to keep things in the 30-something to 40-something range, but I think this will work better both for this episode and the next.
What we’re talking about here is that letter from Pope Alexander III to Prester John, its contents and context. The circumstances.
It was the year 1177, probably. It was September 27th, possibly, and Pope Alexander III had something to say to that near omnipotent king from somewhere out east.
It had been a busy time for him. After nearly 20 years as pope, 20 years spent struggling on and off with Frederick Barbarossa and his anti-pope, 20 years in which he was generally unable to safely reside in Rome, instead ever on the move across Italy, France, and elsewhere, he had only just that year, in 1177, been recognized by Barbarossa as pope at the Treaty of Venice. In the previous year, his allies in the Lombard League had defeated Barbarossa’s forces at the Battle of Legnano. In late July, he had accepted the emperor’s request for peace and strengthened his hold at home; then, in late September, he wrote to this other, eastern, emperor, seeking to bring Prester John also under his authority.
Alexander was used to dealing with people of immense power, with Barbarossa, with the Byzantine emperor Manuel I, and with kings such as Henry II of England, as in during the Thomas Beckett crisis. He was accustomed to power, to wielding it, to dealing with those figures of his time who held it also, and now he was writing to another of those. He begins by addressing his letter.
“Bishop Alexander, servant of the servants of God, to John, beloved in Christ the son, illustrious and magnificent king of the Indians, greetings and papal blessings.”
Then he further establishes who he is and what it means to be pope.
He writes about the papal seat, the one he presides over, however humble he may be, how it is the “head and mistress of all those who believe in Christ,” how he, no matter how unworthy, is successor to the blessed Peter, the one to whom Christ had said, “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the doors of Hell will not prevail against it.”
Alexander was humble, unworthy, and ever so modest, but also ever so clear as to his position of primacy. It was, as ever, easy to be humble from up on the throne.
And then Alexander turned his attention to his correspondent.
We’ve heard of you, he says. We’ve heard for a long time, by reports and common rumour, “reports” perhaps including those which we covered in the last few episodes, common rumour implying a more general level of chit-chat as to Prester John. But the pope hadn’t only heard those other reports, wasn’t just responding to some loose talk at this court or that. His own “doctor and familiar,” that Master Philip, had told him. He’d told him of speaking with honourable men from Prester John’s kingdom who had talked of the priest-king’s desire to be, quote, “educated in the Catholic and papal teaching.” It was a laudable goal, Alexander assured his reader, so that Prester John “may never be seen to hold in [his] faith that which dissents from or is in any way at variance with the doctrine of the papal seat.”
The priest-king Prester John might have had gems and knights that were practically beyond number and may have counted among his people many who we at least would consider among the supernatural, with power to match—and it’s not totally clear what the pope thought of all that—but Alexander had the correct Christianity, and he wasn’t shy about making that clear. He lectured that far-off lord of legendary might. He chastised him.
To declare yourself a Christian, wasn’t enough, he wrote. Indeed, he who did so, but was “not in agreement in word and deed with this same declaration [could not] truly hope for salvation.” You could have all the magic mirrors raised on steps of precious gems and metals that you wanted. You could have world-shattering armies that followed the cross at your command, some of them eating the resultant, a little suspect in itself, but it was, quote, “not enough for anyone to be thought of as Christian in name, who has experience of a faith other than that which the Catholic and papal teaching holds…” “Not all who say to me ‘Lord, Lord’ will enter into the kingdom of the heavens…”
But all of that was okay, Alexander assured Prester John. It was going to be alright because Philip had related to him that the priest-king “wanted with fervent desire to have a church in the city [of Rome], and an altar in Jerusalem, where prudent men from [his] kingdom may be able to stay and be completely instructed…”
Little Prester John was, in other words, going to be just fine, just so long as he sat down and paid attention in class, so long as he recognized that Alexander was not one of his fellow students. They were not the same.
The letter slips back and forth between cautioning Prester John that he was not home and dry, religiously speaking, and commending him for being ready to do something about it, between a kind of theatrical modesty as to its writer’s scant suitability for the greatness of his office and reminding the reader of that very greatness, and just how very great it was.
“Although we are placed in blessed Peter’s chair without deserving it,” the letter read, “with wise men and foolish men, rich and poor, on account of the apostle we recognise [our] obligations, [and so] we have concern for the salvation of you and your men… .”
What was needed, it continued, was for someone from the pope’s side to go to Prester John and help him, “a very difficult and painstaking [task],” as the letter put it, to journey to those distant lands “through such labours, various dangers, and different places, through barbarous and unknown languages… .”
But the pope would see it done, he assured Prester John. Because of the duties of the papal office and the priest-king’s pious intentions, he would send his Philip to him, send that “distinguished man, circumspect and foresightful,” to correct Prester John and his people “regarding the articles of the Christian faith in which [he] and [his] men seem[ed] to be at variance with [Alexander],” at variance, as he would have it, with the truth.
In the final passages of the letter, Alexander asked Prester John, he admonished and exhorted him, to receive Philip “respectfully and faithfully,” to, if it was, as indeed it should be, his will, heed what Philip said to him and learn, to send back with with Philip “honest persons and letters signed with [his] seal.” The pope wished to know this man’s purpose, his desires. Alexander was curious about this mysterious figure. Was he indeed inclined to yield to the church of Rome? Alexander, for his part, was willing to listen to any requests that the priest-king might have and to grant those which were beneficial. He wished, quote, “to move forward in all ways in which [he could], according to God, and [he] desire[d] to make the souls of [Prester John and his] men profit in the Lord.”
The letter is dated September the 27th, “at Venice, on the Rivo Alto.” A date and a place, but what of the year? That comes to us thanks to the work of 19th century German philologist, Friedrich Karl Theodor Zarncke who found the day on one copy of the letter and Venice on the other, and then examined Alexander’s movements, narrowing it down to 1177 as the only year when the pope had been in Venice on that particular date. It seems like an imperfect practice, but that’s what we have, and that’s what’s generally accepted.
Dating issues aside, that, more or less, was the letter, and it all seems reasonable enough. A pope gets a letter from a figure of mystery to the far east, and he replies to it. The content seems believable enough, as does the failure of Philip’s embassy, its disappearance without, thus far, any trace. What wasn’t to be believed? Why did I mention that this might have not been quite how it happened? Why does the much referenced Brewer question this chain of events? The answer, for Brewer, gets back to that question of belief. To what degree did people believe what the letter of Prester John said? How can we tell?
Brewer’s position, his point of annoyance really, is the way the first part of the equation is laid out. The pope reads a letter. He replies to the letter. For Brewer, it’s the first part that needs further examination, the part where people have accepted that Alexander had read the letter of Prester John and answered it, and that this then stands as a clear demonstration of belief in the ruler himself.
To this, the response is that 1) Even if the pope himself was reading and replying to Prester John’s letter, it hardly follows that belief in the priest-king was necessarily wide-spread throughout medieval Europe 2) We don’t actually have outside evidence of Philip’s expedition taking place & 3) It’s not at all clear that Alexander was familiar with the letter.
And this is an interesting assertion on Brewer’s part. How could Alexander be unaware of the letter? What leads Brewer to suggest it?
For one, Alexander makes no reference to the letter. He doesn’t say he’s read the letter, doesn’t quote the letter, doesn’t ask about topics in the letter that you might expect him to. The various objects of power for example, the curious people and creatures, and then the Saint Thomas material with really the most striking absence. Nothing.
Alexander doesn’t tell us he knows the letter. Instead, he makes repeated mention of the somewhat mysterious Philip, physician to the pope though not a person we know much else about, and Philip’s source was supposedly not the letter either. He claims to have had it from people he’d met on his travels, people from Prester John’s kingdom who told him of that place and its ruler.
So maybe that’s what happened, exactly as it’s presented in the letter. Bit odd that we don’t have any other reference to Philip’s mission, but it is certainly possible. Or maybe Alexander did read the letter. Maybe he read the letter and actually recognized it for the barbed dart of imperial propaganda it maybe was. Maybe he replied in kind, and maybe this papal communication to the eastern priest-king wasn’t ever really meant to be read by a Prester John but instead by a Latin Christian European audience to whom Alexander now trumpeted his authority and asserted his primacy, doubtless weaving in all manner of allegorical and rhetorical touches as he did so that will escape the modern reader. Maybe. As I think I said earlier, there will be no shortage of maybes in this series.
The history of the Prester John story is full of such uncertainties, but that’s not all there is to it. Next episode, we’ll be rubbing up against the very concrete events of the crusades, in particular the 5th one, where promises understood will go unfulfilled, absolutely fatally so, where we see the way information becomes distorted at a distance, how the end result of that transmission provided an amazingly rose-tinted picture of real events that would, not too much later, be very much more immediately felt.
The news, misleading as it was, arrived and circulated, and it brought hope.
It’s the hope that kills.
Thank you very much for listening, everyone. I’ll be back soon with that next episode, the next in this Prester John series, and I’ll talk to you then.