The Bondage and Travels of Johann Schiltberger

“An editor, or a translator, collects the merits of different writers, and, forming all into a wreath, bestows it on his author’s tomb.”—SHENSTONE.

The world is indebted to the late Professor Karl Friedrich Neumann, for having rendered the perusal of Johann Schiltberger’s travels generally accessible. Until his edition of the Heidelberg MS. appeared, in 1859, there had been no publication of the interesting work, in its integrity, since the year 1700, the supposed date of an edition, sine anno, sine loco; so that, as a fact, the work had become scarce, and could be consulted in a few libraries only, or in private collections of rare books. In 1813, and again in 1814, was published Abraham Jacob Penzel’s edition of what was known as the Nuremberg MS.; but its sole merit consisted in the insertion of Proper and Geographical names in their original orthography, the work being otherwise vitiated by its modern and paraphrased style, and by the introduction of passages, of which Schiltberger never could have been the author.

Scheiger[1] condemns this book as being written in a very extraordinary and uncommonly empty style, in which the narrative of the honest old Bavarian drags itself along very uncouthly. Tobler[2] stigmatises it as being an unhappy translation into modern German, with no Introduction; and Neumann,[3] a still severer critic, says:—“This edition, in its modern garb, does honour to nobody. The additions to the original text are absurd, and testify to the editor’s ignorance of Schiltberger’s character, and of the times in which he lived. Take, for instance, the following sentence, with which Penzel concludes the author’s address to the reader:—‘Just as the doctor smears with honey the glass of physic prepared for a sick child, so have I also, as an agreeable pastime, introduced here and there some wonderful stories which, I flatter myself, will prove agreeable and instructive reading.’” Neumann might have added, that Penzel was not even the originator of the idea conveyed in this passage, evidently borrowed from Tasso!

“Sai, che là corre il mondo, ove più versi Di sue dolcezze il lusinghier Parnaso, E che ’l vero condito in molli versi I più schivi allettando ha persuaso. Così all’ egro fanciul porgiamo aspersi Di soave licor gli orli del vaso: Succhi amari ingannato intanto ei beve, E dall’ inganno suo vita riceve.”

La Gerusalemme Liberata, Can. I, iii.

In 1823 these travels were again published, in 8vo., at Munich; but this is a copy of which it would seem that very little is known.

Judging by the numerous editions of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, each issue being an almost exact transcript of the copy that preceded it, Schiltberger must have been a popular author during that period. One long blank occurs from 1557 to 1606, after which the book of travels was not again reprinted until 1700.

The version now offered is a literal translation of Neumann’s edition in mittelhoch Deutsch, an exact transcript of the Heidelberg MS., with the exception of a few errors that have been rectified, and slight alterations in the headings of some chapters. Neumann believes his book to be the first printed edition that faithfully represents what Schiltberger wrote, the wording in all previous editions having been changed to suit the language of the times. He has added an Introduction and Notes by himself, and Notes by Fallmerayer and Hammer-Purgstall; such of those Notes as are referred to in the new Notes at the end of this volume, appear in their proper places at foot in the text, each bearing the initial of the writer.