The Journey as a Mirror
The story of Alexander the Great is a ubiquitous one, co-opted throughout the years by many cultures and writers, who each tell a different version of the same base story. Each different version of Alexander’s tales incorporates a new view on his travels throughout Europe and Asia, telling of the unfamiliarity of other cultures, or what each individual author has found wondrous and strange. Specifically, this occurs in the Epistola Alexandri, which is attributed to Alexander, by way of his travels in India. In this way, the story of a journey is indicative not just of an individual, but of a culture. The author’s observations do, of course, reveal information about the unfamiliar culture he is faced with, but in doing so they also offer us a glimpse into parts of the author’s own customs.
This type of reflection is not only confined to literature or pseudo-historical accounts. In fact, accounts thought to be primarily factual also allow the readers to glean the views of the writers through examining what is unfamiliar to them, and therefore what their culture is accustomed to. In this way, the journey itself is the conveyor of information, by means of a story that would never have come to pass had its writer never travelled. One such account is provided by William of Rubruck, and published in The Journey of William of Rubruck to the Eastern Parts of the World. Rubruck regards the people he meets on his journey as strange and unfamiliar, and in describing them reveals what his culture regards as normal or abnormal.
The Epistola Alexandri Ad Aristotelem is a letter purportedly written by Alexander himself to his teacher Aristotle, detailing his adventures in India. Throughout the letter, he recounts the strange things he has seen in India, from waves of animals attacking his army at night to men and women entirely covered in hair. Whether factual or not, Alexander’s record reveals less about India itself than it does about the general attitude of Grecians and Macedonians (whom Alexander represents here) towards India. Alexander mentions an “assault” that his camp endures of “countless Indian scorpions [...] quite ready to do us harm” (112), “an immense force of water snakes”, “Indian serpents”, “crabs covered with the hides of crocodiles”, “white lions”, “boars”, “an immense force of bats”, and finally, a “dentityrannus” (113). Particularly of interest is the way that these fantastical creatures are described, regardless of if they are real or just the exaggeration of the writer of the letter. Alexander says of the Indian serpents that they were “as thick as columns but a little longer [...] they had two or three heads and all were crested. Their eyes glittered with poison. Their breath was noxious.” Similarly, he describes the crabs as having “armor so hard that it repelled iron.” No less strange and almost fictional-sounding are his accounts of the lions, boars, and bats; of the lions, he says they were “as huge as bulls” and that “their manes bristled. They charged us like lightning bolts.” Of the boars, he says that they “had horrific bristles like palisades,” and of the bats, that “their bodies were as large as pigeons, and the teeth that they used to rip open the soldiers’ limbs were like human teeth” (113).
The description of these animals is almost beyond belief; today, we would dismiss such notions as a three-headed poison-breathing snake or bats flaying soldiers with their teeth. However, it is precisely because the descriptions are almost too strange to be true that we can see the Greek and Macedonian attitude toward India: this scene is included with such confidence because, to the soldiers, the writer, and the readers, this is not so out of place at all for such an exotic place as India. In fact, when describing the dentityrannus, Alexander even says that the Indians were “accustomed to [it]” (113), indicating that it is actually rather common in the eyes of locals. While horrid giant bats might not be present in the western world, so little is known about the east that it almost makes logical sense that such strange beings might be confined to it.
On his journey in the east, William of Rubruck describes in the later-published Journey of William of Rubruck to the Eastern Parts of the World the people he finds in a similarly disbelieving way. Travelling to the court of Mongke Khan, he comes upon several settlements of idolaters, and goes into a detailed explanation of the lifestyles of each. First, he finds the Tartars; he describes that “all the priests shave their heads, and are dressed in saffron colour, and they observe chastity from the time they shave their heads” (145). Further, he observes that “they burn their dead according to the custom of the ancients, and put the ashes in the top of pyramids” (145). Twice, he attempts to break the Tartars’ customs; in the first, he tries to induce them to speak in an area where it is prohibited, and is “unable to do so” (145). In the second, he tries to force his way into a Tartar’s house, and is “most rudely treated” (149). In similar almost-scornful tones, he refers to another group he hears of, the Tebet. He reports that they are “in the habit of eating their dead parents, so that for piety’s sake they should not give their parents any sepulchre than their own bowels” (151). William of Rubruck plainly states that this practice was considered “an abomination among all nations” (151). The derisive tone with which William delivers these observations indicates that he finds the practices despicable in addition to being unfamiliar; in this way, we can see how he regards the people he runs across. While he may view differences in culture in a disparate way from Alexander, however, the idea that his journey and critique of unfamiliar groups has allowed the contemporary reader to form an impression of William’s culture remains.
The way in which authors write of foreign lands, whether these writings are fact or fiction, gives great insight into how the culture they hail from regards those same lands. While the exact origins of the Epistola Alexandri are unverifiable, it is Romantic or Saxon to the best of our knowledge, and of course William of Rubruck was Flemish. In the case of these western authors, the way in which they tell their stories about the east indicates the attitude that the Occident as a whole regards the Orient: it is seen as some wild, fantastical land, a place in which the animals are strange and dangerous and the people practice unthinkable acts.
This type of reflection is not only confined to literature or pseudo-historical accounts. In fact, accounts thought to be primarily factual also allow the readers to glean the views of the writers through examining what is unfamiliar to them, and therefore what their culture is accustomed to. In this way, the journey itself is the conveyor of information, by means of a story that would never have come to pass had its writer never travelled. One such account is provided by William of Rubruck, and published in The Journey of William of Rubruck to the Eastern Parts of the World. Rubruck regards the people he meets on his journey as strange and unfamiliar, and in describing them reveals what his culture regards as normal or abnormal.
The Epistola Alexandri Ad Aristotelem is a letter purportedly written by Alexander himself to his teacher Aristotle, detailing his adventures in India. Throughout the letter, he recounts the strange things he has seen in India, from waves of animals attacking his army at night to men and women entirely covered in hair. Whether factual or not, Alexander’s record reveals less about India itself than it does about the general attitude of Grecians and Macedonians (whom Alexander represents here) towards India. Alexander mentions an “assault” that his camp endures of “countless Indian scorpions [...] quite ready to do us harm” (112), “an immense force of water snakes”, “Indian serpents”, “crabs covered with the hides of crocodiles”, “white lions”, “boars”, “an immense force of bats”, and finally, a “dentityrannus” (113). Particularly of interest is the way that these fantastical creatures are described, regardless of if they are real or just the exaggeration of the writer of the letter. Alexander says of the Indian serpents that they were “as thick as columns but a little longer [...] they had two or three heads and all were crested. Their eyes glittered with poison. Their breath was noxious.” Similarly, he describes the crabs as having “armor so hard that it repelled iron.” No less strange and almost fictional-sounding are his accounts of the lions, boars, and bats; of the lions, he says they were “as huge as bulls” and that “their manes bristled. They charged us like lightning bolts.” Of the boars, he says that they “had horrific bristles like palisades,” and of the bats, that “their bodies were as large as pigeons, and the teeth that they used to rip open the soldiers’ limbs were like human teeth” (113).
The description of these animals is almost beyond belief; today, we would dismiss such notions as a three-headed poison-breathing snake or bats flaying soldiers with their teeth. However, it is precisely because the descriptions are almost too strange to be true that we can see the Greek and Macedonian attitude toward India: this scene is included with such confidence because, to the soldiers, the writer, and the readers, this is not so out of place at all for such an exotic place as India. In fact, when describing the dentityrannus, Alexander even says that the Indians were “accustomed to [it]” (113), indicating that it is actually rather common in the eyes of locals. While horrid giant bats might not be present in the western world, so little is known about the east that it almost makes logical sense that such strange beings might be confined to it.
On his journey in the east, William of Rubruck describes in the later-published Journey of William of Rubruck to the Eastern Parts of the World the people he finds in a similarly disbelieving way. Travelling to the court of Mongke Khan, he comes upon several settlements of idolaters, and goes into a detailed explanation of the lifestyles of each. First, he finds the Tartars; he describes that “all the priests shave their heads, and are dressed in saffron colour, and they observe chastity from the time they shave their heads” (145). Further, he observes that “they burn their dead according to the custom of the ancients, and put the ashes in the top of pyramids” (145). Twice, he attempts to break the Tartars’ customs; in the first, he tries to induce them to speak in an area where it is prohibited, and is “unable to do so” (145). In the second, he tries to force his way into a Tartar’s house, and is “most rudely treated” (149). In similar almost-scornful tones, he refers to another group he hears of, the Tebet. He reports that they are “in the habit of eating their dead parents, so that for piety’s sake they should not give their parents any sepulchre than their own bowels” (151). William of Rubruck plainly states that this practice was considered “an abomination among all nations” (151). The derisive tone with which William delivers these observations indicates that he finds the practices despicable in addition to being unfamiliar; in this way, we can see how he regards the people he runs across. While he may view differences in culture in a disparate way from Alexander, however, the idea that his journey and critique of unfamiliar groups has allowed the contemporary reader to form an impression of William’s culture remains.
The way in which authors write of foreign lands, whether these writings are fact or fiction, gives great insight into how the culture they hail from regards those same lands. While the exact origins of the Epistola Alexandri are unverifiable, it is Romantic or Saxon to the best of our knowledge, and of course William of Rubruck was Flemish. In the case of these western authors, the way in which they tell their stories about the east indicates the attitude that the Occident as a whole regards the Orient: it is seen as some wild, fantastical land, a place in which the animals are strange and dangerous and the people practice unthinkable acts.
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