Thietmar’s Liber Peregrinationis

Bibliographic Information

Medieval Title:          Liber peregrinationis

Author:                      Thietmar

Composition:

Recounts a pilgrimage to the Holy Land c. 1217-18 CE by a European likely from Westphalia in Germany

Textual Information

Brief Summary:       

The pilgrim recounts in detail his travels in the Holy Land and encounters with Muslims there. He mentions only the Cross relic but includes tales of Christian icons working across religious lines, the burning bush Moses saw being reverenced by both Christians and Muslims, the relics of St Catherine, and the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, His tone and description of Muslims varies from offensive to admiring, and he conveys a clear sense of Muslim control and power in the Holy Land, of the diversity of Christians there, and of various devotional objects and spaces revered there.

Passion Relics Appearing in Text: 

Cross

Manuscripts, Editions, and Translations

Manuscripts:            

18 manuscripts exist; some date from the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. For a full list, see Röhricht, R. Bibliotheca Geographica Palaestinae: chronologisches Verzeichniss der auf die Geographie des Heiligen Landes bezüglichen Literatur von 333 bis 1878. Berlin: H. Reuther, 1890, p. 47.

List of Editions of the Medieval Text: 

Magistri Thietmari Historia de Dispositione Terre Sancte, ed. J.C.M. Laurent (Hamburg, 1852)

List of Translations of the Medieval Text: 

“Thietmar: Pilgrimage (1217-18). Trans Denys Pringle. In Pilgrimage to Jerusalem and the Holy Land, 1187-1291. Farnham: Ashgate, 2012. Pp. 95-134.

Original Editions/Translations We Have Produced:        n/a