Matthew Paris

Matthaeus Parisiensis

(c. 1250)

A Benedictine monk and cartographer based in England.

Latin.

A= London, BL, Ms Roy. 14. C.vii, fols. 4v-5r

B= Cambridge, Corpus Christi Ms. 26, fols. 3v-4r

A

This land which is to the right, that is to say to the south, and is called Africa and is the third part of the world, takes in much of India, Mauretania, that is Ethiopia, Egypt, Barbary, Bujaya (Bugie) and all the land of the Mumelin ‘amir, it comprises a large expanse of land from east to west, for its dimension is long.

B

This land, which is to the right , that is to say the south, and is called Africa and is the third part of the world, takes in much of India, Mauretania, Egypt, Barbary, Bujaya, Alexandria and Ethiopia, where there are savage monstrous people, and all the land of the Murmelin ‘amir, who is called Miramumelin, and the land of Morocco, which is his; it comprises a large expanse of land from east to west, but not nearly as much breadth.

Selected editions

D. Pringle, Pilgrimage to Jerusalem and the Holy Land 1187-1291 (Farnham: 2012), pp. 197-208.