Kingdom of the Jean priest

In the middle of XIIe century, rumors come from the East give a report on a mysterious Christian kingdom , that of the Jean Priest, whom one could not really locate, beyond the Perse and of the Arménie, with the borders of the world, in Africa or India, so much the geopolitical data were confused. These rumors take enormous proportions, when start to circulate various versions of a letter, addressed by the Jean Priest to various monarchs of Europe, or to the pope, according to the versions. This false letter, which is probably a gigantic mystification, will be read and propagated with passion until the time of the Great Discoveries.

Birth of the legend

The first mention of the Jean Priest appears in the middle of XIIe century in the “Chronicle” of évèque German Otton de Freising: It is mentioned there a évèque Syrian named Hugues de Gabala, arrived to Occident to announce there the fall of the town of Édesse, fallen to the hands from the Moslems, the first serious reverse of the Croisés out of Holy Land. Hugues also tells that: … a certain Jean Priest living in the Far East, beyond Persia and of Arménie, king and priest, Christian but nestorien, would have made the war with the Persian kings and mèdes called Sarmiades and would have driven out them of their capital, Ecbatane. The assumption most usually allowed is that this odd account would constitute a very deformed version of events which had just occurred in Central Asia. At the beginning of XIIe century, China of north was dominated by Mongolian people, the Khitans. They were overcome by Djurtchet, but some of between them took refuge in Central Asia, where they founded the empire of the Kara-Khitans. In 1141, their sovereign Yelü Dashi gained a victory crushing over the Turks Seldjoukides.

Towards 1165, starts to circulate in the entourage of the Christian kings, a Latin letter addressed to the Empereur Manuel Ier Comnène of Byzance. Written by a certain “Jean priest”, it describes the existence of a kingdom Christian all in the east:

Beyond Persia and from Arménie, a marvellous kingdom directed by the Jean Priest extends. This ground is crossed by a river coming from the Paradise, carting emeralds, sapphires and ruby. All the Christian values are respected with the letter. The flight, cupidity, the lie are unknown. There are no poor. Especially not the Jean Priest, whose palate without window is enlightened interior by all the invaluable stones of which it is avoided…

The prospect for a Christian ground beyond the Moslem grounds is for the Westerners, a possibility of taking the infidels out of clipper. The existence of the kingdom then will serve as a pretext for the European to advance towards the mysterious destination which are the the Indies, persuaded to find there a support Christian.

The Portuguese will not cease any more trying to discover the access to the kingdom of the Jean Priest.

Origins of the rumor

In 1323, in its Mirabilia , the Jordan de Séverac, identifies the Jean Priest with the Négus, the emperor of Ethiopia.

One thus estimated to have raised the mystery by affirming that it was not other than the Négus (king of remote the Ethiopia and sovereign of the monophysites). Europeans had believed to recognize the kingdom of the Jean Priest before in the Mongolian empire directed by a grandson of Gengis Khan whose wife, Börte, were an enthusiastic Christian woman who went to the mass the every day.

In fact, there existed then many other cut Christian communities of the Occident by the force of the things, one can quote inter alia:

communities of the south of the Egypt, whose last are exterminated by the Moslems in 1492;
those of the south of India, Christians of Saint-Thomas, in current the Kerala;
in China, where in 1307, the pope Clément V had created an archbishop's palace with Beijing (Beijing) with the head of which it installed the Franciscain Jean de Montecorvino (Jean Corvin);
of the communities nestoriennes in Persian.

Propagation of the myth

At the time of the crusades, the myth of the Jean priest becomes extensive. The Jean priest could become a potential support of Europe against the Moslems. During last crusades, certain writers regard his existence as some. Marco Polo and Jean de Joinville is both convinced that the kingdom of the Jean priest existed, but that it was overcome recently by the Tartar people (Mongolian) surrounding.

More recently, the research of the kingdom of Jean priest is the base of the intrigue of the novel Baudolino, of Umberto Eco.

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