[1] Forster, Voy.

And Disc.

In the North, p. 158.

[2] About this period, many abuses subsisted among the Golden Tribe on the Wolga. Mamay and Ideku, or Yedeghey-khan, called Edigi by Schildtberger, had not the title of great khan of the Golden Tribe in Kiptschak, but held in fact the supreme power in their hands, and set up khans from among the royal family, or deposed them at their pleasure. - Forst

[3] The names are much disfigured, and the commencement of the journey is not mentioned; but, from the course afterwards, this may be some corruption for Armenia, or one of its districts. - E.

[4] Perhaps a corruption for Daghistan. - E.

[5] Perhaps Kahira, or Cairo. - E.

[6] Schildtberger, or his transcriber, calls this the town of Bursa, by mistake for the mountain of Al-Burs. - Forst.

[7] Probably Agrachan; as both Astracan and Saray had been demolished by Timur. As to his saying that it stood in the middle of the Edil, Etilia, or Wolga, that may be a mistake; but at any rate, Edil signifies any river whatever. - Forst.

[8] Bissibur or Issibur, is the ancient Russian town of Isborsk. - Forst. It would appear that the present expedition was into Siber, or Siberia - E.

[9] This appears to refer to the Uralian chain, and the frozen regions of the north of Russia. - E.

[10] A mistake, by confounding close-made dresses of fur with the notion of naked men, covered all over with shaggy hair. - E.

[11] Probably Wolgar, Bulgar, or Bulgaria, is here meant. - E

[12] From the sequel he appears rather to have been his brother. - E.

[13] This is probably a corruption for Mangrill, or Mingrelia. - E.

[14] Forster explains this by substituting the names of Bebian and Bedias as synonymous. No such name occurs in our best maps; but there is a place near the country of Mingrelia in Guria on the Black-Sea, named Batum, which may be here indicated - E.

[15] This place is called in the text Weisseburgh, signifying the White Town, otherwise named Akkerman or Akkiermann, Asprecastro, Tschetatalba, and Belgorod. - Forst.

From the concluding sentence, Schildtberger, who began his travels, or rather captivity in 1394, must have returned to Munich about 1426 or 1427 - E.

CHAP. XVII.

Travels of the Ambassadors of Mirza Shah Rokh, King of Persia, from Herat to Khanbalek in Katkay, in 1419[1].

INTRODUCTION.

This curious embassy, sent by Mirza Shah Rokh one of the sons of Timur, or Timour the Great, better known in Europe by the name of Tamerlane, travelled from Herat, in Persia, the residence of their sovereign, to Khanbalek, Cambalu, or Peking, the imperial city of Kathay, Khatay, Kitay, or Northern China, where Yong-lo, or Ching-tsu, the third emperor of the race of Ming then kept his court. Yong-lo began to reign, in 1404, and died in 1425, the year in which the ambassadors returned to Persia, the race of Ming, a Chinese dynasty, was founded in 1368, fifty-one years before the present embassy, by Hoang-vu, who had expelled the Mongol khans, the degenerate and enervated descendants of Gingis or Zengis.

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