In 14th-century Castile, a nameless mendicant friar pens a travel diary that doubles as a world catalog of rulers and their coats of arms. The Libro del Conocimiento de Todos los Reinos blends real voyages with imaginative heraldry to map power—signaling distant, non-Christian realms with symbolic devices rather than precise facts. This episode shows how the book functioned as a practical reference for merchants, diplomats, and pilgrims, drawing on portolan charts and older sources while revealing deliberately invented arms for exotic places. We explore its mix of fact and fantasy, its Baltic blind spot due to Hanseatic information networks, and what it reveals about medieval knowledge, trust, and how symbols bridged empire and distance. Brought to you by Embersil.
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