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The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 26: Eclipse, Insurrection, and MurderThe date is December 21, 1637, and we have made our way to Book 7 of the travel journal of Adam Olearius, the last of the series. Our trade ambassadors have survived the dangerous journey from Germany to the capital city of Persia, but, as we will see, Ambassador Otto Bruggeman’s actions have made the return trip even more dangerous.On New Year’s Day they fire their cannons three times in celebration, listen to a sermon, make what Olearius calls “the ordinary prayers,” and then travel another five leagues to the village of Sensen.As they leave Ko...2024-06-2515 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 25: Dogs, Pigs, Camels and SilkWelcome to The Voyages and Travels of the Ambassadors, the epic story of a 17th century trade expedition from Germany to Persia that failed so completely its leader was publicly executed upon his return. This is Episode 25: Dogs, Pigs, Camels and Silk.Last time we heard about the suburbs and agriculture of Isfahan, and now we will learn why, according to Persian lore, certain animals hate each other.The best silk is white, but yellow silk could also be quite good as long as it is clean and of good quality. Production estimates vary widely...2024-05-2126 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 24: Suburbs, Inflation, and the Great PoxWe continue our exploration of Isfahan, which is the most commodious of any Persian city, Olearius writes, and is just as good in winter or summer because the mountains are nearby and there is always some wind stirring, which cools the air in all the homes of the city.Surrounding Isfahan there are nearly 1500 villages, many of them engaged in manufacturing textiles. Every province in the country produces cotton, and the fields around Isfahan are intentionally flooded when the river rises with melting snow. If not for this, Olearius writes, the region would not be habitable because...2024-04-3022 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 23: Isfahan, Ispahan, or Spaam?They say that the City of Isfahan was once called Hecatonopolis, and that 2nd century Roman astronomer Ptolemy referred to it as Aspadana. In old Persian, the city was known as Sipahan, the plural form of a word meaning “the gathering place for armies,” and plural because the original city consisted of seven villages.Tamerlane conquered the city in 1387 AD and named it Ispahan – with a p – by switching the first two letters of the old Persian name. The Persians call it Isfahan – with an f – from an Arabian word meaning rank or battalion.The ambassador o...2024-04-1023 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 22: Pleasure and PainShah Safi I is the grandson of Shah Abbas I, and he had succeeded to the throne only because Abbas had murdered his eldest son and blinded his younger sons. Like the sons, the grandson spent his youth in his grandfather’s harem, where he was regularly given large amounts of opium and alcohol.Abbas took the throne from his father in 1587 with a military coup. Upon seizing power, he sent his father to die in prison and blinded his two surviving brothers to prevent them from mounting their own coup. His harem consisted of up to 500 wo...2024-03-2626 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 21: Dying, Drinking, Hunting, and KillingLast time, we heard the tale of watchmaker John Stadler’s execution for murdering a Muslim citizen of Isfahan. This time we will hear the same tale as told in 1678 by French jewel merchant Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, who made six voyages to Turkey, Persia, and India over the course of his 40-year career.Tavernier is perhaps most famous as the man who brought the Hope Diamond from India to Europe, probably during his sixth and final voyage between 1664 and 1668. The stone originally weighed 112 carats, and was known as the Tavernier Blue. He sold the diamond to Louis XIV of...2024-03-1920 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 20: Wedding, Betrayal, ExecutionThe Armenian community in Isfahan was created in 1604 when Shah Abbas conducted a scorched earth military campaign against the Ottomans in the Caucuses, left many villages and the city of Julfa as smoking ruins, and deported the Armenians to Persia for his strategic and economic benefit.Our ambassadors have their first public audience with the shah occurs on August 8, 1637, and the first private audience three weeks later. They attend many of the best parties ever, but the English merchants throw a party that surpasses the magnificence of all previous entertainments. The Prior of the Augustine...2024-03-0727 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 20: Wedding, Betrayal, ExecutionThe Armenian community in Isfahan was created in 1604 when Shah Abbas conducted a scorched earth military campaign against the Ottomans in the Caucuses, left many villages and the city of Julfa as smoking ruins, and deported the Armenians to Persia for his strategic and economic benefit.Our ambassadors have their first public audience with the shah occurs on August 8, 1637, and the first private audience three weeks later. They attend many of the best parties ever, but the English merchants throw a party that surpasses the magnificence of all previous entertainments. The Prior of the Augustine...2024-03-0627 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 19: Isfahan ThrowdownOur ambassadors arrive in Isfahan on August 3, 1637, and immediately get into a running street battle with servants of the Indian ambassador. The shah demands someone's head.Olearius tells us that, in general, the Indians are good natured, civil, friendly, and their conversation not unpleasant, provided that no one does them any injury. But they are also apt to resent any kind of insult, they are never satisfied without taking the blood of those who do the offending.The first audience with Shah Safi occurs on August 16. Forty horses from the shah’s own stables arrive to...2024-03-0121 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 19: Isfahan ThrowdownOur ambassadors arrive in Isfahan on August 3, 1637, and immediately get into a running street battle with servants of the Indian ambassador. The shah demands someone's head.Olearius tells us that, in general, the Indians are good natured, civil, friendly, and their conversation not unpleasant, provided that no one does them any injury. But they are also apt to resent any kind of insult, they are never satisfied without taking the blood of those who do the offending.The first audience with Shah Safi occurs on August 16. Forty horses from the shah’s own stables arrive to...2024-02-2921 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 18: Across the Persian DesertThe Holstein trade mission leaves Caswin on the evening of July 13, 1637, the baggage and sick people leaving first and the gentlemen following later that night.This is the final leg of their outbound journey from the German port city of Hamburg to the Persian capital of Isfahan that began almost four years ago. Along the route they’re taking, Persia is about 500 miles wide from the Caspian Sea to the Persian Gulf, and although the 300-mile road to Isfahan does not cross the harshest deserts in the country, the conditions described by Adam Olearius are still very ha...2024-02-1318 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 17: Immortality and Brain-Eating SnakesThe Persian city of Caswin, where our trade ambassadors from Holstein are now, is about 50 miles from the south shore of the Caspian Sea. They have traveled almost 500 miles overland after being shipwrecked on the west shore near the small town of Nisavay, and they have roughly another 300 miles to go before reaching their destination – the capital city of Isfahan.The perimeter of Persia is almost entirely mountainous, while the center is a vast desert plateau that sits below the mountains but two or three thousand feet above sea level. The country might be described as a sa...2024-02-0420 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 16: Apricocks, Cowcumbers, and Home InvasionsAs the trade mission from Duke Frederick of Holstein prepares to leave Ardebil, our author investigates the local religious institution built by the city’s founder and expanded by his son. Its wealth amounts to many millions in gold, that it could supply more ready cash than the Shah of Persia himself, and that it is capable of raising and maintaining a powerful army all on its own. The tomb of Sheik Sefi has the additional critical function of providing certificates that can be used to prove a pilgrim’s Islamic faith, protect the bearer against disgrace and...2024-01-2722 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 15: Oh Husayn!"By God’s wisdom, because cats in Ardebil have short lives, there are very many rats, more than in other regions. The mice chew up the people's clothing – their woolen cloaks, for example. So this city has a royal auction for cats. There are professional cat-brokers, much in demand, who sell cats in cages. The Divrigi cat is a particular favorite, fetching a price of up to 100 gurus; still, it does not live long here. When the brokers cry their wares, this is the patter they sing in a loud voice: ‘You who seek a feline, A cat to hunt y...2024-01-1322 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 14: 6000 Batmans of WineThis is the first episode of the year 2024, and I am recording it on January 1. On the Islamic calendar, the current year is 1445, and it is 1402 on the Iranian calendar.In Persia, the date is March 30, 1637, and our travelers are in the Kur River valley near the modern-day border of Azerbaijan and Iran. After days of freezing in the mountains, they now encounter “nothing but fair weather, a sky clear, and without any cloudiness,” except for a light haze in the mornings that is quickly burned off by the sun.They cross the river on Apri...2024-01-0222 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 13: The Great Persian Replacement TheoryThe worst day of the Persian year is the Wednesday before New Year’s Day. Nothing good ever happens on that day, so no one does business, no one signs contracts, no one holds a party, and – perhaps most important of all – no one pays anyone any money. Some people spend the entire day counting whatever money they have, while others go without speaking. Many people sprinkle their homes and possessions with river water, hoping to fend off any misfortune. If they meet anyone they know on the way home from the river, they throw water into his face. If the...2023-12-1824 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 12: Gunpowder EmpiresWelcome to The Voyages and Travels of the Ambassadors, the epic story of a 17th century trade expedition from Germany to Persia that failed so completely its leader was publicly executed upon his return. This is Episode 12: Gunpowder Empires.It is still early February, 1637, and our voyagers are still in the city of Schamachie, Persia, just a few days by horseback from where they were shipwrecked on the Caspian Sea. They have been drinking their way across two continents, carrying barrels of the stuff by land, river, and sea, and 22 of them are in bed with “burning fe...2023-12-1132 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 11: Death and AstronomyIt is now January 1637, and the new year begins with a funeral for the Persian man who drank himself to death at the welcome party for our ambassadors in the town of Schamachie.Olearius visits various schools and mosques on his walks in the city, and sometimes carries with him a small celestial globe which he has made himself. Teachers and students tell him that “astrology and the mathematicks” must be taught better in Germany than Persia, for they are “not acquainted with the invention of globes, and make use only of the astrolabe for instruction.”He dem...2023-12-0328 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 10: Mountains, Mausoleums, and MusicIt is now December 1636, and our adventurers are making their way south along the coast of the Caspian Sea, in what is still one of the most dangerous places on earth.We ended the last episode with a brief history of the major conquests of the region. As I write this episode, the most recent military conflict has ended in the old way: a prolonged siege with all the suffering that entails, followed by conquest, the expulsion of civilians, and celebration by the victors.This particular chapter of the ancient story started with the fall...2023-11-2724 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 9: How Many Miles to Babylon?How many miles to Babylon? Threescore miles and ten.Can I get there by candle-light? Yes, and back again.If your heels are nimble and light,You may get there by candle-light. – Songs for the Nursery (1805)The date is November 15, 1636, and the wrecked Friedrich has deposited them in a very pleasant country, green and filled with birds who sing until the middle of December. The village of Nisavay has only 15 or 16 poor houses, built of clay and absolutely square, with turf roofs you can walk on. In summer, the Persians erect tents up there so they can enj...2023-11-1924 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 8: Hyrcanian SeaIt is now October 10, 1636, and the Friedrich is sailing down the shallow Volga delta, guided by a new pilot from Astrakhan and preceded by a boat of Tatars who are supposed to help them avoid the sandbars.Incredibly big plants grow along the river, Olearius says. Esula, today listed among the world’s 100 most invasive species, grows as tall as a man, and Angelica as big as a man’s arm. Angelica has been cultivated in northern climates since the 10th century, and can be used to make candy and flavor various kinds of liquor including aquavit, gin...2023-11-1224 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 7: The Venice of the SouthThe date is September 16, 1636. After an exhausting voyage down the Volga, our ambassadors are anchored off the Russian city of Astrakhan, and Paul Fleming is writing a 200-line poetic monument to his friend and fellow poet, Adam Olearius.He relates how he and Olearius are wont to go down to the edge of the Caspian to contemplate the tempestuous sea, describing its fury and the events that culminated in the Baltic shipwreck described in Episode 4. And he exclaims that he wishes all his unhappiness had been destroyed and sunk to the bottom of the sea in the...2023-11-0522 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 6: The CossacksWelcome to The Voyages and Travels of the Ambassadors, the epic story of a 17th century trade expedition from Germany to Persia that failed so completely its leader was publicly executed upon his return. This is Episode 6: The Cossacks.We are now in Book 4, the date is July 30, 1636, and the ambassadors are about to board the Friedrich, and leave Nizhny Novgorod for Astrakhan, where the Volga River empties into the Caspian Sea.But they discover that a labor dispute has been simmering among the shipbuilders, and a reckoning of construction costs is required. Upon investigation...2023-10-2933 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 5: To the VolgaIt is now the spring of 1636. For the past two-and-a-half years, our ambassadors from Holstein have traveled to Moscow twice over land and sea. Not only have they been shipwrecked, shot, kicked by horses, and thrown off sleds into the snow, they’ve been attacked by Russian insects and German mercenaries. And they’ve partied with Livonian nobles, with Swedish ambassadors, and with working-class Russians on the frontier.Ambassadors Bruggeman and Crusius are negotiating the company’s departure to Persia, imploring the Tsar to confirm everything previously agreed with Duke Frederick, and invoking the family ties between the tw...2023-10-2224 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 4: Back to MoscowWelcome to The Voyages and Travels of the Ambassadors, the epic story of a 17th century trade expedition from Germany to Persia that failed so completely its leader was publicly executed upon his return. This is Episode 4: Back to Moscow.So far, our trade ambassadors from Holstein have sailed up the Baltic, traveled overland to Moscow, and been granted permission by Tsar Mikhail I to cross Russian territory into Persia. But Duke Frederick of Holstein must also sign the treaty and approve a first-year payment to the Tsar of 600,000 reichthalers. The ambassadors make the return trip in...2023-10-1520 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 3: To MoscowWelcome to The Voyages and Travels of the Ambassadors, the epic story of a 17th century trade expedition from Germany to Persia that failed so completely its leader was publicly executed upon his return. This is Episode 3: To Moscow.It is now the end of July 1634, and the company is, once again, eager to get moving, but they are forced to remain in a small island fort on Lake Ladoga, called Nöteburg because it is shaped like a nut, for another three weeks. They arrive in Great Novgorod on July 29, where Paul Fleming and others in t...2023-10-0823 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 2: Waiting for the TsarIn Episode 1, we followed the Ambassadors on their winter voyage up the Baltic Sea from Lubeck to Riga, and then overland to Narva in a convoy of horse-drawn sleds. We pick up the story as Adam Olearius and his companions are waiting for Tsar Mikhail I to authorize their entry into Russia. It is now January 1634, and as the company waits to get moving, I will introduce the ambassadors chosen for the journey by Frederick, Duke of Holstein. Get full access to The Semi-Pro Pilgrim at semipropilgrim.substack.com/subscribe2023-10-0129 min
The Voyages and Travels of the AmbassadorsEpisode 1: The FortuneOn the night of Nov. 11, 1633, a ship named Fortune, 34 passengers aboard, was making her way up the Baltic Sea from Lubeck to Riga, when a storm forced the crew to take in all sails.In the bowels of the convulsing ship, one of the passengers was keeping a journal. “Those among us who were not used to the sea were so sick that some vomited blood,” he wrote.That passenger was Adam Olearius, a 31-year- old university-educated Master of Philosophy, who was now on a 6-year, 7000-mile journey to Moscow and Persia. After less than 48 hour...2023-09-2525 min