Giosafat Barbaro - Writing

Writing

In 1487, Barbaro wrote an account of his travels. In it, he mentions being familiar with the accounts of Niccolò de' Conti and John de Mandeville.

Barbaro's account of his travels, entitled "Fiaggi falti da Fenezia alla Tana in Persi" was first published from 1543 to 1545 by the sons of Aldus Manutius. It is included Giovanne Baptista Ramusio's 1559 "Collection of Travels" as "Journey to the Tanais, Persia, India, and Constantinople" The scholar and courtier William Thomas translated this work into English for the young King Edward VI under the title ‘’Travels to Tana and Persia’’ and also includes the account of Barbaro’s fellow ambassador to Persia, Ambrogio Contarini. This work was republished in London in 1873 by the Hakluyt Society and a Russian language edition was published in 1971. In 1583, Barbaro’s account was published by Filippo Giunti in ‘’Volume Delle Navigationi Et Viaggi’’ along with those of Marco Polo and Kirakos Gandzaketsi’s account of the travels of Hethum I, King of Armenia. In 1601, Barbaro’s and Contarini’s accounts were included in Pietro Bizzarri’s ‘’ Rerum Persicarum Historia’’ along with accounts by Bonacursius, Jacob Geuder von Heroldsberg, Giovanni Tommaso Minadoi, and Henricus Porsius; which was published in Frankfurt. in 2005, Barbaro’s account was also published in Turkish as ‘’ Anadolu'ya ve İran'a seyahat’’.

Barbaro’s account provided more information on Persia and its resources than that of Contarini. He showed skill in observing unfamiliar places and reporting on them. Much of Barbaro's information about the Kipchak Khanate, Persia, and Georgia is not found in any other sources.

Giosafat Barbaro’s dispatches to the Venetian Senate were complied by Enrico Cornet and published as ‘’ Lettere al Senato Veneto’’ in 1852 in Vienna. Barbaro also discussed his travels in a letter written in 1491 to the Bishop of Padua, Pietro Barocci.