Whose profession
of Christianity there is indeed (as has been indicated - supra) no real
evidence; who could not be said to have made an attack upon any pair of
brother Kings of the Persians and the Medes, nor to have captured Ecbatana
(a city, whatever its identity, of Media); who could never have had any
intention of coming to Jerusalem; and whose geographical position in no
way suggested the mention of Armenia.
Professor Bruun thinks he finds a warrior much better answering to the
indications in the Georgian prince John Orbelian, the general-in-chief
under several successive Kings of Georgia in that age.
At the time when the Gur-Khan defeated Sanjar the real brothers of the
latter had been long dead; Sanjar had withdrawn from interference with the
affairs of Western Persia; and Hamadan (if this is to be regarded as
Ecbatana) was no residence of his. But it was the residence of Sanjar's
nephew Mas'ud, in whose hands was now the dominion of Western Persia;
whilst Mas'ud's nephew, Daud, held Media, i.e. Azerbeijan, Arran, and
Armenia. It is in these two princes that Professor Bruun sees the
Samiardi fratres of the German chronicler.
Again the expression "extreme Orient" is to be interpreted by local usage.
And with the people of Little Armenia, through whom probably such
intelligence reached the Bishop of Gabala, the expression the East
signified specifically Great Armenia (which was then a part of the kingdom
of Georgia and Abkhasia), as Dulaurier has stated.[3]
It is true that the Georgians were not really Nestorians, but followers of
the Greek Church. It was the fact, however, that in general, the
Armenians, whom the Greeks accused of following the Jacobite errors,
retorted upon members of the Greek Church with the reproach of the
opposite heresy of Nestorianism. And the attribution of Nestorianism to a
Georgian Prince is, like the expression "extreme East," an indication of
the Armenian channel through which the story came.
The intention to march to the aid of the Christians in Palestine is more
like the act of a Georgian General than that of a Karacathayan Khan; and
there are in the history of the Kingdom of Jerusalem several indications
of the proposal at least of Georgian assistance.
The personage in question is said to have come from the country of the
Magi, from whom he was descended. But these have frequently been supposed
to come from Great Armenia. E.g. Friar Jordanus says they came from
Moghan.[4]
The name Ecbatana has been so variously applied that it was likely to
lead to ambiguities. But it so happens that, in a previous passage of his
History, Bishop Otto of Freisingen, in rehearsing some Oriental
information gathered apparently from the same Bishop of Gabala, has shown
what was the place that he had been taught to identify with Ecbatana, viz.
the old Armenian city of ANI.[5] Now this city was captured from the
Turks, on behalf of the King of Georgia, David the Restorer, by his great
sbasalar,[6] John Orbelian, in 1123-24.
Professor Bruun also lays stress upon a passage in a German chronicle of
date some years later than Otho's work:
"1141. Liupoldus dux Bawariorum obiit, Henrico fratre ejus succedente in
ducatu. Iohannes Presbyter Rex Armeniae et Indiae cum duobus regibus
fratribus Persarum et Medorum pugnavit et vicit."[7]
He asks how the Gur-Khan of Karakhitai could be styled King of Armenia
and of India? It may be asked, per contra, how either the King of
Georgia or his Peshwa (to use the Mahratta analogy of John Orbelian's
position) could be styled King of Armenia and of India? In reply to
this, Professor Bruun adduces a variety of quotations which he considers
as showing that the term India was applied to some Caucasian region.
My own conviction is that the report of Otto of Freisingen is not merely
the first mention of a great Asiatic potentate called Prester John, but
that his statement is the whole and sole basis of good faith on which the
story of such a potentate rested; and I am quite as willing to believe, on
due evidence, that the nucleus of fact to which his statement referred,
and on which such a pile of long-enduring fiction was erected, occurred in
Armenia as that it occurred in Turan. Indeed in many respects the story
would thus be more comprehensible. One cannot attach any value to the
quotation from the Annalist in Pertz, because there seems no reason to
doubt that the passage is a mere adaptation of the report by Bishop Otto,
of whose work the Annalist makes other use, as is indeed admitted by
Professor Bruun, who (be it said) is a pattern of candour in controversy.
But much else that the Professor alleges is interesting and striking. The
fact that Azerbeijan and the adjoining regions were known as "the East" is
patent to the readers of this book in many a page, where the Khan and his
Mongols in occupation of that region are styled by Polo Lord of the
LEVANT, Tartars of the LEVANT (i.e. of the East), even when the
speaker's standpoint is in far Cathay.[8] The mention of Ani as
identical with the Ecbatana of which Otto had heard is a remarkable
circumstance which I think even Oppert has overlooked. That this Georgian
hero was a Christian and that his name was John are considerable
facts. Oppert's conversion of Korkhan into Yokhanan or John is anything
but satisfactory. The identification proposed again makes it quite
intelligible how the so-called Prester John should have talked about
coming to the aid of the Crusaders; a point so difficult to explain on
Oppert's theory, that he has been obliged to introduce a duplicate John in
the person of a Greek Emperor to solve that knot; another of the weaker
links in his argument.
