Draft:Travels of Pietro Della Valle

three parts - turkey, persia, india

first edition while he was alive, second etc posthumous

shaped much of what europe knew about those regions

french (1661-1663), english (1664 - india and return), dutch (1664-1665), german (1674)

for some reason only the third volume was translated into english - thankfully mvp george bull published an abridged version of viaggi in 1990

On 8 June 1614, Della Valle sailed from Venice on the galleon Gran Delfino.Darnault, Sezim Sezer; Ağır, ‪Aygül. "Visions and Transitions of a Pilgrimage of Curiosity: Pietro Della Valle's Travel to Istanbul (1614-1615)". In Piera, Montserrat (ed.). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvfxvc5n.13?seq=6 Remapping Travel Narratives, 1000-1700]. pp.159. He was 28 years old. That summer was spent visiting sites from antiquity in the Mediterranean — especially locations from Greek and Roman history. Della Valle visited the ruins of Butrint (near modern-day Sarandë in Albania), the Greek islands of Corfu, Zakynthos, and Chios, and the Turkish island of Tenedos, most of which were part of the Ottoman Empire at the time. He travelled with his two servants (Tommaso and Lorenzo) as well as a Franciscan monk from Istanbul and a priest named Andrea.{{Cite book |last=Valle |first=Pietro della |url=https://archive.org/details/viaggidipietrode01vall/mode/2up |title=Viaggi di Pietro della Valle, il pellegrino, descritti da lui medesimo in lettere familiari all'erudito suo amico Mario Schipano, divisi in tre parti cioè: la Turchia, la Persia, e l'India, colla vita e ritratto dell'autore |date=1843 |publisher=Brighton G. Gancia |others=Robarts - University of Toronto}}{{Quote|text="And on the voyage I had dealings with about five hundred people ... in short, people from almost all the religions and different nations of the world. Such mixed company should have been very much to my taste, but there was just too many of us, and this created all kinds of anxieties and confusion, as you can well imagine, crammed as we were into such a small space. Eventually there spread throughout the ship a type of infection ... Yet through God's special grace, I and my own escaped falling into the hands of the ship's barber, a slovenly quack doctor, who would have made me fall sick, healthy as I was, merely by taking my pulse."|author=Pietro Della Valle|title=Viaggi|source=Part 1: Turkey, letter I}}

File:Panorama alexandriatroas.jpg, the site Pietro Della Valle likely believed to be the ancient city of Troy.]]

Della Valle was heavily inspired by the Aenid and the writings of Virgil; he had a copy of Aenid with him on his journey, and began quoting from it in his letters as soon as he left Italy. Historian Sezim Sezer Darnault says Della Valle "makes Virgil’s work his guide on this journey," using his writings to compare ancient sites to their modern-day equivalents as well as provide intellectual guidance. Like Virgil, Della Valle refers to the East as "Aurora," or "dawn," because day breaks on the eastern horizon.{{Cite book |last=Virgil |url=https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/228/pg228-images.html |title=Aenid}}

In early August, Della Valle visited what he thought was the ruins of Ancient Troy; however, the site actually dated to the Roman period.{{Cite journal |last=Rossi |first=Ettore |date=1953 |title=Pietro Della Valle Orientalista Romano (1586–1652) |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/25812147 |journal=Oriente Moderno |volume=33 |issue=1 |pages=49–64 |issn=0030-5472 |jstor=25812147}} Much of his first letter to Schipano is dominated by this visit to Troy.Darnault, Sezim Sezer; Ağır, ‪Aygül. "Visions and Transitions of a Pilgrimage of Curiosity: Pietro Della Valle's Travel to Istanbul (1614-1615)". In Piera, Montserrat (ed.). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvfxvc5n.13?seq=6 Remapping Travel Narratives, 1000-1700]. pp.160. Virgil's Aenid follows the story of Aeneas, a Trojan soldier from the siege of Troy who, according to legend, was the first hero of Rome and the progenitor of the Roman people.{{Cite book |last1=L'Homond |first1=C. F. |url=https://archive.org/details/selectionsfromv02lhogoog/page/n44 |title=Selections from Viri Romae; |last2=Arrowsmith |first2=Robert |last3=Knapp |first3=Charles |date=1896 |publisher=New York, Cincinnati [etc.] American Book Company |others=Harvard University}} A Roman himself, Della Valle quotes Virgil, describing Troy as "et gentis cunabula nostrae" ("the cradle of our races"). He saw Troy as the "first important stop of his pilgrimage;" many emperors in antiquity made similar pilgrimages to the "mother city" of the Romans.{{Cite journal |last=Ousterhout |first=Robert |date=January 2004 |title=The East, the West, and the Appropriation of the Past in Early Ottoman Architecture |url=https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.2307/25067103 |journal=Gesta |volume=43 |issue=2 |pages=165–176 |doi=10.2307/25067103 |issn=0016-920X |jstor=25067103}}

File:Ca. 1660 bird's eye view map of Constantinople.jpg

Della Valle landed in Constantinople (modern-day Istanbul) in mid-August, two and a half months after leaving Italy. Here he sent his first letter to Schipano — he would go on to send a total of ten letters from Constantinople, which he gave to a Dominican priest to take with him to Naples. Della Valle wrote in his second letter that he planned to follow in the footsteps of Petrus Gyllius, a French topographer and traveler who visited Constantinople in the 1540s, and that his descriptions of Constantinople's history were so thorough that Della Valle had nothing to add.Darnault, Sezim Sezer; Ağır, ‪Aygül. "Visions and Transitions of a Pilgrimage of Curiosity: Pietro Della Valle's Travel to Istanbul (1614-1615)". In Piera, Montserrat (ed.). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvfxvc5n.13?seq=7 Remapping Travel Narratives, 1000-1700]. pp.161. Instead, a lot of Della Valle's letters focused on what the city was like at the time he visited. His descriptions of Ottoman Constantinople made up a significant part of what Western Europe knew about the region for the next century.{{Citation |last1=Darnault |first1=Sezim Sezer |title=Visions and Transitions of a Pilgrimage of Curiosity: Pietro Della Valle's Travel to Istanbul (1614–1615) |date=2018 |work=Remapping Travel Narratives, 1000-1700 |pages=155–184 |editor-last=Piera |editor-first=Montserrat |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvfxvc5n.13 |access-date=2025-04-16 |series=To the East and Back Again |publisher=Arc Humanities Press |isbn=978-1-942401-59-9 |jstor=j.ctvfxvc5n.13 |last2=Ağir |first2=Aygül}} Della Valle often used comparisons to Italy while talking about Turkey; his writing from this time "accentuates the resemblances rather than the differences between Italy and the Ottoman Empire."

{{Quote|text="He describes Istanbul as “a figure, like from the theater, very agreeable.” When he writes that the tiles of the houses and the lead-covered mosques in combination with the cypress trees create an exquisite view, he enables his reader almost to visualize this “extraordinary” panorama. “Looking from the outside,” he notes, “there can be no city more beautiful.” Thinking that the comparison would please the people of Naples and especially Schipano, Della Valle adds the description “the most beautiful city of the world, just like Naples.”"|author=Sezim Sezer Darnault, ‪Aygül Ağır|title=Remapping Travel Narratives, 1000-1700|source=Chapter 7: Visions and Transitions of a Pilgrimage of Curiosity}}

File:صورة للشاهزاده أحمد 2013-12-19 09-18.jpg

During his year in Constantinople, Della Valle lived in a house in Pera (modern-day Beyoğlu) connected to the French embassy; he shared the house with French ambassador Achille Harlay de Sancy.{{Cite journal |last=Antoche |first=Emanuel Constantin |date=2015-01-01 |title=Un ambassadeur français à la Porte ottomane : Achille de Harlay, baron de Sancy et de la Mole (1611 - 1619) |url=https://www.academia.edu/12743910 |journal=Istoria ca datorie, Académie Roumaine, « Centrul de Studii Transilvane », Cluj-Napoca.}} He wrote detailed descriptions of Divanyolu, the sultan's palaces, and the Bosphorus, as well as military processions and theatrical productions he saw, which he described as a large part of life throughout the city.

Della Valle was able to gain an audience with Sultan Ahmed I during his time in the capital of the Ottoman Empire. In the Topkapı Palace, he was ushered into a "small, silent room;"{{Cite journal |last=Gurney |first=J. D. |date=February 1986 |title=Pietro della Valle: the limits of perception |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/bulletin-of-the-school-of-oriental-and-african-studies/article/abs/pietro-della-valle-the-limits-of-perception/B7162223E8FB7A74E2CD19E52CE9775E |journal=Bulletin of SOAS |language=en |volume=49 |issue=1 |pages=103–116 |doi=10.1017/S0041977X0004252X |issn=1474-0699}} here, he met the sultan, "who was sitting behind a small table decorated with precious gems."Darnault, Sezim Sezer; Ağır, ‪Aygül. "Visions and Transitions of a Pilgrimage of Curiosity: Pietro Della Valle's Travel to Istanbul (1614-1615)". In Piera, Montserrat (ed.). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvfxvc5n.13?seq=29 Remapping Travel Narratives, 1000-1700]. pp.183. Della Valle wrote that he couldn't take his eyes off of the sultan's feathered headgear as well as the extravagant diamond and gold jewelry he wore.

Della Valle's descriptions, because of their nature as letters, were all in first person and based on his own eyewitness accounts. Much of Viaggi consists of personal anecdotes, such as his experience with whirling Dervishes:{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |title=The Pilgrim: The Travels of Pietro Della Valle |publisher=Hutchinson |year=1989 |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=15–18 |translator-last=Bull |translator-first=George |chapter=Part 1: Turkey |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/16/mode/2up?view=theater}}

{{Quote|text="One Friday, a day when the Turks customarily go more than usual to the mosques to hear sermons, I went along, here in the suburb of Pera where we live, to a local centre of dervishes where I had heard that on this day it was normal to have good music. ... the dervishes came together in a circle in the middle of the mosque and here, to the sound of four or five flutes made of reeds which, distinguishing all the voices, bass, tenor, contralto and soprano, made a most sweet harmony, they began to dance ... In the beginning they start with slow and steady movements, adagio, adagio; but then, warming up little by little, they move ever more quickly, till finally after their fervour has reached a crescendo, they move so quickly and spin round with so much velocity that one's eyes can scarcely keep up with them. ... They claim (if I were told the truth) to be imitating the angels in these spinning motions, on what grounds, I know not; or rather they are imitating the heavens, according to the opinion of some of their philosophers, who say (I have heard) that the motion of the celestial spheres is indeed a dance, which, through the sacred lightning of the divine illumination, has its beginning from God."|author=Pietro Della Valle|title=Viaggi|source=Part 1: Turkey, letter II}}

File:Whirlingdervishes.JPG from Turkey. They belong to a Sufi Islamic sect called the Mevlevi, founded by the famous philosopher Mevlana. Photo from 2006.]]

Ottoman architecture was a central interest for Della Valle. He visited a number of mosques, which he would call a "tempio" ("temple") rather than a mosque in order to draw comparisons to ancient temples and Italian cathedrals. He loved the designs of the mosques and thought that Italy should copy some of their architecture: "With all these adornments the mosques are indeed very beautiful to look at, and I want to carry back to Italy some painting of them, perhaps of all Constantinople, which I believe our architects would not be unhappy to see, as they would find there something to imitate."{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/8/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=9}} Before leaving Constantinople, Della Valle climbed to the top of the dome of Hagia Sophia, which he said he had never done for his own cathedral, San Pietro in Rome. He described Hagia Sophia's dome as beautiful and noteworthy, but "our rotonda is a hundred times better."

While in Constantinople, Della Valle sought the company of expatriates rather than Turks. Despite making "rapid progress" in learning Turkish from Harlay, J.D. Gurney writes that Della Valle's "fundamental attitudes barely changed" and he wasn't very interested in meeting Turkish people, seeing them as "infidels, brutes, barbarians." Darnault, however, writes that Della Valle's view of the people was much more favorable. He cites Della Valle's poem Nimfa Galata ("Nymph of Galata"), which he wrote for a girl in Constantinople, as an example of his "poetic panorama" of the city:Darnault, Sezim Sezer; Ağır, ‪Aygül. "Visions and Transitions of a Pilgrimage of Curiosity: Pietro Della Valle's Travel to Istanbul (1614-1615)". In Piera, Montserrat (ed.). [https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvfxvc5n.13?seq=26 Remapping Travel Narratives, 1000-1700]. pp.180.

{{Quote|text=Amorous, sweet wind
That ripples over the salty waves
Between the Western shores
Blow and travel to the Orient,
Reach, I beg you, that shore
Where the plane trees provide shade,
Where in the middle of the mosques
A lofty tower hovers over the roofs,
Where I find the Grand Seraglio
And the great temple of Sophia
At the foot of a lovely hill
Where I already left my soul behind …|author=Pietro Della Valle|title=Nymph of Galata}}

Della Valle collected a large number of Turkish items to bring back to Naples. This included sketches of palaces and locations throughout the city (both made by him and by artists), books in various languages, antique medals, medicinal drugs, plant samples, textiles, coins, and official Ottoman documents. He also collected rocks from the "Trojan" ruins he visited in 1614. The books in particular were of great interest to Della Valle — he was an avid book collector, and much of his second-to-last letter from Constantinople was devoted to describing the linguistic books he purchased there.

After spending more than a year in Constantinople, Della Valle left Turkey and sailed to Egypt in September 1615. He departed on the first day of Ramadan.{{Cite web |title=Islamic Calendar 1024, 1615-1616 |url=https://www.islamiccal.com/en/hijri-calendar/1024/ |access-date=2025-04-21 |website=IslamicCal.com |language=en}} By this point his entourage included nine people — "seven Christians and two Turks" — including a priest, a friar, Harlay's former assistant, a painter, the interpreter "Paolo the Greek," Tommaso, Lorenzo, a palace official of the sultan, and the official's attendant. The Italian states and Ottoman Empire were very much enemies in 1615; to keep Della Valle safe, the Ottoman ambassador provided him with travel paperwork that falsely claimed him as his nephew.{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/44/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=45}}

Della Valle sailed to Alexandria with the intention of making his way to Mount Sinai. From here he took a boat to Cairo on the River Nile, stopping at night in villages on the riverbanks. He described being amazed by the people he saw: above all else, he was fascinated by their comfort around nudity. Egypt — like Turkey — was a Muslim country, but unlike what Della Valle saw in Constantinople the religious rules of modesty weren't enforced along the Nile: "I have never seen a country where, for just as many of the women as of the men, less concern is taken over showing one's private parts here. They appear half naked, or rather completely so: people pass by, and look, and they do not care at all."{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/46/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=47}}

File:All Gizah Pyramids.jpg

After three and a half days, Della Valle and his group passed the pyramids of Giza; from there they continued onto Cairo by camel. Once they arrived they were greeted by the Lord Consul of France, who put them up in his house. He described his shock by the sheer size of Cairo, saying that "it is bigger than Constantinople or any other city I know."{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/48/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=48}} The group of travelers came to Cairo in November 1615; in early December, they returned to the pyramids to see them up close. At first, Della Valle was disappointed by their lack of "architectural charm," but he quickly reversed his position once he went inside: "It remains utterly steady through all the motions of heaven, earth and time, assuming no less the firmness than the form of a natural mountain. Wonder increases when one enters the pyramid ... I believe that there is here such a standard of architecture and craftmanship that I for one would not know how to better it."{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/50/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=50–53}} He and his entourage also climbed to the top of the pyramid from the outside:

{{Quote|text="I had no less pleasure seeing the pyramid from the outside, because I climbed with no little exertion right up to the top, where there is a fine view to be enjoyed, revealing the sea and Egypt and many countries around. There above, at the highest point, on the part which looks towards Italy, I took pleasure in leaving my name carved."|author=Pietro Della Valle|title=Viaggi|source=Part 1: Turkey, letter XI}}

The group camped in tents at the base of the pyramids overnight, then left the next day for what Della Valle called "the Pyramids of the Mummies" (Saqqara). By this point the entourage had grown to include 25 or 30 men. His guide Belon originally offered to show him sites where mummies had already been excavated; dissatisfied with this option, Della Valle sent his men out to discover new burials, "with the promise and determination that I would not leave that place till I had found something."{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/54/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=54–63}} One night, a man approached Della Valle (via his interpreter) and let him know he had a mummy to sell — he said this had to stay a secret from other locals, so Della Valle and a handful of others followed the man on foot.

File:Engraving of finding mummies in Sakkara by Pietro Della Valle.gif

{{Quote|text="They made us walk over a mile or two, and it seemed to me we were travelling very far to find what he, pointing with his finger, kept saying was just here, just here, and very close. Finally we arrived at a spot where, near to an excavated well that they said had been discovered by him two or three days before, he drew forth a mummy from some sand under which he had it hidden: the entire body of a dead man which, being for the most part well preserved and most curiously adorned and neat, seemed to me very beautiful and elegant. ... These cloth bindings and bundles immediately brought to my mind the story of the raising of Lazarus who obviously appeared like this. ... What is of interest is that on the top part of the body, flattened like the lid of a chest from so much binding, was painted the effigy of a youthful man, and from head to foot his garment was adorned with so many bits and pieces of pictures and gold, with so many hieroglyphics and characters and similar fanciful decorations, that, believe me, it was the most graceful thing imaginable."|author=Pietro Della Valle|title=Viaggi|source=Part 1: Turkey, letter XI}}

The "effigy" Della Valle described in Viaggi is the first discovered Faiyum portrait: a type of naturalistic painted portrait attached to upper class mummies from Roman Egypt during the 1st through 3rd centuries AD.{{Cite web |title=Fayum portraits |url=https://www.namuseum.gr/en/collection/fayum-portraits/ |access-date=2025-04-22 |website=National Archaeological Museum |language=en-US}} The man was about 25 to 30 years old when he died. Under his right arm is a Greek inscription, ΕΥΨΥΧΙ, which means "farewell."{{Cite web |title=SKD {{!}} Online Collection |url=https://skd-online-collection.skd.museum/Details/Index/1266314 |access-date=2025-04-22 |website=skd-online-collection.skd.museum}} Della Valle also discovered the mummy of a woman with a Faiyum portrait in the same well, "who must be none other than the wife or sister of the man already dug out." She was about 30 to 40 years old.{{Cite web |title=SKD {{!}} Online Collection |url=https://skd-online-collection.skd.museum/Details/Index/1267162 |access-date=2025-04-22 |website=skd-online-collection.skd.museum}} He transported these mummies back to Italy; as of 2025 they are both being housed in the Albertinum in Germany.Barbara Borg (1998). "Der zierlichste Anblick der Welt ...". Ägyptische Porträtmumien. Zaberns Bildbände zur Archäologie/ Sonderhefte der Antiken Welt. Mainz am Rhein: Von Zabern.

File:Man Faiyum Portrait (Pietro Della Valle).png|link=|Faiyum portrait of the mummy of a man found by Pietro Della Valle in 1615. 3rd century AD.

File:Woman Faiyum Portrait (Pietro Della Valle).png|link=|Faiyum portrait of the mummy of a woman found by Pietro Della Valle in 1615. 3rd century AD.

There were several more mummies buried near the Faiyum portraits, which Della Valle and his men explored thoroughly. One of them, the remains of a young woman, was falling apart, so Della Valle had it broken into pieces for further inspection. He also ate a piece of the mummy's flesh to test its supposed medicinal qualities. He then had several of the mummies packed and brought with him back to Cairo to be shipped to Naples.

In the spring of 1616, Della Valle visited the "fountain of Lovelessness" in Cairo. This was a stone pillar with a carving of Anubis and a fountain at its base. He wrote that the legend was that any lover who drank the water would have "the frenzy of love" taken from him; despite describing the legend as ignorant, he refused to drink from it just in case: "I had no wish to drink, both because the water was muddy (for at times the animals drink there too) and also because I have no need nor wish for my loves to be taken away."{{Cite book |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/64/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=65}}

On 8 March 1616, Della Valle left Cairo and crossed Egypt by donkey to Mount Sinai. His entourage had dwindled to six: Tommaso, Lorenzo, the painter, a French servant from Alexandria, the head camel driver, and the camel driver's servant.{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/n97/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=69}} He visited the mountain, including Saint Catherine's Monastery, where monks showed him the relic remains of St. Catherine of Alexandria by opening a marble sarcophagus to him. At the end of March he continued on to Jerusalem.

Della Valle arrived in Jerusalem in time for the 1616 Easter celebration.{{Cite web |title=Easter Dates from 1600 to 2099 |url=https://www.census.gov/data/software/x13as/genhol/easter-dates.html#par_textimage_1300332353 |access-date=2025-04-22 |website=Census.gov |language=en}} The Franciscan vicar had heard ahead of time that he was coming to the city, so a group of friars greeted him at the city gate, giving him room and board in their monastery. His reputation proceeded him and a rumor had spread in Jerusalem that Della Valle was the son of a European king.{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/70/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=70–71}}

On Maundy Thursday, Della Valle visited the sacred spots of the Via Dolorosa and the passion of Christ, as well as the tomb of the Virgin Mary. On Holy Saturday, he attended an Orthodox church ceremony where he witnessed the Holy Fire and claimed it to be a fraud:{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/78/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=78–82}}

{{Quote|text="We saw everything clearly, including how very quickly two or three monks slipped inside [the Holy Chapel] and immediately shut the door after them. The story is that these monks soak everything inside the chapel with brandy, and then with the flint that they have hidden there they kindle a light and produce fire; and so all of a sudden the flame is seen through the little windows of the chapel to leap up high and reach the ceiling, as if it were indeed coming from heaven."|author=Pietro Della Valle|title=Viaggi|source=Part 1: Turkey, letter XIII}}

Della Valle found his visits to Saint Catherine's Monastery and the Holy Sepulchre to have a "curative" effect on his mental health and heartbreak. He wrote to Schipano that "I was not only cured of the old, unhappy passions of Italy ... but I had also wholly eradicated from my heart all memory of them, and every former horror, and whatever remained of these."{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/110/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=110}}

Della Valle left Jerusalem on 19 April, visiting nearby holy sites as part of his pilgrimage, including Nazareth and Mount Tabor. He then travelled to Damascus, where he had to stay longer than planned due to Tommaso's sudden severe illness.{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/88/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=88}} Tommaso eventually pulled through and the group continued onto Aleppo.

It was around this time that Della Valle began to make plans to extend his original travels, which angered Schipano; the two were having increasingly diverging opinions on the purpose of Della Valle's journey. Jules Verne claims that his pilgrimage had given him "a taste for a traveller's life."{{Cite book |last=Verne |first=Jules |url=https://www.gutenberg.org/files/24777/24777-h/24777-h.htm |title=Celebrated Travels and Travellers, Vol 1: Exploration of the World |year=1882 |isbn= |translator-last=Leigh |translator-first=Dora}} Rather than turn back to Naples, Della Valle decided to venture further east and set off for Baghdad.{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/94/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=94}}

File:Sitti Maani Gioerida della Valle.jpg

In order to reach Baghdad, Della Valle and his group joined a caravan of about 1,500 people in September 1616. The men disguised themselves as Syrians to avoid recognition, shaving their heads and wearing turbans.{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/94/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=94}} A dispute one night in the caravan led to Tommaso fatally stabbing Lorenzo in the back — Della Valle had the body hidden and disposed of so as to not attract attention to the group of Italian travelers.{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/104/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=104–105}}

His main contact once in Baghdad was NAME Gioerida, arranging housing for the travelers and serving as a sort of guide to the city. It was at a dinner party at Gioerida's house that Della Valle met the family's eldest daughter, Sitti Maani — the two quickly fell in love.{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/108/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=108–112}} He was 30 years old and she was around 18.{{Cite journal |last=Baskins |first=Cristelle |date=2017 |title=Writing the Dead: Pietro Della Valle and the Tombs of Shirazi Poets |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26551698 |journal=Muqarnas |volume=34 |pages=197–221 |doi=10.1163/22118993_03401P008 |issn=0732-2992 |jstor=26551698}}

Writing to Schipano to inform him of the news, Della Valle referred to Sitti Maani as "my Babylonian love" and spent several pages describing her "most agreeable" attributes:

{{Quote|text="I shall tell you that she is Asian in nationality, of very ancient Christian blood, about eighteen years old, and well endowed — as well as having other fine qualities (those of her mind I consider out of the ordinary), and also very acceptable physical beauty."|author=Pietro Della Valle|title=Viaggi|source=Part 1: Turkey, letter XVIII}}

He claimed that he fell in love with her when she offered him a quince, "from which seed in turn grew many now sweet, now bitter, fruits in my mind." Della Valle and Sitti Maani married in December; she left Baghdad with him as he embarked on the second leg of his travels. The newlyweds originally intended to leave on Christmas Eve, but the ongoing Ottoman-Safavid War — the reason they had to leave Baghdad in the first place — delayed them by a fortnight. They left on 4 January 1617.{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/118/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=117–118}}

Part of Della Valle's decision to extend his journey further east came from his desire to meet Shah Abbās I.{{Cite journal |last=Gurney |first=J. D. |date=February 1986 |title=Pietro della Valle: the limits of perception |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/bulletin-of-the-school-of-oriental-and-african-studies/article/abs/pietro-della-valle-the-limits-of-perception/B7162223E8FB7A74E2CD19E52CE9775E |journal=Bulletin of SOAS |language=en |volume=49 |issue=1 |pages=106 |doi=10.1017/S0041977X0004252X |issn=1474-0699}} Both Persia and Italy were at war with the Ottomans; to him, the Persians were "friends of [his] nation."{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/122/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=121–122}} He left the Ottoman Empire and crossed Kurdistan — stopping along the way to shave his beard off into a more Persian style, much to Sitti Maani's dislike — and arrived at the Persian capital of Isfahan on 22 February 1617.

The city of Isfahan was "without doubt superior to everything in Constantinople" in Della Valle's mind.{{Cite journal |last=Gurney |first=J. D. |date=February 1986 |title=Pietro della Valle: the limits of perception |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/bulletin-of-the-school-of-oriental-and-african-studies/article/abs/pietro-della-valle-the-limits-of-perception/B7162223E8FB7A74E2CD19E52CE9775E |journal=Bulletin of SOAS |language=en |volume=49 |issue=1 |pages=107 |doi=10.1017/S0041977X0004252X |issn=1474-0699}}{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/page/122/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The Pilgrim |date=1990 |publisher=Hutchinson |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=123}} He admired the architecture especially, describing at length in his letters to Schipano how "nothing prettier could be seen" than the fountains, promenades, and main square of the capital.

After visiting the holy sites, Della Valle travelled from Damascus to Aleppo. After seeing a portrait of the beautiful Assyrian Christian Sitti Maani Gioerida, daughter of a Nestorian Catholic father and an Armenian mother,[https://iranicaonline.org/articles/della-valle "Della Valle, Pietro", Encyclopædia Iranica] he went to Baghdad and married her a month later. While in the Middle East, he made one of the first modern records of the location of ancient Babylon and provided "remarkable descriptions" of the site. He also brought back to Europe inscribed bricks from Nineveh and Ur, some of the first examples of cuneiform available to modern Europeans.The Sumerians: Their History, Culture and Character, by Samuel Noah Kramer, University of Chicago Press, 1963, p. 7 At that time Baghdad was being contested between Turkey and Iran during the frequent Ottoman-Persian Wars, so he had to leave Baghdad on 4 January 1617. Accompanied by his wife Maani, he proceeded to Persia, and visited Hamadan and Isfahan. In the summer of 1618, he joined Shah Abbas in a campaign in northern Persia. Here he was well received at court and treated as the Shah's guest.{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}}

When Shah ʿAbbās returned to winter quarters at Faraḥābād, Della Valle, who was unwell, went to Isfahan, where he hoped the Augustinians and Carmelites would restore him to health. On his return to Isfahan he began to think of going back home through India, rather than endanger himself again in Turkey. However, the state of his health and the war between Persia and the Portuguese at Ormuz generated problems. In October 1621 he left Isfahan, visited Persepolis and Shiraz and made his way to the coast. While waiting for transport, his wife died shortly after delivering a stillborn child. It was not until January 1623 that he found a passage for Surat on the English ship Whale,{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} Captain Nicholas Woodcock.

here's the 1665 english translation{{Cite book |last=Valle |first=Pietro della |url=https://archive.org/details/bim_early-english-books-1641-1700_the-travels-of-sig-piet_valle-pietro-della_1665 |title=The travels of Sig. Pietro della Valle, ... 1665 |date=1665 |others=Internet Archive}}

He sojourned in India until November 1624, his headquarters being Surat and Goa. In India, Della Valle was introduced to the King Vekatappa Nayaka of Keladi, South India by Vithal Shenoy, the chief administrator of those territories. The accounts of his travels are one of the most important sources of history for the region.

He was at Muscat in January 1625, and at Basra in March. In May he started by the desert route to Aleppo, and boarded on a French ship at Alexandretta. He reached Cyprus and finally Rome on 28 March 1626. There, he was received with many honours, not only in literary circles, but also from Pope Urban VIII, who appointed him a gentleman of his bedchamber.

full travel writing (yay!) in a language i can't read (boo!){{Cite book |last=Valle |first=Pietro della |url=https://archive.org/details/viaggidipietrode01vall/mode/2up |title=Viaggi di Pietro della Valle, il pellegrino, descritti da lui medesimo in lettere familiari all'erudito suo amico Mario Schipano, divisi in tre parti cioè: la Turchia, la Persia, e l'India, colla vita e ritratto dell'autore |date=1843 |publisher=Brighton G. Gancia |others=Robarts - University of Toronto}}

ENGLISH TRANSLATION (!!!!) thanks george{{Cite book |last=Della Valle |first=Pietro |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/mode/2up |title=The Pilgrim: The Travels of Pietro Della Valle |publisher=Hutchinson |others=Internet Archive |year=1989 |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |translator-last=Bull |translator-first=George}}

Della Valle’s pilgrimage “was a quest for a positive and universal human quality behind cultural and religious differences.”{{Cite book |last=Rubiés |first=Joan Pau |url=https://archive.org/details/travelethnologyi0000rubi/mode/2up |title=Travel and ethnology in the Renaissance : South India through European eyes, 1250-1625 |date=2000 |publisher=Cambridge ; New York : Cambridge University Press |others=Internet Archive |isbn=978-0-521-77055-2}}

Misc quotes I like:

• "When it pleases you to write to me, be kind enough to let me know in particular if there is anyone in Naples who ever remembers me, if they talk about me and what they say." (letter i, George Bull translation)
• page 7 letter ii GBT description of how beautiful constantinople is
• page 10-11 letter ii GBT old wives' tale
• page 11 letter ii GBT turkish women
• page 12 letter ii GBT view from his window
• "just like macaroni between cheese" GBT page 59 letter xi
• "I alone surely must adapt myself to the usage of an entire country, and not the country just to me." (GBT 112)

books were a big fn deal

three parts - turkey, persia, india

first edition while he was alive, second etc posthumous

shaped much of what europe knew about those regions

french (1661-1663), english (1664 - india and return), dutch (1664-1665), german (1674)

goethe liked him

Extending the trip diverged strongly from what Schipano and Della Valle planned — Schipano wanted Della Valle to collect information about science and history, intending to cut most of the personal anecdotes from his letters to publish a more straightforward treatise. Della Valle had been increasingly turning his letters into an autobiographical narrative — the style Viaggi is now famous for — and arguments over the purpose of the writing meant Schipano never went on to edit the letters after all. Rubiés writes that "from an early stage in his journey, and certainly by the time he left Jerusalem, Della Valle intended to leave a lasting record of his journey, one geared towards Italian learned academies and the Republic of Letters more generally."

Of the 54 letters Della Valle wrote to Schipano, only one of them was lost. LOST LETTER

Part 1: Turkey:

• Letter i - From Constantinople, 23 August 1614
• Letter ii - From Constantinople, 25 October 1614
• Letter iii - From Constantinople, 7 February 1615
• Letter iv - From Constantinople,
• Letter v - From Constantinople,
• Letter vi - From Constantinople, 13 June 1615
• Letter vii - From Constantinople,
• Letter viii - From Constantinople,
• Letter ix - From Constantinople, 4 September 1615
• Letter x - From Constantinople,
• Letter xi - From Cairo, 25 January 1616
• Letter xii - From Cairo, 7 March 1616
• Letter xiii - From Aleppo, 15 June 1616
• Letter xiv -
• Letter xv -
• Letter xvi -
• Letter xvii - From Baghdad, 10 December 1616
• Letter xviii - From Baghdad, 23 December 1616
• Letter ???? - From Baghdad, 2 January 1617

Part 2: Persia:

• Letter i - From Isfahan, 17 March 1617
• Letter ii -
• Letter iii - From Isfahan, 18 December 1617
• Letter iv - From Farahabad the first days of May and from Qazvin, 25 July 1618
• ...
• Letter xvi - From the gardens of Shiraz, 27 July 1622

Part 3: India:

• Letter i - From Surat, 22 March 1623
• Letter ii - From Goa, 27 April 1623
• Letter iii - From Goa, 10 October 1623
• Letter iv - From Onor, 30 October 1623
• Letter v - From Ikkeri, 22 November 1623
• Letter vi - From Mangalore, 9 December 1623
• Letter vii - From Goa, 31 January 1624
• Letter viii - From Goa, 4 November 1624

• Pietro Della Valle
• Sitti Maani Gioerida Della Valle
• Travel literature
• Fayum portraits
• Persian cat

= PIETRO DELLA VALLE PAGE REWRITE DRAFT =

{{Infobox biography

| name = Pietro Della Valle

| image = Pietro Della Valle.jpg

| other_names = il Pellegrino

| birth_date = {{Birth date|1586|04|02}}

| birth_place = Rome, Italy

| death_date = {{Death date and age|1652|04|21|1586|04|02}}

| death_place = Rome, Italy

| burial_place = Santa Maria in Ara Coeli

| citizenship = Papal States

| era = 17th century

| known_for = Travel writings of Turkey, Persia, and India

| notable_works = Viaggi di Pietro della Valle il Pellegrino

| mother = Giovanna Alberini

| father = Pompeo della Valle

| relatives = Andrea della Valle

}}

Pietro Della Valle ({{langx|la|Petrus a Valle}}; 2 April 1586 – 21 April 1652), also written Pietro della Valle, was an Italian traveler, writer, and diplomat who travelled throughout Asia during the 17th century. His travels took him to the Holy Land, the Middle East, Northern Africa, and as far as India.[http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15260b.htm Löffler, Klemens. "Pietro della Valle." The Catholic Encyclopedia] Vol. 15. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1912. 27 July 2023 {{PD-notice}}/

Della Valle was unusual among travelers of his time; whereas others had a set reason for travelling, like trade or diplomacy, Della Valle was mostly fueled by curiosity.{{Cite journal |last=Gurney |first=J. D. |date=February 1986 |title=Pietro della Valle: the limits of perception |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/bulletin-of-the-school-of-oriental-and-african-studies/article/abs/pietro-della-valle-the-limits-of-perception/B7162223E8FB7A74E2CD19E52CE9775E |journal=Bulletin of SOAS |language=en |volume=49 |issue=1 |pages=103–116 |doi=10.1017/S0041977X0004252X |issn=1474-0699}} He originally left Italy as part of a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, but this was done just as much — if not more so — out of a desire to travel as it was to visit the Holy Land.{{Cite web |title=Saudi Aramco World : Pietro della Valle: Pilgrim of Curiosity |url=https://archive.aramcoworld.com/issue/201401/pietro.della.valle.pilgrim.of.curiosity.htm |access-date=2025-04-16 |website=archive.aramcoworld.com}} Once he reached Jerusalem, Della Valle continued to journey throughout the Middle East and Asia for the next decade.{{Cite web |title=Pietro della Valle - Encyclopedia Volume - Catholic Encyclopedia |url=https://www.catholic.org/encyclopedia/view.php?id=11892 |access-date=2025-04-16 |website=Catholic Online |language=en}} Jules Verne called Della Valle "the first of that prolific race of tourists."{{Cite book |last=Verne |first=Jules |url=https://www.gutenberg.org/files/24777/24777-h/24777-h.htm |title=Celebrated Travels and Travellers, Vol 1: Exploration of the World |year=1882 |isbn= |translator-last=Leigh |translator-first=Dora}}

Pietro Della Valle was born into a well-known aristocratic family in Rome on 2 April 1586.[http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/15260b.htm Löffler, Klemens. "Pietro della Valle." The Catholic Encyclopedia] Vol. 15. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1912. 27 July 2023 {{PD-notice}}/ His relatives included two cardinals, Rustico and Andrea della Valle.{{Cite book |last1=Della Valle |first1=Pietro |chapter-url=https://archive.org/details/travelsofpietrod00dell/page/n21/mode/2up |title=The travels of Pietro della Valle in India : from the old English translation of 1664 |last2=Havers |first2=G. (George) |last3=Grey |first3=Edward |date=1892 |publisher=London : Printed for the Hakluyt Society |others=University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill University Library |chapter=Life of Pietro Della Valle}} Like many wealthy Romans of the time, he was educated in astrology, astronomy, medicine, history, music, and the classics.{{Cite journal |last=Gurney |first=J. D. |date=February 1986 |title=Pietro della Valle: the limits of perception |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/bulletin-of-the-school-of-oriental-and-african-studies/article/abs/pietro-della-valle-the-limits-of-perception/B7162223E8FB7A74E2CD19E52CE9775E |journal=Bulletin of SOAS |language=en |volume=49 |issue=1 |pages=103–116 |doi=10.1017/S0041977X0004252X |issn=1474-0699}} As a teenager Della Valle met Beatrice Boraccio; she was a young Roman woman and fellow aristocrat, and he quickly fell in love with her.{{Cite journal |last=Rubiés |first=Joan-Pau |date=2023-07-03 |title=Pietro Della Valle: Christian pilgrimage, antiquarianism and cosmopolitanism in the age of the Baroque |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09518967.2023.2264142#d1e106 |journal=Mediterranean Historical Review |volume=38 |issue=2 |pages=221–250 |doi=10.1080/09518967.2023.2264142 |issn=0951-8967}}

The beginning of the 17th century in Italy was marked by unrest — Pope Paul V's conflicts with Venice led to the Venetian Interdict, and the death of Henry IV of France in 1610 meant that many Europeans expected war. Della Valle joined the military service as a result. In 1611, at the age of 25, Della Valle took part in a Spanish naval expedition against pirates and the Barbary States off the coast of Tunisia.{{Cite web |title=Saudi Aramco World : Pietro della Valle: Pilgrim of Curiosity |url=https://archive.aramcoworld.com/issue/201401/pietro.della.valle.pilgrim.of.curiosity.htm |access-date=2025-04-16 |website=archive.aramcoworld.com}} He later described the engagements "rather as skirmishes than fights."

Della Valle returned home from the navy to discover that Boraccio had married somebody else in his absence.{{Cite book |last=Verne |first=Jules |url=https://www.gutenberg.org/files/24777/24777-h/24777-h.htm |title=Celebrated Travels and Travellers, Vol 1: Exploration of the World |year=1882 |isbn= |translator-last=Leigh |translator-first=Dora}} Heartbroken, he moved to Naples, where he spent the next few years depressed and contemplating suicide.

Della Valle had been a member of the Accademia degli Umoristi since 1609 and continued to be a part of the academic circle while living in Naples. Here he met the professor Mario Schipano, who studied medicine and philosophy; the two would form a lifelong friendship. Schipano led him to learn Arabic from Diego de Urrea Conca, the leading European scholar on Middle Eastern languages at the time.

Schipano was the one who first suggested that Della Valle travel east. Giovanni Pietro Bellori, an Italian painter and one of Della Valle's contemporaries, wrote the preface for the second edition of his travel accounts in 1662; he describes this idea of travel as feeling "providential" to him:{{Cite book |last=Valle |first=Pietro della |url=https://archive.org/details/viaggidipietrode01vall/mode/2up |title=Viaggi di Pietro della Valle, il pellegrino, descritti da lui medesimo in lettere familiari all'erudito suo amico Mario Schipano, divisi in tre parti cioè: la Turchia, la Persia, e l'India, colla vita e ritratto dell'autore |date= 1843|publisher=Brighton G. Gancia |others=Robarts - University of Toronto}}{{Quote|text="It seemed to him that he heard the words of someone exhorting him to flight and to seek distance, at which point, suddenly overturning his desire for death, he began to think about remote solitudes, faraway regions, strange customs, and a barbarous life, not bothered about abandoning his beloved motherland, and ignoring the needs of his blood and succession. Resolved to depart for other parts of the world, and choosing travel to the East, a pious zeal grew inside him to visit the Holy Land and to release his vow and heal his affections, trusting that perhaps one day he would be able to close in his chest the wound that oppressed him mortally: this was the aim of his pilgrimage."|author=Giovanni Pietro Bellori|title=Viaggi, Second Edition|source="Vita"}}There is some debate over the original purpose of Della Valle's pilgrimage. Although Bellori and other writers have said he initially travelled for spiritual solace alone, historian Joan-Pau Rubiés claims this narrative falls apart in the face of Della Valle's activities: "It quickly becomes clear to any reader of the letters written by Della Valle throughout his travels that his pilgrimage to the Holy Land was always intended to also be a journey of curiosity in the Levant." Most scholars believe it was a combination of both heartbreak and curiosity that inspired him to leave. What's certain is that Della Valle saw himself as a pilgrim — from his time in Naples to his death, he signed his name as "Pietro Della Valle, il Pellegrino" ("Pietro Della Valle, the pilgrim").

Della Valle and Schipano planned the trip to Jerusalem together, agreeing that Della Valle would write him letters with extensive descriptions of the places he went, people he saw, and things he did on his travels. In return, Schipano would organize the letters into a narrative and supply Della Valle with information from back in Italy.{{Cite book |last1=Darnault |first1=Sezim Sezer |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvfxvc5n.13 |title=Remapping Travel Narratives, 1000-1700 |last2=Ağır |first2=‪Aygül |editor-last=Piera |editor-first=Montserrat |pages=157–158 |chapter=Visions and Transitions of a Pilgrimage of Curiosity: Pietro Della Valle's Travel to Istanbul (1614-1615)|date=2018 |publisher=Arc Humanities Press |doi=10.2307/j.ctvfxvc5n.13 |jstor=j.ctvfxvc5n.13 |isbn=978-1-942401-59-9 }}

{{Main|Draft:Travels of Pietro Della Valle}}

somehow gonna summarize all that other stuff i guess

File:Pietro della valle mummies.png

french music bio{{Cite web |title=Pietro della Valle (1586-1652) |url=https://www.musicologie.org/Biographies/v/valle_pietro_della.html |access-date=2025-04-23 |website=www.musicologie.org |language=fr}}

Apart from his activities as an ethnographer, Della Valle was also a composer and a writer of theoretical treatises on music. He composed several dialogues (actually brief oratorios) on biblical subjects. His only preserved work is an oratorio composed for l'Oratorio del Croficisso di San Marcello, where he experiments with musical modes and scales inspired by ancient music theory. For this purpose, he developed two new instruments, such as a "violone panharmonico" and a "cembalo triharmonico". Notwithstanding his interest in ancient musical practices, in his theoretical writings on music (e.g. "Della musica dell'età nostra che non è punto inferiore, anzi è migliore di quella dell'età passata", Rome 1640, and "Note … sopra la musica antica e moderna, indirizzato al Sig.r Nicolò Farfaro", 1640/41), he praises the modern music culture in contemporary Rome and defended the modern music against the criticism of Nicolò Farfaro, an Italian musician of his times.

Pietro Della Valle also wrote texts and librettos for several musical spectacles, such as "Il carro di fedeltà d'Amore", (music by his teacher of harpsichord Paolo Quagliati, performed in Rome in 1606 and printed in 1611), and "La valle rinverdita" (written in celebration of the birth of his first child in 1629, now lost).

"unknown episode"?{{Cite journal |last=Venditti |first=Gianni |date=2013-01-01 |title=Un episodio ignoto nella vita di Pietro della Valle |url=https://www.academia.edu/9235493 |journal=Studi in onore del cardinale Raffaele Farina, II, a cura di Ambrogio M. Piazzoni, Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, Città del Vaticano 2013, pp. 1099-1142 [Studi e testi, 478]}}

The rest of his life was uneventful; he married his second wife, Mariuccia (Tinatin de Ziba), a Georgian orphan of a noble family. She had been adopted by his first wife as a child, had travelled with him, and was the mother of fourteen children. He died in Rome on 21 April 1652,{{sfn|Chisholm|1911}} and is buried at his family's burial vault at Santa Maria in Ara Coeli.

By 1665 the portion of his "Travels" dealing with India and with his return had been translated into English. They contain accounts of his discussions with "Hindoo" Brahmans about whether the Egyptians or Indians first came up with the concept of reincarnation, a dialogue with a woman who invited him to her upcoming sati, a description of the barefoot 'Queen of Olaza', who was out on the embankments giving directions to her engineers—and many other bits of first-rate ethnography.

"in both of these images, Della Valle wears european clothing but retains the large “Persian” moustache that he adopted during his twelve years abroad."{{Cite journal |last=Baskins |first=Cristelle |date=2017 |title=Writing the Dead: Pietro Della Valle and the Tombs of Shirazi Poets |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26551698 |journal=Muqarnas |volume=34 |pages=197–221 |doi=10.1163/22118993_03401P008 |jstor=26551698 |issn=0732-2992}}

good info on why/how he mummified his wife{{Cite journal |last=Baskins |first=Cristelle |date=2017 |title=Writing the Dead: Pietro Della Valle and the Tombs of Shirazi Poets |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/26551698 |journal=Muqarnas |volume=34 |pages=197–221 |doi=10.1163/22118993_03401P008 |jstor=26551698 |issn=0732-2992}}

description of maani and their courtship

called her "my Babylonian love"

two illigetimate kids (that we know of) which were born before he left italy{{Cite book |last=Pietro Della Valle |url=https://archive.org/details/pilgrimtravelsof00dell/mode/2up?view=theater |title=The pilgrim |date= |publisher=Hutchinson |others=Internet Archive |isbn=978-0-09-174189-1 |pages=xi |chapter=Introduction}}

books were a big fn deal

three parts - turkey, persia, india

first edition while he was alive, second etc posthumous

shaped much of what europe knew about those regions

french (1661-1663), english (1664 - india and return), dutch (1664-1665), german (1674){{Citation |last1=Darnault |first1=Sezim Sezer |title=Visions and Transitions of a Pilgrimage of Curiosity: Pietro Della Valle's Travel to Istanbul (1614–1615) |date=2018 |work=Remapping Travel Narratives, 1000-1700 |pages=155–184 |editor-last=Piera |editor-first=Montserrat |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvfxvc5n.13 |access-date=2025-04-16 |series=To the East and Back Again |publisher=Arc Humanities Press |isbn=978-1-942401-59-9 |last2=Ağir |first2=Aygül|jstor=j.ctvfxvc5n.13 }}

goethe liked him

Extending the trip diverged strongly from what Schipano and Della Valle planned — Schipano wanted Della Valle to collect information about science and history, intending to cut most of the personal anecdotes from his letters to publish a more straightforward treatise. Della Valle had been increasingly turning his letters into an autobiographical narrative — the style Viaggi is now famous for — and arguments over the purpose of the writing meant Schipano never went on to edit the letters after all. Rubiés writes that "from an early stage in his journey, and certainly by the time he left Jerusalem, Della Valle intended to leave a lasting record of his journey, one geared towards Italian learned academies and the Republic of Letters more generally."{{Cite journal |last=Rubiés |first=Joan-Pau |date=2023-07-03 |title=Pietro Della Valle: Christian pilgrimage, antiquarianism and cosmopolitanism in the age of the Baroque |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09518967.2023.2264142#d1e106 |journal=Mediterranean Historical Review |volume=38 |issue=2 |pages=221–250 |doi=10.1080/09518967.2023.2264142 |issn=0951-8967}}

bibliography of his works starts on p63

• Il Carro di Fideltà d’amore (music by Paolo Quagliati), Robletti, Roma, 1611.
• "Funeral Oration on his Wife Maani", whose remains he brought with him to Rome and buried there (1627)
• Account of Shah Abbas (1628)
• Discorso sulla musica dell'età nostra, Roma, 1640.
• The Travels in Persia (2 parts) were published by his sons in 1658, and the third part (India) in 1663.
• Viaggi di Pietro Della Valle il pellegrino, con minuto ragguaglio di tutte le cose notabili osservate in essi: descritti da lui medesimo in 54 lettere familiari all'erudito suo amico Mario Schipano, divisi in tre parti cioè: la Turchia, la Persia e l'India. Colla vita e ritratto dell'autore. Roma 1650–1658, Torino 1843.
• Diario di viaggio in Persia (1617-1623), a cura di Mario Vitalone. ISMEO, Roma 2023. {{ISBN|978-88-66872-55-9}}

{{reflist}}