Sæwulf
{{Short description|12th-century English pilgrim to Jerusalem}}
File:Uppsala map of Jerusalem.jpg depicting city map of Jerusalem under Crusader control, {{c.}} 1200s.]]
Sæwulf ({{small|Late}} {{IPA|ang|ˈsæːwulf}}; {{floruit}} 1102 – 1103) was probably the first English pilgrim to Jerusalem following its conquest in the First Crusade.{{Cite web|title=The Project Gutenberg eBook of Early Travels in Palestine, by Thomas Wright.|url=https://www.gutenberg.org/files/40131/40131-h/40131-h.htm#Page_xx|access-date=2020-08-14|website=www.gutenberg.org}} His Latin written account of his pilgrimage, Relatio de situ Ierusalem , tells of an arduous and dangerous journey; and Sæwulf's descriptive narrative provides scholars brief but significant insight into sea travel across the Mediterranean to the new Kingdom of Jerusalem that was established soon after the end of the First Crusade.{{Cite web|title=Pilgrim Libraries: books & reading on the medieval routes to Rome & Jerusalem|url=http://www.bbk.ac.uk/pilgrimlibraries/tag/augustine/|access-date=2020-08-14|language=en-GB}}{{Cite ODNB|last=Damian-Grint|first=Peter|title=Sæwulf (fl. 1102–1103), traveller|url=https://doi.org/10.1093/ref:odnb/24468|access-date=2020-08-14|year=2004 |language=en|doi=10.1093/ref:odnb/24468}}
History
Jerusalem fell to the forces of the First Crusade in 1099 after a successful siege of the city. Sæwulf's telling of his travels on pilgrimage to the Holy Land start in Apulia on 13 July 1102 with his boarding ship at Monopoli. Via many ports, he made landfall at Jaffa and began a tour of Palestine, including Jericho and Hebron.
The narrative of his journey to Jerusalem described the prevailing lawlessness of the Judean hills at the time. He noted the road between Jaffa and Jerusalem "was very dangerous...because the Saracens are continually plotting an ambush...day and night always keeping a lookout for someone to attack".The Crusades: The Authoritative History of the War for the Holy Land by Thomas Asbridge He noted the presence of many corpses of pilgrims abandoned on and near the road, unburied because of the rough ground and reasons of safety, as "[a]nybody who did this would dig a grave not for his fellow Christian but for himself."{{cite book |last=Jones |first=Dan |author-link=Dan Jones (writer) |date=2017 |title=The Templars: The Rise and Spectacular Fall of God's Holy Warriors |url= |location=New York |publisher=Viking Press |pages=19–20 |isbn=978-0-525-42830-5}}
For Jerusalem, Sæwulf related guidebook-like details highlighting important sites for pilgrims,{{Cite journal|last=Garnett|first=Margaret Elizabeth|title="The longed-for place" : Saewulf and twelfth-century pilgrimage to the Holy Land (2000).|url=https://scholarworks.wm.edu/honorstheses/749|journal=Undergraduate Honors Theses.|date=April 2000 |volume=Paper 749.}} including the famous Church of the Holy Sepulchre.{{Cite web|last=Hays|first=Jeffrey|title=CHURCH OF THE HOLY SEPULCHRE {{!}} Facts and Details|url=http://factsanddetails.com/world/cat55/sub352/entry-5771.html#chapter-8|access-date=2020-08-14|website=factsanddetails.com|language=en}} He also visited Bethlehem, finding it, with the exception of a monastery, "all ruined".
For his return journey, Sæwulf took a dromund from Jaffa on 17 May 1103. The galley was attacked near Acre by Saracen ships, but soldiers onboard defended the vessel allowing it to escape. They were attacked again on the voyage from Cyprus to Constantinople by pirates. Sæwulf's account abruptly ends after recounting passage through the Dardanelles.
Pilgrimage
In 1839 Sæwulf's report was edited into French{{Cite book|last=Armand d'Avezac|url=https://archive.org/details/bub_gb_8TFUAAAAQAAJ|title=Relation des voyages de Seawulf à Jérusalem et en TerreSainte pendant les années 1102 et 1103, publiés pour la première fois d'après un manuscrit de Cambridge|date=1839|publisher=Imp. Bourgogne et Martinet|others=unknown library|language=fr}} by Armand d'Avezac and from that translated into English by Thomas Wright who included it as the section "The Travels of Sæwulf"{{Cite web|title=The Project Gutenberg eBook of Early Travels in Palestine, by Thomas Wright.|url=https://www.gutenberg.org/files/40131/40131-h/40131-h.htm#Page_31|access-date=2020-08-14|website=www.gutenberg.org}} in his 1848 anthology "Early Travels in Palestine".{{Cite book|title=Early Travels in Palestine: Comprising the Narratives of Arculf, Willibald, Bernard, S?wulf ... : Thomas Wright , Arculfus : Free Download, Borrow, and Streaming|url=https://archive.org/details/earlytravelsinp00arcugoog|access-date=2020-08-14|via=Internet Archive|isbn=9780790505381 |language=en}}{{Citation|last=Beazley|first=Raymond|title=Sæwulf|url=https://en.wikisource.org/wiki/S%C3%A6wulf_(DNB00)|work=Dictionary of National Biography, 1885-1900|volume=50|access-date=2020-08-14}} Though details of Sæwulf's life after his pilgrimage are uncertain, he is generally thoughtThis assumption is argued against by Margaret Elizabeth Garnett in her dissertation, "'The Longed-for Place': Saewulf and Twelfth-Century Pilgrimage to the Holy Land", pp. 4-16. to be the Sæwulf (or Seuulfus) of Worcester mentioned by the distinguished English historian William of Malmesbury in his "Gesta Pontificum Anglorum" as a merchant who in his old age became a monk in Malmesbury Abbey in Wiltshire, England.{{cite web | title=The Project Gutenberg eBook of Early Travels in Palestine, by Thomas Wright. | website=Project Gutenberg | date=2012-07-03 | url=https://www.gutenberg.org/files/40131/40131-h/40131-h.htm#Page_xx | access-date=2020-11-04}}
See also
References
{{reflist}}
Work
- {{cite book|last=Sæwulf|author-link=Sæwulf|year=1892|url=https://archive.org/details/cu31924028534299/page/n7/mode/2up|title=Saewolf (A.D. 1102, 1103)|publisher=Palestine Pilgrims' Text Society}}
{{Authority control}}
{{Medieval travelogues of Palestine}}
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Category:12th-century English writers
Category:English travel writers
Category:Christian pilgrimages