High Middle Ages · Europe · Exploration
1287
Rabban Bar Sauma arrives at the court of France
1287
A Nestorian Christian monk born in China and sent as an envoy by the Mongol Ilkhanate reached Paris, where Philip IV received him, and then Bordeaux, where he gave communion to Edward I. His memoir is an eastern mirror of Marco Polo, too little read. His astonishment at the stained glass of the Sainte-Chapelle and the student riots of Paris offers a uniquely foreign perspective on medieval Europe.
In context
Also in 1287 (3 other events on record)
- St. Lucia's flood reshapes the Dutch coastline · Europe · Disaster
- Mongols sack Pagan · Southeast Asia · War
- Pagan kingdom of Burma falls to Mongol invasion · Southeast Asia · War
Before and after in Europe
Before and after in Exploration
Era
High Middle Ages (1000–1300), one of 1,306 events from that era on Saeculum.