At the beginning of the 13th century, when Mongol Empire expansion into Europe, the Italian city-states-Venice, Genoa, Pisa, Florence, Milan, Siena and Lucca - come on the scene, next to the centralized Western European monarchies (France, England) and the Papal Curia. In Genoa and Venice, major naval republics, the chief source of wealth and power was transit trade between Western Europe and the East. Both Genoa and Venice had the political systems ideal for realizing large business operations. All the power in these republics belonged to mercantile patricians, who fell to the vast majority of income from overseas trade. In the last third of the 13th century Genoese merchants, side by side with the Franciscan and Dominican missionaries, began to expand further to the east. Genoese colonies, factories and leading trading posts were also supporting bases of religious missions. The list of these missions in the Franciscan Vicaria Tartariæ Aquilonaris is presented in the end of this paper., Vladimír Liščák., and Obsahuje seznam literatury a poznámky
At the beginning of the 13th century, when Mongol Empire expansion into Europe, the Italian city-states-Venice, Genoa, Pisa, Florence, Milan, Siena and Lucca - come on the scene, next to the centralized Western European monarchies (France, England) and the Papal Curia. In Genoa and Venice, major naval republics, the chief source of wealth and power was transit trade between Western Europe and the East. Both Genoa and Venice had the political systems ideal for realizing large business operations. All the power in these republics belonged to mercantile patricians, who fell to the vast majority of income from overseas trade. In the last third of the 13th century Genoese merchants, side by side with the Franciscan and Dominican missionaries, began to expand further to the east. Genoese colonies, factories and leading trading posts were also supporting bases of religious missions. The list of these missions in the Franciscan Vicaria Tartariæ Aquilonaris is presented in the end of this paper., Vladimír Liščák., and Obsahuje poznámky a seznam literatury
At the beginning of the 1330s on of the most important travelogues describing the road through the then Mongolian Asia to China was written. Its author was Odoric of Pordenone (or of Friuli, of Udine, etc.), a Franciscan friar born near Pordenone. A large part of the travelogue is taken up by a story about four Franciscan missionaries and the alleged transfer of their bones by Odoric from the Indian city of Thana to one of the Franciscan settlements in southern China. This story occurs in almost all versions of Odoric´s travelogue, but it is missing in a few (except for a brief mention of the martyrdom of the four Franciscans). It seems that this passage, which incidentally, also considerably differs from the rest of the travelogue style, is a later addition, resulting from the influence of the emerging hagiographic tradition. My article presents the historical circumstances of the events that occured just prior to the arival of Odoric in Thana and their representation in the frescos in Udine. A constituent part of the article is a translation of a substantial part of this passage from Odoric´s travelogue, based on the Latin text of the unpublished manuscript XVII.E.2., held by the National Museum Library in Prague., Vladimír Liščák., and Obsahuje seznam literatury