The Prester John Myth

Gone Medieval

History Hit

History

4.6 • 2.2K Ratings

🗓️ 14 January 2023

⏱️ 31 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Matt Lewis continues his Mystery Month on Gone Medieval with another tantalising enigma of the Middle Ages - the legendary figure of Prester John.

There’s a long history to the myth that “out there” in the east, a pious and noble Christian king ruled over a mighty kingdom — ﬁlled with strange beasts, fabulous wealth, and colossal buildings — who was prepared to lead his army to the defence of Christendom. But Prester John never showed up to help. Did he even exist? Matt examines the facts with Medieval era historian Dr. Nicholas Morton.

This episode was edited and produced by Rob Weinberg.

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1:33.2	Welcome to this episode of Gone Medieval. I'm Matt Lewis. It's mystery month here on Gone Medieval
1:38.2	and this one has cropped up a fair bit. It's one that lots of listeners have asked us to cover.
1:42.9	So here we are. Presta John is a name shrouded in mystery throughout the medieval period.
1:48.7	It pops up again and again without any sign of Presta John himself. So who was he or at least
1:55.0	who did people think he was? What did they make of his failure to arrive? Was the whole thing
2:00.5	a dangerous misunderstanding? Well to try and answer all of this and a bit more and
	...

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