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4 unusual facts about Johann Schiltberger


Johann Schiltberger

At the Battle of Nicopolis on September 28, 1396, he was wounded and taken prisoner; when Schiltberger had recovered the use of his feet, Sultan Bayezid I (Ilderim) took him into his service as a runner (1396-1402).

After Timur's death (February 17, 1405) his German runner first became a slave of Shah Rukh, the ablest of Timur's sons; then of Miran Shah, a brother of Shah Rukh; then of Abu Bekr, a son of Miran Shah, whose camp roamed up and down Armenia.

On Bayezid's overthrow at the Battle of Ankara (July 20, 1402), Schiltberger passed into the service of Bayezid's conqueror Timur: he now appears to have followed Timur to Samarkand, and perhaps also to Armenia and Georgia.

Arriving at Constantinople, Schiltberger stayed in hiding there for a time; he then returned to his Bavarian home (1427) by way of Kilia, Akerman, Lemberg, Kraków, Breslau and Meissen.



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