The Riddle and the Knight: In Search of Sir John Mandeville

For hundreds of years the travels of Sir John Mandeville veered from inspirational to dubious. Some doubted the man's existence, never mind his travels. One man was able to muddy the waters by claiming that Sir John came from Liège rather than from England. Now the only potential proof of his existence is a barely visible inscription in St. Albans cathedral.Giles Milton wanted to see if he could prove that Sir John Mandeville had existed and whether he had travelled to the places that he claimed to have visited. To that end Milton visited various locations in the Near and Middle East. He also did a lot of research in the UK, comparing Mandeville's writing with that of other medieval travellers. What he found doesn't answer the riddle, but I didn't really expect it to. I won't talk about Milton's conclusions (spoilers!) but his journey to reach those conclusions is an interesting one. It was also interesting to read how Mandeville's writing inspired other travellers, including Christopher Columbus.A fair attempt to solve an unanswerable riddle.

after reading big chief elizabeth ,white gold and nathaniels nutmeg,which enthralled me i expected much the same from the riddle and the knight.alas i was disappointed.in fact the only part which interested me or stirred my imagination were the few passages regarding the "true "site of golgotha. frankly the rest bored me to tearsand seemed blighted by pages and pages of "filler" designed to lengthen the book. a very uninteresting book in my opinion and one that has made me very unlikely to purchase samurai william another of his books i intended to buy.

Before I read Giles Milton's book, I was not aware of Sir John Mandeville and his book about his travels. I thoroughly enjoyed reading the author's account of his researches and his journeys following different leads to explore in an attempt to shed some light on the enigma of this comparatively unknown medieval knight and the book he claimed to have written about his travels to the Middle East and beyond. An intriguing story worth reading.

I like Giles Milton as an author and an historian. He is not an intellectual snob and does not seek to complicate and confound the reader with abstruse concepts and jargon. He has the audacity to actually make his topics lively and interesting. So far I have read a bit of Nathaniel's Nutmeg, all of Samurai William but had to break off to finish some other books. I expect that whether Sir John's Riddle is fact or fiction it will be a good read, and infinitely better than staring at the television.

I really enjoyed this book. It looks into the life and adventures of sir john mandeville, and whether he did really go to the places he writes about in his medieval book. I enjoy the combination of travelogue and historical detective work and found some of the places giles visits fascinating.This book is a good, engrossing but easy read.