(Much Ado About Nothing 2.1.259-63)

In the Middle Ages, the name of Prester John was a byword for the exotic far east, for an empire at the outer limits of the known world. It conjured up an image in the medieval mind of a celebrated monarch who held sway over a vast multitude of loyal subjects, of a palace of immense splendor overflowing with riches and of a country teeming with marvelous beings. More compelling that the tales of grandeur was the idea that Prester John, a powerful king with an impressive empire, was in fact a Christian.

The origin of the myth of Prester John is unknown. Various theories have been proclaimed, including the idea that it was the 'three wise men' from the gospel of St Matthew that had led to the wide spread belief in the existence of Christian priest-kings ruling in the Orient. Nevertheless, in 1165 a letter purporting to come from Prester John began circulating in Europe. It was addressed to Manuel Comnenus, Emperor of Byzantium and in it Prester John claims to rule over the Three Indies, a territory which he explains runs from the Tower of Babel to the place where the sun rises. He announces his intention of defeating the enemies of Christ and tells of his great treasures and the many marvels of his kingdom. It is not surprising then, especially after the defeat of the Crusading armies, that Europeans would want to contact this glorious Christian leader and that travelers to the east, both mercantile and missionary, would search for the kingdom of Prester John.

In 1271 young Marco Polo traveled across the Asian continent to China in the company of his father and uncle who were Venetian merchants. They journeyed extensively in Asia and for the next 20 years they worked for the Great Khan. The Travels of Marco Polo owes its existence to the fact that Polo fought with the Venetian army against the Genoese soon after his return to Italy and was captured in battle. In prison in 1298 he dictated the story of his travels to a fellow inmate, who was a romance writer.

The first reference to Prester John is made quite early in The Travels and it is clear from the outset that he does not correspond with the figure of popular myth. Marco Polo clearly identifies the famous priest-king with an Asian warlord who had ruled over the Tartars as he writes, "(the Tartars) were actually tributary to a great lord who was called in their language Ung Khan, which simply means Great Lord. This was that Prester John, of whose empire all the world speaks." Far from being the savior of Western Christians, Prester John is an arrogant overlord whose disdain for his subjects is in sharp contrast with the honourable Chinghiz Khan, who is the hero of the story. Chinghiz Khan's request for a marriage alliance between the two rulers is scornfully received, which in turn leads to war. Polo has conceited Prester John dismiss out of hand the threat posed by the Khan, declaring that his foes were "men of no prowess" and that in the unlikely event of Chinghiz arriving to fight " he would be seized and put to an evil death". The Khan did arrive and after a great battle Prester John was slain.

It is clear from The Travels that Marco Polo attributed a historical Asian personage with the promulgation of the Prester John myth. The events he recounts supposedly concerning Prester John were actually an account of Chinghiz Khan's overthrow of his one time ally, Wang Khan, alternatively known as Ung Khan, a story that is found in the earlier narratives of the missionaries John of Joinville and William of Rubruck. What is not clear is why Polo made the connection between Wang Khan and Prester John. As depicted by Polo, this Prester John has no treasures or a menagerie of curious beasts, in fact it is only when we meet Prester John for a second time that we learn he is Christian. But far from ruling over a glorious empire, this Prester John, who is in fact the sixth ruler to bear the title, has the personal name of George and holds all his land as a vassal of the Great Khan. It seems Marco Polo has combined the tale of the historical Tartar Wang Khan with contemporary accounts of a Christian community in Asia, which results in the garbled account of the hereditary priest-kings who are subject to the Great Khan and take Prester John as a honorific title on being crowned.

Marco Polo's Prester John, that is the original ruler of the large empire alternatively known as Ung Khan, is a cruel tyrant whose greed for power knows no bounds. Such is revealed by the incident concerning a rebellious vassal of Prester John's called the Golden King. With the help of seven henchmen, who went to serve at court of the Golden King, Prester John pursued him for two years. The king was finally brought before the emperor alive and forced to become a cowherd "in order to humiliate him and to show him that he was nothing". This he did for two years and after being questioned on his loyalty and faithfulness to Prester John, he was let go.

It is clear then that the figure of Prester John as represented in The Travels of Marco Polo has nothing in common with the popular conception of the priest-king, with his strong Christian Empire and fabulous riches nowhere to be found. Instead, Polo's Prester John is an arrogant overlord whose main function in the narrative is to serve as a contrast to his depiction of the Great Khan.

In stark comparison is the portrait of Prester John from the pages of the popular mid-fourteenth century narrative, Mandeville's Travels. The purpose of the work, as stated in the prologue, is to encourage the Christian population to reclaim Jerusalem. Mandeville chides the monarchs of Europe for the poor example they set for their subjects. It is only through a lack of good leadership that the Holy City has not been won. The "pride, envy and covetousness" of the Christian lords is the reason for the failure of the Crusades, and "that they are more busy to disinherit their neighbours than to lay claim to or conquer their own rightful inheritance". In Mandeville's Travels Prester John is depicted as an ideal monarch, a priest-king who is both authoritative and pious, a figure whom the crowned heads of Europe should strive to emulate.

Prester John makes his first appearance approaching the conclusion of the book, as is appropriate for a man who rules the land at the edge of the known world. Mandeville, who calls him the Emperor of India, remarks that people do not travel to his lands very often because of the extreme length of the journey. To travel to the country of Great Khan takes many months and the land of Prester John "is many days journey further". In line the Marco Polo's account, Mandeville reports that the Great Khan and Prester John are allied through marriage. This is the only fact, apart from both being of the same religious persuasion, which the two representations of Prester John have in common.

Mandeville's Prester John fulfills all the criteria as put forward in the letter of 1165. His country is full of marvels. There are birds that talk like men, a sea of gravel that ebbs and flows like a body of water and from which tasty fish are caught and in the wilderness live wild men who possess horns on their heads. His land too is a land of great treasures. In the emperor's territory, which is called Pentoxere, a variety of precious stones are found, some so big that dishes and the like are made from them. In fact a river that stems from Paradise flows, not with water but with precious stones. Prester John's sumptuous palace at Susa is the epitome of opulence.

The detailed account of the wealth of Prester John is not without purpose. Even though his riches pale in comparison with those of the Great Khan, by European standards the emperor possessed a massive fortune. It is Prester John's humility, even in the face of such great wealth that is the lesson to the monarchs of western Europe. When he rides around his country with his retinue in times of peace, he has carried before him two large gold plates. One plate is full of precious stones that signify his power and affluence, the other is full of dirt, "a token that notwithstanding his great nobleness and power he came from the earth and to the earth he shall return". If Prester John, a man of so much wealth and power is not full of pride but is forever conscious of his mortality, how much easier for other kings who had but a fraction his money and authority.

It was not only through symbolic actions that Prester John proved his temperance. In comparison to the representation of Prester John found in The Travels of Marco Polo, who is depicted as a power hunger tyrant with little self restraint, in Mandeville's narrative the priest-king's life is ruled by abstinence. He and his company eat only once a day and Mandeville adds that even though there are sometimes over 30 000 people eating at one sitting, they consume only as much as 12 000 Europeans. Prester John does not live a debauched life populated with concubines. Even though he has more than one wife, he sleeps with them only on four set occasions during the year, and then it is strictly for the purpose of procreation. In fact the great Emperor named himself Prester John, or Priest John, after observing an ordination service for priests, which the men of the church undertook with such devotion that he wanted to be associated with them. He took the name of John, the first priest that came out of the church.

The figure of Prester John serves a different purpose in the two narratives. In the basically factual Travels of Marco Polo he fills a void in the story. Of the two authors is it probably Polo, whose description does much to tarnish the image of Prester John, that actually believed in the famous emperor's existence. When Polo traveled to Asia he would have been expected to find the priest king and his empire. Of course Polo did not, but identified him with the person of Ung Khan. Thus tales of Ung Khan's exploits became stories of Prester John. He is cruel power hungry tyrant who is in contrast with the Great Khan. In Mandeville's Travels Prester John is also used to illuminate the power of the Great Khan but as we have seen, the motif of Prester John was primarily used by the author to project his ideas about the ideal king, a man of nobility, virtue and abstinence regardless of his wealth or power. No longer able to dwell in Asia after the journey of Marco Polo and his family, Prester John is transferred to India, where he dwells in a splendid palace amid many marvels. The myth of Prester John did not die with The Travels and Mandeville's Travels but continued to fascinate the population of Europe for hundreds of years.