Random Spectacular: The Travels of Sir John Mandeville, #4

Random Spectacular: The Travels of Sir John Mandeville, #4

Some months back I was asked by St Jude's (http://www.stjudesprints.co.uk/products/random-spectacular) to contribute to their forthcoming publication, Random Spectacular (http://randomspectacular.co.uk/), which was printed this week. And immediately sold out!

The brief: Anything, learned and lushly illustrated. I chose as my subject matter the Travels of Sir John Mandeville, the fantastical (and quite possibly fictional) account of a 14th Century English knight's journeys across the known world. On his way he encounters relics of Christ, the daughter of Hippocrates turned into a dragon, Sciapods, the bones of giants, enormous flesh-eating ants (pismires) hoarding mountains of gold, the Great Khan of Cathay, the Fountain of Youth (from which he drank), the Trees of the Sun and Moon (who foretold the death of Alexander the Great),the Vale Perilous and the Great Sultan of Araby, amongst many, many other wonders.

Here are four details of Page 4 (4 pages in toto). Where-ever possible I have used the names for people and places as described by Mandeville - Polainie for Poland, Cressy for Greece, Liban for Lebanon, &c., &c..