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Robert Curzon
Visits to Monasteries in the Levant
Published by Good Press, 2021
EAN 4057664580719
Table of Contents
PART I.
CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XII.
PART II.
JERUSALEM AND THE MONASTERY OF ST. SABBA. 1834.
PART III.
PART IV.
THE MONASTERIES OF MOUNT ATHOS.
PREFACE.
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In presenting to the public another book of travels in the East, when it is already overwhelmed with little volumes about palm-trees and camels, and reflections on the Pyramids, I am aware that I am committing an act which requires some better excuse for so unwarrantable an intrusion on the patience of the reader than any that I am able to offer.
The origin of these pages is as follows:—I was staying by myself in an old country-house belonging to my family, but not often inhabited by them, and, having nothing to do in the evening, I looked about for some occupation to amuse the passing hours. In the room where I was sitting there was a large book-case full of ancient manuscripts, many of which had been collected by myself, in various out-of-the-way places, in different parts of the world. Taking some of these ponderous volumes from their shelves, I turned over their wide vellum leaves, and admired the antiquity of one, and the gold and azure which gleamed upon the pages of another. The sight of these books brought before my mind many scenes and recollections of the countries from which they came, and I said to myself, I know what I will do; I will write down some account of the most curious of these manuscripts, and the places in which they were found, as well as some of the adventures which I encountered in the pursuit of my venerable game.
I sat down accordingly, and in a short time accumulated a heap of papers connected more or less with the history of the ancient manuscripts; at the desire of some of my friends I selected the following pages, and it is with great diffidence that I present them to the public. If they have any merits whatever, these must consist in their containing descriptions of localities but seldom visited in modern times; or