Никколо де Конти: Итальян саяхатшысы мен жазушысының өмірі мен саяхаттары

Italian merchant, explorer, and writer

Niccolò de' Conti ( 1395 – 1469) was an Italian merchant, explorer, and writer. Born in Chioggia, he traveled to India and Southeast Asia, and possibly to Southern China, during the early 15th century. He was one of the sources used to create the 1450 Fra Mauro map, which indicated that there was a sea route from Europe around Africa to India. De' Conti departed from Venice around 1419 and established himself in Damascus, Syria, where he studied Arabic. Over a period of 25 years, his familiarity with the languages and cultures of the Islamic world enabled him to travel to many places on ships owned by Islamic merchants. De' Conti's travels followed the period of Timurid relations with Europe. They also occurred around the same time and in the same places as the Chinese expeditions of Admiral Zheng He. His accounts are contemporary, and fairly consistent with those of the Chinese writers who were on Zheng He's ships, such as Ma Huan (writing in 1433) and Fei Xin (writing in about 1436).

After the return of Marco Polo in 1295, there is no record of Italian traders returning from China until the return of de' Conti by sea in 1439. The only exception are the travel accounts by Franciscan friar Odoricus Mattiuzzi (1286 1331) from Friuli, who in 1310 visited Armenia, Mesopotamia, Persia, Ceylon (Sri Lanka), Sumatra, Java, Cambodia, Champa and China. De' Conti first crossed the desert to reach Baghdad and from there sailed down the Tigris to Basra. He then sailed through the Persian Gulf and went to Iran where he learnt Persian. He then crossed the Arabian sea to Cambay, in Gujarat. He travelled in India to "Pacamuria", "Helly" and Vijayanagar, capital of the Deccan before 1420. It was in India that he coined the phrase 'Italian of the East' to refer to the Telugu language, which he found had words ending with vowels, similar to Italian. He went to "Maliapur" on the east coast of India (probably modern day Mylapore, in Chennai), where he visited the tomb of St. Thomas, who in Christian tradition is recorded to have founded a Christian community there. Around 1421, de' Conti crossed to "Pedir" in northern Sumatra, where he spent a year, gaining local knowledge, particularly on the gold and spice trade. (This was the period of fairly intensive contact between Sumatra and China, thanks in particular to the voyages of Zheng He.) He then continued after sailing 16 days to Tenasserim on the Malay Peninsula. He then sailed to the mouth of the Ganges, visited Sonargaon and Chittagong (in modern Bangladesh) and then went overland to Arakan (now Rakhine State, Burma). After traveling through Burma, he left for Java where he spent nine months, before going to Champa (in modern Vietnam). De' Conti described South East Asia as "exceeding all other regions in wealth, culture and magnificence, and abreast of Italy in civilization". and thence, in company with Pedro, to Cairo. Throughout his travels, he was accompanied by his family. However his wife, whom he had met in India, and two of his four children died in Egypt during an epidemic. He continued to Italy with his remaining children. de' Conti returned to Venice in 1444, where he remained as a respected merchant.

The first printed edition of de' Conti's account was made in 1492 in the original Latin by Cristoforo da Bollate and dedicated to Pietro Cara, who was going on a journey to India. Various translations followed, into Portuguese (1502) and Spanish (1503). The first Italian language edition appears to have been translated from the Portuguese edition, and was made a part of the collection of travellers' accounts published in 1550 by Giovanni Battista Ramusio. The first English edition was translated from the Spanish, and printed in 1579 by John Frampton, using a combination of Marco Polo's and de Conti's narrations.