Ruy Gonzalez De Clavijo Essay

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Ruy Gonzalez de Clavijo (d. 1412) was a Castilian traveler and writer, who was sent to the court of Timur as an ambassador by the ruler of Castile (Spain) Enrique III. Clavijo wrote about the land of Timurids at the peak of its glory and diligence of Timur to embellish his capital. Clavijo’s travelogue shows to the audience Samarqand as the city, which is in a constant cycle of construction and Timur, as a diligent, perfectionist ruler, so, this can be seen from the following excerpt: “The Mosque which Timur had caused to be built to the memory of the mother of his wife... seemed to us to be the noblest of all we visited in the city of Samarkand, but no sooner had it been completed than he began to find fault with its entrance gateway, which he now said was much too low and must be pulled down”.
The purpose of this embassy and journal probably was to familiarize with one of the most “abundant and noblest” capitals of East to Enrique III, who had a favorable view of Timurids and wanted to extend the diplomatic relations of Spain to the remotest parts of the World.
This journal is sufficiently reliable, because, firstly, the audience …show more content…

To my mind the importance of the text lies in the political activities of Timur. He was one of the key figures of that time and he was truly an outstanding politician. Only the fact that Clavijo did a very long trip just to meet Timur shows his influence and importance in the world arena. A good reputation of Timur can also be seen from this very sentence: Timur “carried off the best men of the population to people Samarqand, bringing thither together the master-craftsmen of all nations”. So, the curiosity of Western powers like Spain to get familiar with Timur as a politician, and his remarkable political strategies described by an ambassador Clavijo show that the most essential aspects of this work for me as a history student are Timur’s methods of ruling and political

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