chapter 67

, it is named “Bothan”. Neumann suggests that for “Kathon” we should read Gori; Professor Bruun is of opinion that Batoum is intended, and Hammer (_Denkschr. d. Kön. Akad. d. Wissensch._, ix) thinks that “Kathon” should be Kargwel or Karduel, and “Bothan”, Cotaïs; but it may fairly be inferred from Schiltberger’s account, that this “Kathon” or “Bothan”, as it also appears in the editions of 1475 (?), 1549, and 1814, stands for Poti. In both chapters, the author speaks of the chief town of “Megral”, “Magrill”—Mingrelia—as being situated on the Black Sea, and says that on leaving it, he rode along the sea-shore until he reached a mountainous country. Poti, the ancient Phasis, a place of importance from the most remote times, lays in an unexceptionably flat country, from which it would have been necessary for Schiltberger, who was effecting his escape and must therefore have been travelling south, to ride fully ten miles by the sea-side, before he could have reached a highland. Gori and Koutaïs, being inland towns, are quite out of the question, and had the author got to Batoum, he would already have been in a mountainous country, and need not have described his ride before attaining it. I cannot find any record that Batoum, situated in Lazistan, formerly included in Colchis, ever formed part of the principality of Mingrelia.—ED.

(10.) “Merdin”.—With the exception of the citadel, which remained in the hands of a prince of the Ortok dynasty, this place, formerly a chief town of Mesopotamia, had to submit, with many others, to the yoke of Timour. Upon the death of the conqueror, his heir, afterwards assassinated by Kara Yelek, called to his assistance Kara Youssouf, chief of the Turkomans of the Black Sheep, and gave to him Mardin, in exchange for Mosoul, where he was poisoned. His son transferred the royal residence to Sindjar, and died of the plague in the year 814 of the Hegira. These were the last members of the Ortok dynasty, which reigned three hundred years.—BRUUN.

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