Chartres, winter, 1325–1326

The forest had given way to rolling fields of stubbled grain. At noon Shasha said, “What’s that?” and they followed her pointing finger to the massive stone spires rising up from the horizon, as if to knock at the very doors of heaven itself. “That would be the cathedral,” Alaric said.

Chartres was a small, prosperous town clustered around its crowning glory, the cathedral, an immense and awe-inspiring edifice of stone surrounded by flying buttresses and surmounted with two towers in two different styles. The town around it bustled with inns and taverns, and shops selling everything from cockleshells to shards of the True Cross. One busy agent was organizing pilgrimages north to Notre Dame in Paris and south to Santiago de Compostela in Galicia, with a sideline in the same to Jerusalem, via Venice.

“I feel right at home,” Johanna said.

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Dana sez–

And so she should. Princess Cruises wasn’t in business back in 1325 but people were on the move every bit as much then as now. Here are some photos of the Seljuk Caravanserai on the way to Konya in Turkey. The caravanserai was built in 1229, although it does seem in awfully good shape to be that old. You should recognize it from the caravanserai the Wu family stayed in in Kashgar after they found Jaufre.

Top is the exterior. Bottom left is the inner courtyard, bottom middle is inside those arches where caravaners could eat and sleep under cover, and bottom right is the latrine, through which water constantly ran to carry away your waste.

1229. The year of the Sixth Crusade. Which means it would only have been a hundred years old at the time of this novel.

Here’s the 411 on this caravansarai.

Book Review Monday Chatter caravanserai Chartres historical romance marco polo medieval tourism Silk and Song silk road