Talk:Rabban Bar Sauma

Uyghur
Is the claim Sauma was Uyghur really substantiated? A (http://chass.colostate-pueblo.edu/history/seminar/sauma.htm) seminar page at Colorado State says he was a Onggud Turk, which was a Turkic tribal confederation formed in Southern Mongolia - which the Uyghurs had left already. (http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9013252) Encyclopedia Brittanica says he was descended from "nomadic Uighurs", which frankly sounds odd as Uyghur people then as now were sedentary agrarians, not nomads. Anyhow, not that he couldn't have been, but wondering how that was sourced. Also, there is a book by Morris Rossabi called "Voyager from Xanadu" that centers on Rabban Bar Sauma.

Chinese origin
Is this fellow known in China, and would anyone know what Characters would be used to write his name?

Here: 拉賓掃務瑪 PHG 02:28, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

At the end of this article, it says that Rabban Bar Sauma travelled to Europe "immediately prior" to the journey of Marco Polo. However, the article indicates that Bar Sauma made his journey in the 1280's, while Marco Polo arrived in China a decade earlier. Can anyone clear this up for me?

KidBohemia 14:47, 1 October 2007 (UTC)


 * I think it should be "prior to the return of Marco Polo in Europe". Regards. PHG 20:02, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

"Mongolian Chinese" is nonsense
Just Rabban Bar Sawma he may have spent some years of his life under Yuan dynasty (unfortunately the article does not give the year when he started his journey) does not mean he is "Mongolian Chinese" any more than Roman Ungern von Sternberg would be "Austrian Soviet". Rabban Bar Sawma was of either Uighur or Onggut origin, and he seems to have spent the more important parts of his career in the service of the Il-Khans. Yaan 10:10, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * He was born in Yuan Dynasty Beijing, and was from one of the Mongol Chinese tribes - that makes him Chinse in my book. He doesn't have to be Han to be Chinese - let's not confuse the two. Uighurs are Chinese too. InfernoXV 10:43, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Sorry, the birthplace is not the most important part of someone's identity. And maybe you shoul d look up your Chinese history again. Finally, just because you consider Mongols to be Chinese doesn't mean Mongols back then considered themselves Chinese. Yaan 10:53, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * In any case, I fail to see how the fact that he is/might be claimed by the Chinese now is of any relevance to the introduction. He became known as agent of the Il-Khanids, who clearly had nothing to do with China. Yaan 11:02, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * P.S. Uighurs submitted to the Mongols in 1209, long before the idea that the Mongol state would split up and a part transform into a Chinese dynasty was even remotely fathomable.Yaan 11:04, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * How about this - a little note saying that the precise definition of his ethnicity is disputed? We've both seen a fair amount of serious academic literature out there claiming him as Mongol Chinese. This seems the fairest and most peaceful way out of this. InfernoXV 11:09, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * The definition of his ethnicity is not disputed at all. He is either Onggut or Uighur, both of which can be fairly enough subsumed under the term Mongol. Tatar might also be good if it wasn't so ambigous. Yaan 11:16, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * Btw. I don't think we omit anything substantial if we just call him Mongol. readers who think that everybody who was ever born in Beijing is Chinese can infer his Chinese-ness from the second sentence of the intro. Readers who think that Mongols are per se Chinese don't even need to read that far. If there are other reasons for considering him Chinese (first language? adherence to Confucian values ;) ? etc.) they should be mentioned in the article. Until then, I can't see any serious dispute. In any case, what he is notable for is being an agent of the Mongol rulers of Iran, not for anything related to China or even Yuan dynasty. Yaan 12:14, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Fair enough, but one of the things he's known for is being a Christian monastic from what is now China, so on so on second thoughts, the reference to being born in China works for me. InfernoXV 14:36, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * What about the current version? It's not perfect because people might understand "diplomat from China" when AFAIK he became diplomat only in the middle east, but I don't know how to do better. The reference for the birth date is Weiers et.al., Die Mongolen, Beiträge zu ihrer Geschichte und Kultur, Darmstadt 1986, but it's the same date as all over the internet except Wikipedia (actually, in the book its between 1220 and 1230). They give his ethnicity as Uighur from an Onggut area. Yaan 16:45, 11 October 2007 (UTC)
 * And just out of interest, what about the Chinese sources on him? Are there any old sources on him, or are they all recent? Yaan 16:52, 11 October 2007 (UTC)


 * Jeez! Just one glance at this discussion board and I still can't believe people are debating about something like this.  All these talk are pure garbage in my view, and quite nationalistic as well.  The creator of this article, PHG originally wrote that this fellow was an ethnic "Mongolian" Chinese diplomat, probably based on his references.  And now here are these people gets all hang up about the specific ethnicity of it all.   It just seems a tad ridiculous.  Plus, all of these re-writing doesn't mean he was indeed of Chinese or Mongolian or any other ethnicities, and this article also points out that contemporaneous Chinese records (and Britannica) indictates that he is of Turkic origin.  It shows you how irrelevant these debates are.--TheLeopard (talk) 05:42, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

"While still young"
I think the sentence is a bit confusing and probably a result of the formerly wrongly given birthdate. He was born between 1220 and 1230. According to the History of the Life and Travels of Rabban Bar Sawma it was Markos, who had been born in 1245, who persuaded him to set out on the journey. So, if we assume that Markos at that time was at least 15 years old that would make Rabban Bar Sawma at least 30. However, the History makes them say "It is a long time since we put on the garb of the monastic life", so he may as well have been older. Are there any documents on when exactly he set out, or at least on when he arrived in Iran? Yaan 17:13, 11 October 2007 (UTC)

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"Europeans communicated to him in Persian"
The article says that "Europeans communicated to him in Persian," but did all the various Italian, French, and English kings, nobles, and clergymen actually speak Persian in the 13th century? That seems very unlikely. This should be clarified in the article. 173.88.246.138 (talk) 22:12, 31 December 2020 (UTC)

To add to article
To add to this article: in which language Sauma wrote his memoirs. 173.88.246.138 (talk) 22:29, 31 December 2020 (UTC)