The Secret History of the Mongol Queens - Jack Weatherford [139]
It is quite understandable that Columbus did not know the name of the Mongol monarch for whom he was searching when he sailed to America; he lived in an era of limited knowledge of an unknown world. Today we have the opportunity to know what he did not, to fill in the story that eluded Chaucer.
Amid the carefully censored documents, the conveniently lost manuscripts, and the frustratingly unfinished poems, the answers to a gripping mystery still wait to be slowly dug out again. Like the archaeologist collecting fragments from an ancient, broken mosaic, we may recover only a portion of the original portrait, but even in the faded colors of the chipped pieces we ascertain a glorious image of our history that tells us more about who we are today by seeing who they were then. We may never find the undelivered letter that Columbus carried on his momentous voyage, but it is never too late in history to fill in a missing name.
Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia
Year of the Ox, 2009
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