“So get ready for a dose, my friend, and listen carefully, for these parables you will not hear again, neither in the fields of Serres, nor in the whole world. About the fat man, the beloved merchant, who found on the mountains the horrors of his life, or my poor grandfather, who one afternoon had his toe bitten by a cheeky dog. The Bulgarian shepherd they called Petko, who got entangled in lies and deceptions, or the poor Baruch, who schemed to avoid marriage, wanting to stay free. Let’s not forget, of course, Abrahambakina, who took on demons, even Diatano himself...”

Serres, 1695. A time when camels grazed close to the Egnatia and a thousand languages were still spoken at the markets, young scholar Kasim Hodja composes an intoxicated travelogue of the imagination, recording five stories told to him, in a complete stupor, by Gregory Koprinos, a deposed cleric. Seyahatnames, the travel literature of the Muslim world, full of unpublished tales, legends, and the secret observations of travelers.

[turk.seyahatname–s seyahatname(s) -é]