Prester John

Legendary Christian prince. During the 12th and 13th centuries, Prester John was believed to be the ruler of a vast and powerful empire in the interior of Asia. From the 14th to the 16th century, he was generally believed to be the king of Abyssinia (now Ethiopia) in northeast Africa.

Reports of the prince appeared in the 12th century; he was first mentioned by the German historian Otto of Freising (c. 1111– 58), and a supposed letter from Prester John became a popular text. His message related the marvels of his realm, and its recipient was variously the Byzantine emperor, the pope, the Holy Roman Emperor, or the king of France; efforts were made by the popes to establish communication.

Prester John was also was represented as being a priest; it was said that kings owed him loyalty and service, yet he himself preferred the humbler title. The communities over which he reputedly ruled may have been those associated with the missionaries of Nestorianism, a Christian group which spread through Persia, China, Central Asia, and India after their expulsion from the Byzantine Empire in AD 431. The 13th-century Venetian traveller and writer Marco Polo reported the kingdom of Prester John, or of his successor George (sixth in line), in central Asia, but by the time of the Portuguese navigations in the 15th century, Prester John had become identified with the ruler of Ethiopia.