ABSTRACT
The high rates of Christian pilgrimage and the explosion in pilgrimage literature from the eleventh to fifteenth century reflect, in some sense, the self-perception of the medieval European Christian, who saw himself as a wanderer in this world, a 'pilgrim toward a divine order'. Travel was a physical manifestation of this world view, a recognition that even in an age when nations were emerging all through Europe; the individual was defined by more than just his birthplace. Behind every travel account is the political situation that defines the Self of the writer. Christian travelers go from a world they control to a world they are trying to control but cannot. Jewish travelers travel between worlds that assign them different categories of Other, and Muslims travel mostly in lands under Muslim control, but in which Otherness is defined differently. Delays and alienation exited even for Muslims travelling within the Dar al-Ishm.
