ABSTRACT
As one surveys the world of the earlier middle ages, one cannot fail to note the comparatively narrow area that was clear and familiar to Latin Christendom and how it was hemmed in on all sides by the mists of the unknown. Its western shores were bounded by the dangers of the unnavigable ocean, the north was closed with ice and the regions of perpetual darkness, to the east there lay the vast spaces of the steppes, dreaded as the lands whence again and again for 1,000 years there had surged forth devastating hordes of Scyths and Alans, Huns and Tartars to sweep down upon the peoples of Christendom with fire and sword. Only southward could men look out upon dangers that they understood from the lands of the infidel, but even there only the fringe of the Muslim lands was seen clearly, and beyond them again the haze closed down once more upon the torrid sands of the unknown desert. Civilized men seemed to live in the one bright spot in a shrouded world and, lacking knowledge, they imagined around them wonders of all kinds.
