In the year of Our Lord one thousand two hundred and forty-five, Friar John of the order of Minor Friars, and of Pian de Carpine, despatched by the Lord Pope to the Tartars in company with another friar, left Lyons in France, where the Pope was, on Easter day (16th April), and having arrived in Poland he took at Breslau a third friar of the same order, Benedict by name, a Pole by nationality, to be the companion of his labour and tribulations and to act as his interpreter. Through the assistance of Conrad, Duke of the Poles, they reached Kiew, a city of Ruscia, now under the dominion of the Tartars. The headman of the city gave them an escort for a distance of six days thence to the first camp of the Tartars, near the border of Comania.