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Of all the things described in William of Rubruck's account of his travels through 13th-century Asia, perhaps none is so striking as the remarkably ornate fountain he encountered in the Mongol capital which — complete with silver fruit and an angelic automaton — flowed with various alcoholic drinks for the grandson of Genghis Khan and guests. Devon Field explores how this Silver Tree of Karakorum became a potent symbol, not only of the Mongol Empire's imperial might, but also its downfall.

Detail from an image of Möngke Khan's fountain, based on the depiction, featured below, from Pierre de Bergeron's Voyages faits principalement en Asie (1735) — Source.

B y the time Friar William of Rubruck arrived at the camp of Möngke Khan in the last days of 1253, he had pushed his body to its breaking point. The trip from Acre had taken him by way of Constantinople, across the Black Sea, and then on a punishing overland journey featuring extreme cold, a demon-haunted pass, and little enough food that his travel-companion, Bartolomeo of Cremona, had been close to tears, exclaiming “It seems to me I shall never get anything to eat”.1 And then there had been the Mongols themselves. Passing into their territory was like passing “through one of the gates of hell”, and leaving their presence comparable to escaping “the midst of devils”.2 Safe to say that the Mongols seemed quite alien to this Flemish friar.

William grumbled at their (in his view) incurable greed, commented repeatedly on his distaste for the women's noses, and spoke of the foolishness of their religion. Though in many ways a clever traveller and, despite this xenophobia, an at times astute observer, he was in other ways a fish out of water, even going about at first in bare feet on the frozen winter ground. But not everything was so unfamiliar, so strange to him.

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