Jean-Baptiste Tavernier (1605-1689) was a Flemish-French merchant, florist, and 17th-century traveler who gained fame for his accounts of six voyages to the East.
Tavernier began his first journey to the Ottoman Empire and Persia in 1631. He stayed in Constantinople for eleven months, awaiting a caravan to take him to Persia.
On his journey eastward, he visited Tokat, Erzurum, and Yerevan, eventually reaching Isfahan. He returned via Baghdad, Aleppo, Alexandretta, and Malta, arriving in Paris in 1633.
He undertook six more voyages until 1668, during which Tavernier traded in precious gems, selling them to the Eastern princes. In 1675, under the patronage of his benefactor Louis XIV, Tavernier published “Les Six Voyages de Jean-Baptiste Tavernier” (The Six Voyages of Jean-Baptiste Tavernier, 1676).
Despite confusion in the sequence of events and routes, this work served as a valuable guide for all merchant-travelers operating in the East and Asia. It contains a wealth of information about coins, weights and measures, the cost and prices of products, customs and commercial rules, and so on.
Tavernier was held in high regard in his country and received numerous honors from King Louis XIV.
Over forty years of travel, he covered approximately two hundred and forty thousand kilometers. Voltaire criticized him for remaining “more a merchant than a philosopher” until the end. Montesquieu extensively used Tavernier’s work for his “Persian Letters.”
Below are some of his illustrations from Armenia:
