Buscarello de Ghizolfi and Family

Yesterday's post mentioned Buscarello de Ghizolfi, a man from Genoa who served a few Mongol leaders as their ambassador to Europe, speaking to kings of France and England and others to suggest an alliance. The alliance was to cooperate against the growing threat of Islam. (That goal was never realized.)

Buscarello was part of a Jewish family of merchants who were prominent in the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance. Prior to going to Persia to serve in the Ilkhanate, we see mentions of Buscarello in 1274 where he is involved with arming a galley (the city-states of Italy were frequently at odds with each other as well as non-Italians; note the Genoese-Venetian war that Marco Polo was involved in).

A few years later, he and his brothers are known to be in Cilician Armenia, which is likely where he came to the attention of Mongol leadership. He joined Arghun Khan of the Ilkhanate as an officer, and eventually was named ambassador. He carried out several diplomatic missions for Arghun and his sons, Ghazan and Öljaitü (The illustration is a letter from Öljaitü to Philip IV of France). He even named his son "Argone," after Arghun.

One journey involved Buscarello's nephew, Corrado de Ghizolfi, going ahead to request safe passage for an embassy to Iran.

Buscarello drops out of the public record by 1317. The family remained active in the Black Sea as part of Genoese trade. In 1419, Simeone de Ghisolfi married Bikhakhanim, a princess of Tmutarakan, a medieval principality of Kievan Rus. The translation of her name suggests that she was a descendant of Genghis Khan. Simeone became ruler of Tmutarakan through this marriage. As late as 1482 a descendant, Zacharias de Ghizolfi, was still ruling there.

This gave Genoa a lot of influence on the Black Sea. Genoa, as mentioned above, was a significant rival of Venice for control of maritime trade. Let's look at it's history next time.