The date is September 16, 1636. After an exhausting voyage down the Volga, our ambassadors are anchored off the Russian city of Astrakhan, and Paul Fleming is writing a 200-line poetic monument to his friend and fellow poet, Adam Olearius.

He relates how he and Olearius are wont to go down to the edge of the Caspian to contemplate the tempestuous sea, describing its fury and the events that culminated in the Baltic shipwreck described in Episode 4. And he exclaims that he wishes all his unhappiness had been destroyed and sunk to the bottom of the sea in the storm.

Olearius measures the city at 8,000 feet in circumference, and the side towards the river at 2,216 feet across. He says the city “affords a pleasant prospect, by reason of the great number of turrets and steeples of stone, which look very delightful at a distance.” The houses are made of wood and not well built, and thus the city is not so beautiful when viewed up close.

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