Lanua described Trakai as follows: 'After leaving Vilnius, I turned to Prussia and took the road that led through the Duchy of Lithuania. First, I reached a very large Lithuanian town called Trakai, poorly settled with only wooden houses and completely unfenced. <...> There are many Tatars in Trakai and the surrounding villages who live in tribes, who are true Saracens, completely ignorant of the faith of Jesus Christ, and who have their own separate language, called Tatar. There are Germans, Lithuanians, Russians, and a very large number of Jews living in that town. Each of these tribes has its own distinct language. Trakai belongs to the duke Vytautas. It is seven miles away from Vilnius. The aforesaid ruler of Lithuania, Vytautas, considers an honourable thing that no stranger coming to his land or passing through it should bear any expense. The above-mentioned Vytautas is a very powerful duke, for he defeated twelve or thirteen kingdoms and countries by force of arms. Altogether, he has ten thousand saddled horses of his own. There is a fenced menagerie in Trakai. It contains all kinds of wild beasts and game that breed in the forests, such as wild bulls, called aurochsen and large horses, called mules, and other animals, called elks. There are wild horses, bears, wild boars, deer and other animals there."
Gilbert de Lanua visited Duke Vytautas. "Vytautas also welcomed the Ambassador with a grand honor and a delicious feast. Three times he served him dinner at his table, the Duchess herself was seated there. During the course of one of the dinners, two legations came to Vytautas - one from Bolshoi Novgorod, the other from the "kingdom" of Pskov and presented him with wonderful gifts. Those envoys kissed the ground in front of Vytautas' table and displayed pigskins, silk clothes, furs, at least sixty kinds in all. The departing ambassador Vytautas presented with two silk robes lined with sable skins, four silk garments, a team of four horses, four hoods of his own livery, embroidered head-dresses, four pairs of Russian tassets, a Tartar bow with a quiver and arrows.
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