The Travels of Marco Polo, by Marco Polo and Rustichello of

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THE BOOK OF MARCO POLO.

PROLOGUE.

Great Princes, Emperors, and Kings, Dukes and Marquises, Counts, Knights, and Burgesses! and People of all degrees who desire to get knowledge of the various races of mankind and of the diversities of the sundry regions of the World, take this Book and cause it to be read to you. For ye shall find therein all kinds of wonderful things, and the divers histories of the Great Hermenia, and of Persia, and of the Land of the Tartars, and of India, and of many another country of which our Book doth speak, particularly and in regular succession, according to the description of Messer Marco Polo, a wise and noble citizen of Venice, as he saw them with his own eyes. Some things indeed there be therein which he beheld not; but these he heard from men of credit and veracity. And we shall set down things seen as seen, and things heard as heard only, so that no jot of falsehood may mar the truth of our Book, and that all who shall read it or hear it read may put full faith in the truth of all its contents.

For let me tell you that since our Lord God did mould with his hands our first Father Adam, even until this day, never hath there been Christian, or Pagan, or Tartar, or Indian, or any man of any nation, who in his own person hath had so much knowledge and experience of the divers parts of the World and its Wonders as hath had this Messer Marco! And for that reason he bethought himself that it would be a very great pity did he not cause to be put in writing all the great marvels that he had seen, or on sure information heard of, so that other people who had not these advantages might, by his Book, get such knowledge. And I may tell you that in acquiring this knowledge he spent in those various parts of the World good six-and-twenty years. Now, being thereafter an inmate of the Prison at Genoa, he caused Messer Rusticiano of Pisa, who was in the said Prison likewise, to reduce the whole to writing; and this befell in the year 1298 from the birth of Jesus.

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CHAPTER I. HOW THE TWO BROTHERS POLO SET FORTH FROM CONSTANTINOPLE TO TRAVERSE THE WORLD.

It came to pass in the year of Christ 1260, when Baldwin was reigning at Constantinople,[NOTE 1] that Messer Nicolas Polo, the father of my lord Mark, and Messer Maffeo Polo, the brother of Messer Nicolas, were at the said city of CONSTANTINOPLE, whither they had gone from Venice with their merchants' wares. Now these two Brethren, men singularly noble, wise, and provident, took counsel together to cross the GREATER SEA on a venture of trade; so they laid in a store of jewels and set forth from Constantinople, crossing the Sea to SOLDAIA.[NOTE 2]

NOTE 1.—Baldwin II (de Courtenay), the last Latin Emperor of Constantinople, reigned from 1237 to 1261, when he was expelled by Michael Palaeologus.

The date in the text is, as we see, that of the Brothers' voyage across the Black Sea. It stands 1250 in all the chief texts. But the figure is certainly wrong. We shall see that, when the Brothers return to Venice in 1269, they find Mark, who, according to Ramusio's version, was born after their departure, a lad of fifteen. Hence, if we rely on Ramusio, they must have left Venice about 1253-54. And we shall see also that they reached the Volga in 1261. Hence their start from Constantinople may well have occurred in 1260, and this I have adopted as the most probable correction. Where they spent the interval between 1254 (if they really left Venice so early) and 1260, nowhere appears. But as their brother, Mark the Elder, in his Will styles himself "whilom of Constantinople," their headquarters were probably there.

[Illustration: Castle of Soldaia or Sudak]

NOTE 2.—In the Middle Ages the Euxine was frequently called Mare Magnum or Majus. Thus Chaucer:—

"In the GRETE SEE,
At many a noble Armee hadde he be."

The term Black Sea (Mare Maurum v. Nigrum) was, however, in use, and Abulfeda says it was general in his day. That name has been alleged to appear as early as the 10th century, in the form [Greek: Skoteinae], "The Dark Sea"; but an examination of the passage cited, from Constantine Porphyrogenitus, shows that it refers rather to the Baltic, whilst that author elsewhere calls the Euxine simply Pontus. (Reinaud's Abulf. I. 38, Const. Porph. De Adm. Imp. c. 31, c. 42.)

+ Sodaya, Soldaia, or Soldachia, called by Orientals Súdak, stands on the S.E. coast of the Crimea, west of Kaffa. It had belonged to the Greek Empire, and had a considerable Greek population. After the Frank conquest of 1204 it apparently fell to Trebizond. It was taken by the Mongols in 1223 for the first time, and a second time in 1239, and during that century was the great port of intercourse with what is now Russia. At an uncertain date, but about the middle of the century, the Venetians established a factory there, which in 1287 became the seat of a consul. In 1323 we find Pope John XXII. complaining to Uzbek Khan of Sarai that the Christians had been ejected from Soldaia and their churches turned into mosques. Ibn Batuta, who alludes to this strife, counts Sudak as one of the four great ports of the World. The Genoese got Soldaia in 1365 and built strong defences, still to be seen. Kaffa, with a good anchorage, in the 14th century, and later on Tana, took the place of Soldaia as chief emporium in South Russia. Some of the Arab Geographers call the Sea of Azov the Sea of Sudak.

The Elder Marco Polo in his Will (1280) bequeaths to the Franciscan Friars of the place a house of his in Soldachia, reserving life occupation to his own son and daughter, then residing in it. Probably this establishment already existed when the two Brothers went thither. (Elie de Laprimaudare, passim; Gold. Horde, 87; Mosheim, App. 148; Ibn Bat. I. 28, II. 414; Cathay, 231-33; Heyd, II. passim.)

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CHAPTER II. HOW THE TWO BROTHERS WENT ON BEYOND SOLDAIA.

Having stayed a while at Soldaia, they considered the matter, and thought it well to extend their journey further. So they set forth from Soldaia and travelled till they came to the Court of a certain Tartar Prince, BARCA KAAN by name, whose residences were at SARA[NOTE 1] and at BOLGARA [and who was esteemed one of the most liberal and courteous Princes that ever was among the Tartars.][NOTE 2] This Barca was delighted at the arrival of the Two Brothers, and treated them with great honour; so they presented to him the whole of the jewels that they had brought with them. The Prince was highly pleased with these, and accepted the offering most graciously, causing the Brothers to receive at least twice its value.

[Illustration: Map to illustrate the Geographical Position of the CITY of SARAI]

[Illustration: Part of the Remains of the CITY of SARAI near TZAREV North of the AKHTUBA Branch of the VOLGA]

After they had spent a twelvemonth at the court of this Prince there broke out a great war between Barca and Aláu, the Lord of the Tartars of the Levant, and great hosts were mustered on either side.[NOTE 3]

But in the end Barca, the Lord of the Tartars of the Ponent, was defeated, though on both sides there was great slaughter. And by reason of this war no one could travel without peril of being taken; thus it was at least on the road by which the Brothers had come, though there was no obstacle to their travelling forward. So the Brothers, finding they could not retrace their steps, determined to go forward. Quitting Bolgara, therefore, they proceeded to a city called UCACA, which was at the extremity of the kingdom of the Lord of the Ponent;[NOTE 4] and thence departing again, and passing the great River Tigris, they travelled across a Desert which extended for seventeen days' journey, and wherein they found neither town nor village, falling in only with the tents of Tartars occupied with their cattle at pasture.[NOTE 5]

NOTE 1.— + Barka Khan, third son of Jújí, the first-born of Chinghiz, ruled the Ulús of Juji and Empire of Kipchak (Southern Russia) from 1257 to 1265. He was the first Musulman sovereign of his race. His chief residence was at SARAI (Sara of the text), a city founded by his brother and predecessor Bátú, on the banks of the Akhtuba branch of the Volga. In the next century Ibn Batuta describes Sarai as a very handsome and populous city, so large that it made half a day's journey to ride through it. The inhabitants were Mongols, Aás (or Alans), Kipchaks, Circassians, Russians, and Greeks, besides the foreign Moslem merchants, who had a walled quarter. Another Mahomedan traveller of the same century says the city itself was not walled, but, "The Khan's Palace was a great edifice surmounted by a golden crescent weighing two kantars of Egypt, and encompassed by a wall flanked with towers," etc. Pope John XXII., on the 26th February 1322, defined the limits of the new Bishopric of Kaffa, which were Sarai to the east and Varna to the west.

Sarai became the seat of both a Latin and a Russian metropolitan, and of more than one Franciscan convent. It was destroyed by Timur on his second invasion of Kipchak (1395-6), and extinguished by the Russians a century later. It is the scene of Chaucer's half-told tale of Cambuscan:—

"At Sarra, in the Londe of Tartarie,
There dwelt a King that werried Russie."

["Mesalek-al-absar (285, 287), says Sarai, meaning 'the Palace,' was founded by Bereké, brother of Batu. It stood in a salty plain, and was without walls, though the palace had walls flanked by towers. The town was large, had markets, madrasas—and baths. It is usually identified with Selitrennoyé Gorodok, about 70 miles above Astrakhan." (Rockhill, Rubruck, p. 260, note.)—H. C.]

Several sites exhibiting extensive ruins near the banks of the Akhtuba have been identified with Sarai; two in particular. One of these is not far from the great elbow of the Volga at Tzaritzyn: the other much lower down, at Selitrennoyé Gorodok or Saltpetre-Town, not far above Astrakhan.

The upper site exhibits by far the most extensive traces of former population, and is declared unhesitatingly to be the sole site of Sarai by M. Gregorieff, who carried on excavations among the remains for four years, though with what precise results I have not been able to learn. The most dense part of the remains, consisting of mounds and earth-works, traces of walls, buildings, cisterns, dams, and innumerable canals, extends for about 7-1/2 miles in the vicinity of the town of Tzarev, but a tract of 66 miles in length and 300 miles in circuit, commencing from near the head of the Akhtuba, presents remains of like character, though of less density, marking the ground occupied by the villages which encircled the capital. About 2-1/2 miles to the N.W. of Tzarev a vast mass of such remains, surrounded by the traces of a brick rampart, points out the presumable position of the Imperial Palace.

M. Gregorieff appears to admit no alternative. Yet it seems certain that the indications of Abulfeda, Pegolotti, and others, with regard to the position of the capital in the early part of the 14th century, are not consistent with a site so far from the Caspian. Moreover, F. H. Müller states that the site near Tzarev is known to the Tartars as the "Sarai of Janibek Khan" (1341-1357). Now it is worthy of note that in the coinage of Janibek we repeatedly find as the place of mintage, New Sarai. Arabsháh in his History of Timur states that 63 years had elapsed from the foundation to the destruction of Sarai. But it must have been at least 140 years since the foundation of Batu's city. Is it not possible, therefore, that both the sites which we have mentioned were successively occupied by the Mongol capital; that the original Sarai of Batu was at Selitrennoyé Gorodok, and that the New Sarai of Janibek was established by him, or by his father Uzbeg in his latter days, on the upper Akhtuba? Pegolotti having carried his merchant from Tana (Azov) to Gittarchan (Astrakhan), takes him one day by river to Sara, and from Sara to Saracanco, also by river, eight days more. (Cathay, p. 287.) In the work quoted I have taken Saracanco for Saraichik, on the Yaik. But it was possibly the Upper or New Sarai on the Akhtuba. Ibn Batuta, marching on the frozen river, reached Sarai in three days from Astrakhan. This could not have been at Tzarev, 200 miles off.

In corroboration (quantum valeat) of my suggestion that there must have been two Sarais near the Volga, Professor Bruun of Odessa points to the fact that Fra Mauro's map presents two cities of Sarai on the Akhtuba; only the Sarai of Janibeg is with him no longer New Sarai, but Great Sarai.

The use of the latter name suggests the possibility that in the Saracanco of Pegolotti the latter half of the name may be the Mongol Kúnk "Great." (See Pavet de Courteille, p. 439.)

Professor Bruun also draws attention to the impossibility of Ibn Batuta's travelling from Astrakhan to Tzarev in three days, an argument which had already occurred to me and been inserted above.

[The Empire of Kipchak founded after the Mongol Conquest of 1224, included also parts of Siberia and Khwarizm; it survived nominally until 1502.—H. C.]

(Four Years of Archaeological Researches among the Ruins of Sarai [in Russian] by M. Gregorieff [who appears to have also published a pamphlet specially on the site, but this has not been available]; Historisch- geographische Darstellung des Stromsystems der Wolga, von Ferd. Heinr. Müller, Berlin, 1839, 568-577; Ibn. Bat. II. 447; Not. et Extraits, XIII. i. 286; Pallas, Voyages; Cathay, 231, etc.; Erdmann, Numi Asiatici, pp. 362 seqq.; Arabs. I. p. 381.)

NOTE 2.—BOLGHAR, our author's Bolgara, was the capital of the region sometimes called Great Bulgaria, by Abulfeda Inner Bulgaria, and stood a few miles from the left bank of the Volga, in latitude about 54° 54', and 90 miles below Kazan. The old Arab writers regarded it as nearly the limit of the habitable world, and told wonders of the cold, the brief summer nights, and the fossil ivory that was found in its vicinity. This was exported, and with peltry, wax, honey, hazel-nuts, and Russia leather, formed the staple articles of trade. The last item derived from Bolghar the name which it still bears all over Asia. (See Bk. II. ch. xvi., and Note.) Bolghar seems to have been the northern limit of Arab travel, and was visited by the curious (by Ibn Batuta among others) in order to witness the phenomena of the short summer night, as tourists now visit Hammerfest to witness its entire absence.

Russian chroniclers speak of an earlier capital of the Bulgarian kingdom, Brakhimof, near the mouth of the Kama, destroyed by Andrew, Grand Duke of Rostof and Susdal, about 1160; and this may have been the city referred to in the earlier Arabic accounts. The fullest of these is by Ibn Fozlán, who accompanied an embassy from the Court of Baghdad to Bolghar, in A.D. 921. The King and people had about this time been converted to Islam, having previously, as it would seem, professed Christianity. Nevertheless, a Mahomedan writer of the 14th century says the people had then long renounced Islam for the worship of the Cross. (Not. et Extr. XIII. i. 270.)

[Illustration: Ruins of Bolghar.]

Bolghar was first captured by the Mongols in 1225. It seems to have perished early in the 15th century, after which Kazan practically took its place. Its position is still marked by a village called Bolgari, where ruins of Mahomedan character remain, and where coins and inscriptions have been found. Coins of the Kings of Bolghar, struck in the 10th century, have been described by Fraehn, as well as coins of the Mongol period struck at Bolghar. Its latest known coin is of A.H. 818 (A.D. 1415-16). A history of Bolghar was written in the first half of the 12th century by Yakub Ibn Noman, Kadhi of the city, but this is not known to be extant.

Fraehn shows ground for believing the people to have been a mixture of Fins, Slavs, and Turks. Nicephorus Gregoras supposes that they took their name from the great river on which they dwelt ([Greek: Boúlga]).

["The ruins [of Bolghar]," says Bretschneider, in his Mediaeval Researches, published in 1888, vol. ii. p. 82, "still exist, and have been the subject of learned investigation by several Russian scholars. These remains are found on the spot where now the village Uspenskoye, called also Bolgarskoye (Bolgari), stands, in the district of Spask, province of Kazan. This village is about 4 English miles distant from the Volga, east of it, and 83 miles from Kazan." Part of the Bulgars removed to the Balkans; others remained in their native country on the shores of the Azov Sea, and were subjugated by the Khazars. At the beginning of the 9th century, they marched northwards to the Volga and the Kama, and established the kingdom of Great Bulgaria. Their chief city, Bolghar, was on the bank of the Volga, but the river runs now to the west; as the Kama also underwent a change in its course, it is possible that formerly Bolghar was built at the junction of the two rivers. (Cf. Reclus, Europe russe, p. 761.) The Bulgars were converted to Islam in 922. Their country was first invaded by the Mongols under Subutai in 1223; this General conquered it in 1236, the capital was destroyed the following year, and the country annexed to the kingdom of Kipchak. Bolghar was again destroyed in 1391 by Tamerlan. In 1438, Ulugh Mohammed, cousin of Toka Timur, younger son of Juji, transformed this country into the khanate of Kazan, which survived till 1552. It had probably been the capital of the Golden Horde before Sarai.

With reference to the early Christianity of the Bulgarians, to which Yule refers in his note, the Laurentian Chronicle (A.D. 1229), quoted by Shpilevsky, adduces evidence to show that in the Great City, i.e. Bulgar, there were Russian Christians and a Christian cemetery, and the death of a Bulgarian Christian martyr is related in the same chronicle as well as in the Nikon, Tver, and Tatischef annals in which his name is given. (Cf. Shpilevsky, Anc. towns and other Bulgaro-Tartar monuments, Kazan, 1877, p. 158 seq.; Rockhill's Rubruck, Hakl. Soc. p. 121, note.) —H. C.]

The severe and lasting winter is spoken of by Ibn Folzán and other old writers in terms that seem to point to a modern mitigation of climate. It is remarkable, too, that Ibn Fozlán speaks of the aurora as of very frequent occurrence, which is not now the case in that latitude. We may suspect this frequency to have been connected with the greater cold indicated, and perhaps with a different position of the magnetic pole. Ibn Fozlán's account of the aurora is very striking:—"Shortly before sunset the horizon became all very ruddy, and at the same time I heard sounds in the upper air, with a dull rustling. I looked up and beheld sweeping over me a fire-red cloud, from which these sounds issued, and in it movements, as it were, of men and horses; the men grasping bows, lances, and swords. This I saw, or thought I saw. Then there appeared a white cloud of like aspect; in it also I beheld armed horsemen, and these rushed against the former as one squadron of horse charges another. We were so terrified at this that we turned with humble prayer to the Almighty, whereupon the natives about us wondered and broke into loud laughter. We, however, continued to gaze, seeing how one cloud charged the other, remained confused with it a while, and then sundered again. These movements lasted deep into the night, and then all vanished."

(Fraehn, Ueber die Wolga Bulgaren, Petersb. 1832; Gold. Horde, 8, 9, 423-424; Not. et Extr. II. 541; Ibn Bat. II. 398; Büschings Mag. V. 492; Erdmann, Numi Asiat. I. 315-318, 333-334, 520-535; Niceph. Gregoras, II. 2, 2.)

NOTE 3.—ALAU is Polo's representation of the name of Hulákú, brother of the Great Kaans Mangu and Kublai and founder of the Mongol dynasty in Persia. In the Mongol pronunciation guttural and palatal consonants are apt to be elided, hence this spelling. The same name is written by Pope Alexander IV., in addressing the Khan, Olao, by Pachymeres and Gregoras [Greek: Chalaù] and [Greek: Chalaon], by Hayton Haolon, by Ibn Batuta Huláún, as well as in a letter of Hulaku's own, as given by Makrizi.

The war in question is related in Rashíduddín's history, and by Polo himself towards the end of the work. It began in the summer of 1262, and ended about eight months later. Hence the Polos must have reached Barka's Court in 1261.

Marco always applies to the Mongol Khans of Persia the title of "Lords of the East" (Levant), and to the Khans of Kipchak that of "Lords of the West" (Ponent). We use the term Levant still with a similar specific application, and in another form Anatolia. I think it best to preserve the terms Levant and Ponent when used in this way.

[Robert Parke in his translation out of Spanish of Mendoza, The Historie of the great and mightie kingdome of China … London, printed by I. Wolfe for Edward White, 1588, uses the word Ponent: "You shall understande that this mightie kingdome is the Orientalest part of all Asia, and his next neighbour towards the Ponent is the kingdome of Quachinchina … (p. 2)."—H. C.]

NOTE 4.—UCACA or UKEK was a town on the right bank of the Volga, nearly equidistant between Sarai and Bolghar, and about six miles south of the modern Saratov, where a village called Uwek still exists. Ukek is not mentioned before the Mongol domination, and is supposed to have been of Mongol foundation, as the name Ukek is said in Mongol to signify a dam of hurdles. The city is mentioned by Abulfeda as marking the extremity of "the empire of the Barka Tartars," and Ibn Batuta speaks of it as "one day distant from the hills of the Russians." Polo therefore means that it was the frontier of the Ponent towards Russia. Ukek was the site of a Franciscan convent in the 14th century; it is mentioned several times in the campaigns of Timur, and was destroyed by his army. It is not mentioned under the form Ukek after this, but appears as Uwek and Uwesh in Russian documents of the 16th century. Perhaps this was always the Slavonic form, for it already is written Uguech (= Uwek) in Wadding's 14th century catalogue of convents. Anthony Jenkinson, in Hakluyt, gives an observation of its latitude, as Oweke (51° 40'), and Christopher Burrough, in the same collection, gives a description of it as Oueak, and the latitude as 51° 30' (some 7' too much). In his time (1579) there were the remains of a "very faire stone castle" and city, with old tombs exhibiting sculptures and inscriptions. All these have long vanished. Burrough was told by the Russians that the town "was swallowed into the earth by the justice of God, for the wickednesse of the people that inhabited the same." Lepechin in 1769 found nothing remaining but part of an earthen rampart and some underground vaults of larger bricks, which the people dug out for use. He speaks of coins and other relics as frequent, and the like have been found more recently. Coins with Mongol-Arab inscriptions, struck at Ukek by Tuktugai Khan in 1306, have been described by Fraehn and Erdmann.

(Fraehn, Ueber die ehemalige Mong. Stadt Ukek, etc., Petersb. 1835; Gold. Horde; Ibn Bat. II. 414; Abulfeda, in Büsching, V. 365; Ann. Minorum, sub anno 1400; Pétis de la Croix, II. 355, 383, 388; Hakluyt, ed. 1809, I. 375 and 472; Lepechin, Tagebuch der Reise, etc., I. 235-237; Rockhill, Rubruck, 120-121, note 2.)

NOTE 5.—The great River Tigeri or Tigris is the Volga, as Pauthier rightly shows. It receives the same name from the Monk Pascal of Vittoria in 1338. (Cathay, p. 234.) Perhaps this arose out of some legend that the Tigris was a reappearance of the same river. The ecclesiastical historian, Nicephorus Callistus, appears to imply that the Tigris coming from Paradise flows under the Caspian to emerge in Kurdistan. (See IX. 19.)

The "17 days" applies to one stretch of desert. The whole journey from Ukek Bokhara would take some 60 days at least. Ibn Batuta is 58 days from Sarai to Bokhara, and of the last section he says, "we entered the desert which extends between Khwarizm and Bokhara, and which has an extent of 18 days' journey." (III. 19.)

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CHAPTER III. HOW THE TWO BROTHERS, AFTER CROSSING A DESERT, CAME TO THE CITY OF BOCARA, AND FELL IN WITH CERTAIN ENVOYS THERE.

After they had passed the desert, they arrived at a very great and noble city called BOCARA, the territory of which belonged to a king whose name was Barac, and is also called Bocara. The city is the best in all Persia.[NOTE 1] And when they had got thither, they found they could neither proceed further forward nor yet turn back again; wherefore they abode in that city of Bocara for three years. And whilst they were sojourning in that city, there came from Alau, Lord of the Levant, Envoys on their way to the Court of the Great Kaan, the Lord of all the Tartars in the world. And when the Envoys beheld the Two Brothers they were amazed, for they had never before seen Latins in that part of the world. And they said to the Brothers: "Gentlemen, if ye will take our counsel, ye will find great honour and profit shall come thereof." So they replied that they would be right glad to learn how. "In truth," said the Envoys, "the Great Kaan hath never seen any Latins, and he hath a great desire so to do. Wherefore, if ye will keep us company to his Court, ye may depend upon it that he will be right glad to see you, and will treat you with great honour and liberality; whilst in our company ye shall travel with perfect security, and need fear to be molested by nobody."[NOTE 2]

NOTE 1.—Hayton also calls Bokhara a city of Persia, and I see Vámbéry says that, up till the conquest by Chinghiz, Bokhara, Samarkand, Balkh, etc., were considered to belong to Persia. (Travels, p. 377.) The first Mongolian governor of Bokhara was Buka Bosha.

King Barac is Borrak Khan, great-grandson of Chagatai, and sovereign of the Ulús of Chagatai, from 1264 to 1270. The Polos, no doubt, reached Bokhara before 1264, but Borrak must have been sovereign some time before they left it.

NOTE 2.—The language of the envoys seems rather to imply that they were the Great Kaan's own people returning from the Court of Hulaku. And Rashid mentions that Sartak, the Kaan's ambassador to Hulaku, returned from Persia in the year that the latter prince died. It may have been his party that the Venetians joined, for the year almost certainly was the same, viz. 1265. If so, another of the party was Bayan, afterwards the greatest of Kublai's captains, and much celebrated in the sequel of this book. (See Erdmann's Temudschin, p. 214.)

Marsden justly notes that Marco habitually speaks of Latins, never of Franks. Yet I suspect his own mental expression was Farangi.

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CHAPTER IV. HOW THE TWO BROTHERS TOOK THE ENVOYS' COUNSEL, AND WENT TO THE COURT OF THE GREAT KAAN.

So when the Two Brothers had made their arrangements, they set out on their travels, in company with the Envoys, and journeyed for a whole year, going northward and north-eastward, before they reached the Court of that Prince. And on their journey they saw many marvels of divers and sundry kinds, but of these we shall say nothing at present, because Messer Mark, who has likewise seen them all, will give you a full account of them in the Book which follows.

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CHAPTER V. HOW THE TWO BROTHERS ARRIVED AT THE COURT OF THE GREAT KAAN.

When the Two Brothers got to the Great Kaan, he received them with great honour and hospitality, and showed much pleasure at their visit, asking them a great number of questions. First, he asked about the emperors, how they maintained their dignity, and administered justice in their dominions; and how they went forth to battle, and so forth. And then he asked the like questions about the kings and princes and other potentates.

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CHAPTER VI. HOW THE GREAT KAAN ASKED ALL ABOUT THE MANNERS OF THE CHRISTIANS, AND PARTICULARLY ABOUT THE POPE OF ROME.

And then he inquired about the Pope and the Church, and about all that is done at Rome, and all the customs of the Latins. And the Two Brothers told him the truth in all its particulars, with order and good sense, like sensible men as they were; and this they were able to do as they knew the Tartar language well.[NOTE 1]

NOTE 1.—The word generally used for Pope in the original is Apostoille (Apostolicus), the usual French expression of that age.

It is remarkable that for the most part the text edited by Pauthier has the correcter Oriental form Tatar, instead of the usual Tartar. Tattar is the word used by Yvo of Narbonne, in the curious letter given by Matthew Paris under 1243.

We are often told that Tartar is a vulgar European error. It is in any case a very old one; nor does it seem to be of European origin, but rather Armenian;[1] though the suggestion of Tartarus may have given it readier currency in Europe. Russian writers, or rather writers who have been in Russia, sometimes try to force on us a specific limitation of the word Tartar to a certain class of Oriental Turkish race, to whom the Russians appropriate the name. But there is no just ground for this. Tátár is used by Oriental writers of Polo's age exactly as Tartar was then, and is still, used in Western Europe, as a generic title for the Turanian hosts who followed Chinghiz and his successors. But I believe the name in this sense was unknown to Western Asia before the time of Chinghiz. And General Cunningham must overlook this when he connects the Tátaríya coins, mentioned by Arab geographers of the 9th century, with "the Scythic or Tátár princes who ruled in Kabul" in the beginning of our era. Tartars on the Indian frontier in those centuries are surely to be classed with the Frenchmen whom Brennus led to Rome, or the Scotchmen who fought against Agricola.

_______________

Notes:

[1] See J. As. sér. V. tom. xi. p. 203.

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CHAPTER VII. HOW THE GREAT KAAN SENT THE TWO BROTHERS AS HIS ENVOYS TO THE POPE.

When that Prince, whose name was CUBLAY KAAN, Lord of the Tartars all over the earth, and of all the kingdoms and provinces and territories of that vast quarter of the world, had heard all that the Brothers had to tell him about the ways of the Latins, he was greatly pleased, and he took it into his head that he would send them on an Embassy to the Pope. So he urgently desired them to undertake this mission along with one of his Barons; and they replied that they would gladly execute all his commands as those of their Sovereign Lord. Then the Prince sent to summon to his presence one of his Barons whose name was COGATAL, and desired him to get ready, for it was proposed to send him to the Pope along with the Two Brothers. The Baron replied that he would execute the Lord's commands to the best of his ability.

After this the Prince caused letters from himself to the Pope to be indited in the Tartar tongue,[NOTE 1] and committed them to the Two Brothers and to that Baron of his own, and charged them with what he wished them to say to the Pope. Now the contents of the letter were to this purport: He begged that the Pope would send as many as an hundred persons of our Christian faith; intelligent men, acquainted with the Seven Arts,[NOTE 2] well qualified to enter into controversy, and able clearly to prove by force of argument to idolaters and other kinds of folk, that the Law of Christ was best, and that all other religions were false and naught; and that if they would prove this, he and all under him would become Christians and the Church's liegemen. Finally he charged his Envoys to bring back to him some Oil of the Lamp which burns on the Sepulchre of our Lord at Jerusalem.[NOTE 3]

NOTE 1.— + The appearance of the Great Kaan's letter may be illustrated by two letters on so-called Corean paper preserved in the French archives; one from Arghún Khan of Persia (1289), brought by Buscarel, and the other from his son Oljaitu (May, 1305), to Philip the Fair. These are both in the Mongol language, and according to Abel Rémusat and other authorities, in the Uighúr character, the parent of the present Mongol writing. Facsimiles of the letters are given in Rémusat's paper on intercourse with Mongol Princes, in Mém. de l' Acad. des Inscript. vols. vii. and viii., reproductions in J. B. Chabot's Hist. de Mar Jabalaha III., Paris, 1895, and preferably in Prince Roland Bonaparte's beautiful Documents Mongols, Pl. XIV., and we give samples of the two in vol. ii.[1]

NOTE 2.—"The Seven Arts," from a date reaching back nearly to classical times, and down through the Middle Ages, expressed the whole circle of a liberal education, and it is to these Seven Arts that the degrees in arts were understood to apply. They were divided into the Trivium of Rhetoric, Logic, and Grammar, and the Quadrivium of Arithmetic, Astronomy, Music, and Geometry. The 38th epistle of Seneca was in many MSS. (according to Lipsius) entitled "L. Annaei Senecae Liber de Septem Artibus liberalibus." I do not find, however, that Seneca there mentions categorically more than five, viz., Grammar, Geometry, Music, Astronomy, and Arithmetic. In the 5th century we find the Seven Arts to form the successive subjects of the last seven books of the work of Martianus Capella, much used in the schools during the early Middle Ages. The Seven Arts will be found enumerated in the verses of Tzetzes (Chil. XI. 525), and allusions to them in the mediaeval romances are endless. Thus, in one of the "Gestes d'Alexandre," a chapter is headed "Comment Aristotle aprent à Alixandre les Sept Arts." In the tale of the Seven Wise Masters, Diocletian selects that number of tutors for his son, each to instruct him in one of the Seven Arts. In the romance of Erec and Eneide we have a dress on which the fairies had portrayed the Seven Arts (Franc. Michel, Recherches, etc. II. 82); in the Roman de Mahommet the young impostor is master of all the seven. There is one mediaeval poem called the Marriage of the Seven Arts, and another called the Battle of the Seven Arts. (See also Dante, Convito, Trat. II. c. 14; Not. et Ex. V., 491 seqq.)

NOTE 3.—The Chinghizide Princes were eminently liberal—or indifferent— in religion; and even after they became Mahomedan, which, however, the Eastern branch never did, they were rarely and only by brief fits persecutors. Hence there was scarcely one of the non-Mahomedan Khans of whose conversion to Christianity there were not stories spread. The first rumours of Chinghiz in the West were as of a Christian conqueror; tales may be found of the Christianity of Chagatai, Hulaku, Abaka, Arghun, Baidu, Ghazan, Sartak, Kuyuk, Mangu, Kublai, and one or two of the latter's successors in China, all probably false, with one or two doubtful exceptions.

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Notes:

[1] See plates with ch. xvii. of Bk. IV. See also the Uighúr character in the second Païza, Bk. II. ch. vii.

[Illustration: The Great Kaan delivering a Golden Tablet to the Brothers. From a miniature of the 14th century.]

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CHAPTER VIII. HOW THE GREAT KAAN GAVE THEM A TABLET OF GOLD, BEARING HIS ORDERS IN THEIR BEHALF.

When the Prince had charged them with all his commission, he caused to be given them a Tablet of Gold, on which was inscribed that the three Ambassadors should be supplied with everything needful in all the countries through which they should pass—with horses, with escorts, and, in short, with whatever they should require. And when they had made all needful preparations, the three Ambassadors took their leave of the Emperor and set out.

When they had travelled I know not how many days, the Tartar Baron fell sick, so that he could not ride, and being very ill, and unable to proceed further, he halted at a certain city. So the Two Brothers judged it best that they should leave him behind and proceed to carry out their commission; and, as he was well content that they should do so, they continued their journey. And I can assure you, that whithersoever they went they were honourably provided with whatever they stood in need of, or chose to command. And this was owing to that Tablet of Authority from the Lord which they carried with them.[NOTE 1]

So they travelled on and on until they arrived at Layas in Hermenia, a journey which occupied them, I assure you, for three years.[NOTE 2] It took them so long because they could not always proceed, being stopped sometimes by snow, or by heavy rains falling, or by great torrents which they found in an impassable state.

[Illustration: Castle of Ayas.]

NOTE 1.—On these Tablets, see a note under Bk. II. ch. vii.

NOTE 2.—AYAS, called also Ayacio, Aiazzo, Giazza, Glaza, La Jazza, and Layas, occupied the site of ancient Aegae, and was the chief port of Cilician Armenia, on the Gulf of Scanderoon. Aegae had been in the 5th century a place of trade with the West, and the seat of a bishopric, as we learn from the romantic but incomplete story of Mary, the noble slave-girl, told by Gibbon (ch. 33). As Ayas it became in the latter part of the 13th century one of the chief places for the shipment of Asiatic wares arriving through Tabriz, and was much frequented by the vessels of the Italian Republics. The Venetians had a Bailo resident there.

Ayas is the Leyes of Chaucer's Knight,—

("At LEYES was he and at Satalie")—

and the Layas of Froissart. (Bk. III. ch. xxii.) The Gulf of Layas is described in the xix. Canto of Ariosto, where Mafisa and Astolfo find on its shores a country of barbarous Amazons:—

"Fatto è 'l porto a sembranza d' una luna," etc.

Marino Sanuto says of it: "Laiacio has a haven, and a shoal in front of it that we might rather call a reef, and to this shoal the hawsers of vessels are moored whilst the anchors are laid out towards the land." (II. IV. ch. xxvi.)

The present Ayas is a wretched village of some 15 huts, occupied by about 600 Turkmans, and standing inside the ruined walls of the castle. This castle, which is still in good condition, was built by the Armenian kings, and restored by Sultan Suleiman; it was constructed from the remains of the ancient city; fragments of old columns are embedded in its walls of cut stone. It formerly communicated by a causeway with an advanced work on an island before the harbour. The ruins of the city occupy a large space. (Langlois, V. en Cilicie, pp. 429-31; see also Beaufort's Karamania, near the end.) A plan of Ayas will be found at the beginning of Bk. I. —H. Y. and H. C.

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CHAPTER IX. HOW THE TWO BROTHERS CAME TO THE CITY OF ACRE.

[Ilustration: ACRE AS IT WAS WHEN LOST (A.D. 1291). FROM THE PLAN GIVEN BY MARINO SANUTO]

They departed from Layas and came to ACRE, arriving there in the month of April, in the year of Christ 1269, and then they learned that the Pope was dead. And when they found that the Pope was dead (his name was Pope * *), [NOTE 1] they went to a certain wise Churchman who was Legate for the whole kingdom of Egypt, and a man of great authority, by name THEOBALD OF PIACENZA, and told him of the mission on which they were come. When the Legate heard their story, he was greatly surprised, and deemed the thing to be of great honour and advantage for the whole of Christendom. So his answer to the two Ambassador Brothers was this: "Gentlemen, ye see that the Pope is dead; wherefore ye must needs have patience until a new Pope be made, and then shall ye be able to execute your charge." Seeing well enough that what the Legate said was just, they observed: "But while the Pope is a-making, we may as well go to Venice and visit our households." So they departed from Acre and went to Negropont, and from Negropont they continued their voyage to Venice.[NOTE 2] On their arrival there, Messer Nicolas found that his wife was dead, and that she had left behind her a son of fifteen years of age, whose name was MARCO; and 'tis of him that this Book tells.[NOTE 3] The Two Brothers abode at Venice a couple of years, tarrying until a Pope should be made.

NOTE 1.—The deceased Pope's name is omitted both in the Geog. Text and in Pauthier's, clearly because neither Rusticiano nor Polo remembered it. It is supplied correctly in the Crusca Italian as Clement, and in Ramusio as Clement IV.

It is not clear that Theobald, though generally adopted, is the ecclesiastic's proper name. It appears in different MSS. as Teald (G. T.), Ceabo for Teabo (Pauthier), Odoaldo (Crusca), and in the Riccardian as Thebaldus de Vice-comitibus de Placentia, which corresponds to Ramusio's version. Most of the ecclesiastical chroniclers call him Tedaldus, some Thealdus. Tedaldo is a real name, occurring in Boccaccio. (Day iii. Novel 7.)

NOTE 2.—After the expulsion of the Venetians from Constantinople, Negropont was the centre of their influence in Romania. On the final return of the travellers they again take Negropont on their way. [It was one of the ports on the route from Venice to Constantinople, Tana, Trebizond.—H. C.]

NOTE 3.—The edition of the Soc. de Géographie makes Mark's age twelve, but I have verified from inspection the fact noticed by Pauthier that the manuscript has distinctly xv. like all the other old texts. In Ramusio it is nineteen, but this is doubtless an arbitrary correction to suit the mistaken date (1250) assigned for the departure of the father from Constantinople.

There is nothing in the old French texts to justify the usual statement that Marco was born after the departure of his father from Venice. All that the G. T. says is: "Meser Nicolau treuve que sa fame estoit morte, et les remès un filz de xv. anz que avoit à nom Marc," and Pauthier's text is to the same effect. Ramusio, indeed, has: "M. Nicolò trovò, che sua moglie era morta, la quale nella sua partita haveva partorito un figliuolo," and the other versions that are based on Pipino's seem all to have like statements.