The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 - Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

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THE TRAVELS OF MARCO POLO

THE COMPLETE YULE-CORDIER EDITION

[Illustration: H. Yule]

Including the unabridged third edition (1903) of Henry Yule's annotated
translation, as revised by Henri Cordier; together with Cordier's later
volume of notes and addenda (1920)

IN TWO VOLUMES

VOLUME I

_Containing the first volume of the 1903 edition_

DEDICATION.

TO THE MEMORY OF
SIR RODERICK I. MURCHISON, BART., K.C.B., G.C.ST.A., G.C.ST.S.,
ETC.
THE PERFECT FRIEND
WHO FIRST BROUGHT HENRY YULE AND JOHN MURRAY TOGETHER
(HE ENTERED INTO REST, OCTOBER 22ND, 1871,)
AND TO THAT OF HIS MUCH LOVED NIECE,
HARRIET ISABELLA MURCHISON,
WIFE OF KENNETH ROBERT MURCHISON, D.L., J.P.,
(SHE ENTERED INTO REST, AUGUST 9TH, 1902,)
UNDER WHOSE EVER HOSPITABLE ROOF MANY OF THE PROOF
SHEETS OF THIS EDITION WERE READ BY ME,
I DEDICATE THESE VOLUMES FROM
THE OLD MURCHISON HOME,
IN THANKFUL REMEMBRANCE OF ALL I OWE TO
THE ABIDING AFFECTION, SYMPATHY, AND EXAMPLE OF BOTH.

TARADALE, AMY FRANCES YULE.
ROSS-SHIRE, SEPTEMBER 11TH, 1902.
SCOTLAND.

* * * *
Ed e da noi si strano,
Che quando ne ragiono
I' non trovo nessuno,
Che l'abbia navicato,
* * * *
Le parti del Levante,
La dove sono tante
Gemme di gran valute
E di molta salute:
E sono in quello giro
Balsamo, e ambra, e tiro,
E lo pepe, e lo legno
Aloe, ch' e si degno,
E spigo, e cardamomo,
Giengiovo, e cennamomo;
E altre molte spezie,
Ciascuna in sua spezie,
E migliore, e piu fina,
E sana in medicina.
Appresso in questo loco
Mise in assetto loco
Li tigri, e li grifoni,
Leofanti, e leoni
Cammelli, e dragomene,
Badalischi, e gene,
E pantere, e castoro,
Le formiche dell' oro,
E tanti altri animali,
Ch' io non so ben dir quail,
Che son si divisati,
E si dissomigliati
Di corpo e di fazione,
Di si fera ragione,
E di si strana taglia,
Ch'io non credo san faglia,
Ch' alcun uomo vivente
Potesse veramente
Per lingua, o per scritture
Recitar le figure
Delle bestie, e gli uccelli....

--From _Il Tesoretto di Ser Brunetto Latini_ (circa MDCCLX.).
(_Florence_, 1824, pp. 83 seqq.)

[Illustration]

[Greek:
Andra moi hennepe, Mousa, polytropon, hos mala polla
Plagchthae . . . . . . .
Pollon d' anthropon iden astea kai noon egno].

_Odyssey_, I.

--"I AM BECOME A NAME;
FOR ALWAYS ROAMING WITH A HUNGRY HEART
MUCH HAVE I SEEN AND KNOWN; CITIES OF MEN,
AND MANNERS, CLIMATES, COUNCILS, GOVERNMENTS,
MYSELF NOT LEAST, BUT HONOURED OF THEM ALL."

TENNYSON.

"A SEDER CI PONEMMO IVI AMBODUI
VOLTI A LEVANTE, OND' ERAVAM SALITI;
CHE SUOLE A RIGUARDAR GIOVARE ALTRUI."

DANTE, _Purgatory_, IV.

[Illustration: Messer Marco Polo, with Messer Nicolo and Messer Maffeo,
returned from xxvi years' sojourn in the Orient, is denied entrance to the
Ca' Polo. (See _Int._ p. 4)]

CONTENTS OF VOL. I.

DEDICATION

NOTE BY MISS YULE

PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION

ORIGINAL PREFACE

ORIGINAL DEDICATION

MEMOIR OF SIR HENRY YULE BY AMY FRANCES YULE, L.A.SOC. ANT. SCOT.

A BIBLIOGRAPHY OF SIR HENRY YULE'S WRITINGS

SYNOPSIS OF CONTENTS

EXPLANATORY LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS TO VOL. I.

INTRODUCTORY NOTICES

THE BOOK OF MARCO POLO.

NOTE BY MISS YULE

I desire to take this opportunity of recording my grateful sense of the
unsparing labour, learning, and devotion, with which my father's valued
friend, Professor Henri Cordier, has performed the difficult and delicate
task which I entrusted to his loyal friendship.

Apart from Professor Cordier's very special qualifications for the work,
I feel sure that no other Editor could have been more entirely acceptable
to my father. I can give him no higher praise than to say that he has
laboured in Yule's own spirit.

The slight Memoir which I have contributed (for which I accept all
responsibility), attempts no more than a rough sketch of my father's
character and career, but it will, I hope, serve to recall pleasantly his
remarkable individuality to the few remaining who knew him in his prime,
whilst it may also afford some idea of the man, and his work and
environment, to those who had not that advantage.

No one can be more conscious than myself of its many shortcomings, which I
will not attempt to excuse. I can, however, honestly say that these have
not been due to negligence, but are rather the blemishes almost inseparable
from the fulfilment under the gloom of bereavement and amidst the pressure
of other duties, of a task undertaken in more favourable circumstances.

Nevertheless, in spite of all defects, I believe this sketch to be such
a record as my father would himself have approved, and I know also that he
would have chosen my hand to write it.

In conclusion, I may note that the first edition of this work was
dedicated to that very noble lady, the Queen (then Crown Princess)
Margherita of Italy. In the second edition the Dedication was reproduced
within brackets (as also the original preface), but not renewed. That
precedent is again followed.

I have, therefore, felt at liberty to associate the present edition of my
father's work with the Name MURCHISON, which for more than a generation
was the name most generally representative of British Science in Foreign
Lands, as of Foreign Science in Britain.

A. F. YULE.

PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION

Little did I think, some thirty years ago, when I received a copy of the
first edition of this grand work, that I should be one day entrusted with
the difficult but glorious task of supervising the third edition. When the
first edition of the _Book of Ser Marco Polo_ reached "Far Cathay," it
created quite a stir in the small circle of the learned foreigners, who
then resided there, and became a starting-point for many researches, of
which the results have been made use of partly in the second edition, and
partly in the present. The Archimandrite PALLADIUS and Dr. E.
BRETSCHNEIDER, at Peking, ALEX. WYLIE, at Shang-hai--friends of mine who
have, alas! passed away, with the exception of the Right Rev. Bishop G. E.
MOULE, of Hang-chau, the only survivor of this little group of
hard-working scholars,--were the first to explore the Chinese sources of
information which were to yield a rich harvest into their hands.

When I returned home from China in 1876, I was introduced to Colonel HENRY
YULE, at the India Office, by our common friend, Dr. REINHOLD ROST, and
from that time we met frequently and kept up a correspondence which
terminated only with the life of the great geographer, whose friend I had
become. A new edition of the travels of Friar Odoric of Pordenone, our
"mutual friend," in which Yule had taken the greatest interest, was
dedicated by me to his memory. I knew that Yule contemplated a third
edition of his _Marco Polo_, and all will regret that time was not allowed
to him to complete this labour of love, to see it published. If the duty
of bringing out the new edition of _Marco Polo_ has fallen on one who
considers himself but an unworthy successor of the first illustrious
commentator, it is fair to add that the work could not have been entrusted
to a more respectful disciple. Many of our tastes were similar; we had the
same desire to seek the truth, the same earnest wish to be exact, perhaps
the same sense of humour, and, what is necessary when writing on Marco
Polo, certainly the same love for Venice and its history. Not only am I,
with the late CHARLES SCHEFER, the founder and the editor of the _Recueil
de Voyages et de Documents pour servir a l'Histoire de la Geographie
depuis le XIII'e jusqu'a la fin du XVI'e siecle_, but I am also the
successor, at the Ecole des langues Orientales Vivantes, of G. PAUTHIER,
whose book on the Venetian Traveller is still valuable, so the mantle of
the last two editors fell upon my shoulders.

I therefore, gladly and thankfully, accepted Miss AMY FRANCIS YULE'S kind
proposal to undertake the editorship of the third edition of the _Book of
Ser Marco Polo_, and I wish to express here my gratitude to her for the
great honour she has thus done me.[1]

Unfortunately for his successor, Sir Henry Yule, evidently trusting to his
own good memory, left but few notes. These are contained in an interleaved
copy obligingly placed at my disposal by Miss Yule, but I luckily found
assistance from various other quarters. The following works have proved of
the greatest assistance to me:--The articles of General HOUTUM-SCHINDLER
in the _Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society_, and the excellent books of
Lord CURZON and of Major P. MOLESWORTH SYKES on Persia, M. GRENARD'S
account of DUTREUIL DE RHINS' Mission to Central Asia, BRETSCHNEIDER'S and
PALLADIUS' remarkable papers on Mediaeval Travellers and Geography, and
above all, the valuable books of the Hon. W. W. ROCKHILL on Tibet and
Rubruck, to which the distinguished diplomatist, traveller, and scholar
kindly added a list of notes of the greatest importance to me, for which I
offer him my hearty thanks.

My thanks are also due to H.H. Prince ROLAND BONAPARTE, who kindly gave me
permission to reproduce some of the plates of his _Recueil de Documents de
l'Epoque Mongole_, to M. LEOPOLD DELISLE, the learned Principal Librarian
of the Bibliotheque Nationale, who gave me the opportunity to study the
inventory made after the death of the Doge Marino Faliero, to the Count de
SEMALLE, formerly French Charge d'Affaires at Peking, who gave me for
reproduction a number of photographs from his valuable personal
collection, and last, not least, my old friend Comm. NICOLO BAROZZI, who
continued to lend me the assistance which he had formerly rendered to Sir
Henry Yule at Venice.

Since the last edition was published, more than twenty-five years ago,
Persia has been more thoroughly studied; new routes have been explored in
Central Asia, Karakorum has been fully described, and Western and
South-Western China have been opened up to our knowledge in many
directions. The results of these investigations form the main features of
this new edition of _Marco Polo_. I have suppressed hardly any of Sir Henry
Yule's notes and altered but few, doing so only when the light of recent
information has proved him to be in error, but I have supplemented them by
what, I hope, will be found useful, new information.[2]

Before I take leave of the kind reader, I wish to thank sincerely Mr. JOHN
MURRAY for the courtesy and the care he has displayed while this edition
was going through the press.

HENRI CORDIER.
PARIS, _1st of October, 1902_.

[1] Miss Yule has written the Memoir of her father and the new Dedication.

[2] Paragraphs which have been altered are marked thus +; my own additions
are placed between brackets [ ].--H. C.

[Illustration:
"Now strike your Sailes yee jolly Mariners,
For we be come into a quiet Rode"....
--THE FAERIE QUEENE, I. xii. 42.]

PREFACE TO SECOND EDITION.

The unexpected amount of favour bestowed on the former edition of this
Work has been a great encouragement to the Editor in preparing this second
one.

Not a few of the kind friends and correspondents who lent their aid before
have continued it to the present revision. The contributions of Mr. A.
WYLIE of Shang-hai, whether as regards the amount of labour which they
must have cost him, or the value of the result, demand above all others a
grateful record here. Nor can I omit to name again with hearty
acknowledgment Signor Comm. G. BERCHET of Venice, the Rev. Dr. CALDWELL,
Colonel (now Major-General) R. MACLAGAN, R.E., Mr. D. HANBURY, F.R.S., Mr.
EDWARD THOMAS, F.R.S. (Corresponding Member of the Institute), and Mr. R.
H. MAJOR.

But besides these old names, not a few new ones claim my thanks.

The Baron F. VON RICHTHOFEN, now President of the Geographical Society of
Berlin, a traveller who not only has trodden many hundreds of miles in the
footsteps of our Marco, but has perhaps travelled over more of the
Interior of China than Marco ever did, and who carried to that survey high
scientific accomplishments of which the Venetian had not even a
rudimentary conception, has spontaneously opened his bountiful stores of
new knowledge in my behalf. Mr. NEY ELIAS, who in 1872 traversed and
mapped a line of upwards of 2000 miles through the almost unknown tracts
of Western Mongolia, from the Gate in the Great Wall at Kalghan to the
Russian frontier in the Altai, has done likewise.[1] To the Rev. G. MOULE,
of the Church Mission at Hang-chau, I owe a mass of interesting matter
regarding that once great and splendid city, the KINSAY of our Traveller,
which has enabled me, I trust, to effect great improvement both in the
Notes and in the Map, which illustrate that subject. And to the Rev.
CARSTAIRS DOUGLAS, LL.D., of the English Presbyterian Mission at Amoy, I
am scarcely less indebted. The learned Professor BRUUN, of Odessa, whom I
never have seen, and have little likelihood of ever seeing in this world,
has aided me with zeal and cordiality like that of old friendship. To Mr.
ARTHUR BURNELL, Ph.D., of the Madras Civil Service, I am grateful for many
valuable notes bearing on these and other geographical studies, and
particularly for his generous communication of the drawing and photograph
of the ancient Cross at St. Thomas's Mount, long before any publication of
that subject was made on his own account. My brother officer, Major OLIVER
ST. JOHN, R.E., has favoured me with a variety of interesting remarks
regarding the Persian chapters, and has assisted me with new data, very
materially correcting the Itinerary Map in Kerman.

Mr. BLOCHMANN of the Calcutta Madrasa, Sir DOUGLAS FORSYTH, C.B., lately
Envoy to Kashgar, M. de MAS LATRIE, the Historian of Cyprus, Mr. ARTHUR
GROTE, Mr. EUGENE SCHUYLER of the U.S. Legation at St. Petersburg, Dr.
BUSHELL and Mr. W.F. MAYERS, of H.M.'s Legation at Peking, Mr. G. PHILLIPS
of Fuchau, Madame OLGA FEDTCHENKO, the widow of a great traveller too
early lost to the world, Colonel KEATINGE, V.C., C.S.I., Major-General
KEYES, C.B., Dr. GEORGE BIRDWOOD, Mr. BURGESS, of Bombay, my old and
valued friend Colonel W. H. GREATHED, C.B., and the Master of Mediaeval
Geography, M. D'AVEZAC himself, with others besides, have kindly lent
assistance of one kind or another, several of them spontaneously, and the
rest in prompt answer to my requests.

Having always attached much importance to the matter of illustrations,[2]
I feel greatly indebted to the liberal action of Mr. Murray in enabling me
largely to increase their number in this edition. Though many are
original, we have also borrowed a good many;[3] a proceeding which seems
to me entirely unobjectionable when the engravings are truly illustrative
of the text, and not hackneyed.

I regret the augmented bulk of the volumes. There has been some excision,
but the additions visibly and palpably preponderate. The truth is that
since the completion of the first edition, just four years ago, large
additions have been made to the stock of our knowledge bearing on the
subjects of this Book; and how these additions have continued to come in
up to the last moment, may be seen in Appendix L,[4] which has had to
undergo repeated interpolation after being put in type. KARAKORUM, for a
brief space the seat of the widest empire the world has known, has been
visited; the ruins of SHANG-TU, the "Xanadu of Cublay Khan," have been
explored; PAMIR and TANGUT have been penetrated from side to side; the
famous mountain Road of SHEN-SI has been traversed and described; the
mysterious CAINDU has been unveiled; the publication of my lamented friend
Lieutenant Garnier's great work on the French Exploration of Indo-China
has provided a mass of illustration of that YUN-NAN for which but the
other day Marco Polo was well-nigh the most recent authority. Nay, the
last two years have thrown a promise of light even on what seemed the
wildest of Marco's stories, and the bones of a veritable RUC from New
Zealand lie on the table of Professor Owen's Cabinet!

M. VIVIEN de St. MARTIN, during the interval of which we have been
speaking, has published a History of Geography. In treating of Marco Polo,
he alludes to the first edition of this work, most evidently with no
intention of disparagement, but speaks of it as merely a revision of
Marsden's Book. The last thing I should allow myself to do would be to
apply to a Geographer, whose works I hold in so much esteem, the
disrespectful definition which the adage quoted in my former Preface[5]
gives of the _vir qui docet quod non sapit_; but I feel bound to say that
on this occasion M. Vivien de St. Martin has permitted himself to
pronounce on a matter with which he had not made himself acquainted; for
the perusal of the very first lines of the Preface (I will say nothing of
the Book) would have shown him that such a notion was utterly unfounded.

In concluding these "forewords" I am probably taking leave of Marco
Polo,[6] the companion of many pleasant and some laborious hours, whilst I
have been contemplating with him ("_volti a levante_") that Orient in
which I also had spent years not a few.

* * * * *

And as the writer lingered over this conclusion, his thoughts wandered
back in reverie to those many venerable libraries in which he had formerly
made search for mediaeval copies of the Traveller's story; and it seemed
to him as if he sate in a recess of one of these with a manuscript before
him which had never till then been examined with any care, and which he
found with delight to contain passages that appear in no version of the
Book hitherto known. It was written in clear Gothic text, and in the Old
French tongue of the early 14th century. Was it possible that he had
lighted on the long-lost original of Ramusio's Version? No; it proved to
be different. Instead of the tedious story of the northern wars, which
occupies much of our Fourth Book, there were passages occurring in the
later history of Ser Marco, some years after his release from the Genoese
captivity. They appeared to contain strange anachronisms certainly; but we
have often had occasion to remark on puzzles in the chronology of Marco's
story![7] And in some respects they tended to justify our intimated
suspicion that he was a man of deeper feelings and wider sympathies than
the book of Rusticiano had allowed to appear.[8] Perhaps this time the
Traveller had found an amanuensis whose faculties had not been stiffened
by fifteen years of Malapaga?[9] One of the most important passages ran
thus:--

"Bien est voirs que, apres ce que _Messires Marc Pol_ avoit pris fame et
si estoit demoure plusours ans de sa vie a _Venysse_, il avint que
mourut _Messires Mafes_ qui oncles _Monseignour Marc_ estoit: (et mourut
ausi ses granz chiens mastins qu'avoit amenei dou Catai,[10] et qui
avoit non _Bayan_ pour l'amour au bon chievetain _Bayan Cent-iex_);
adonc n'avoit oncques puis _Messires Marc_ nullui, fors son esclave
_Piere le Tartar_, avecques lequel pouvoit penre soulas a s'entretenir
de ses voiages et des choses dou Levant. Car la gent de _Venysse_ si
avoit de grant piesce moult anuy pris des loncs contes _Monseignour
Marc_; et quand ledit _Messires Marc_ issoit de l'uys sa meson ou Sain
Grisostome, souloient li petit marmot es voies dariere-li courir en
cryant _Messer Marco Milion! cont' a nu un busion!_ que veult dire en
Francois 'Messires Marcs des millions di-nous un de vos gros mensonges.'
En oultre, la Dame _Donate_ fame anuyouse estoit, et de trop estroit
esprit, et plainne de couvoitise.[11] Ansi avint que _Messires Marc_
desiroit es voiages rantrer durement.

"Si se partist de _Venisse_ et chevaucha aux parties d'occident. Et
demoura mainz jours es contrees de _Provence_ et de _France_ et puys
fist passaige aux Ysles de la tremontaingne et s'en retourna par _la
Magne_, si comme vous orrez cy-apres. Et fist-il escripre son voiage
atout les devisements les contrees; mes de la France n'y parloit mie
grantment pour ce que maintes genz la scevent apertement. Et pour ce en
lairons atant, et commencerons d'autres choses, assavoir, de BRETAINGNE
LA GRANT."

_Cy devyse dou roiaume de Bretaingne la grant._

"Et sachies que quand l'en se part de _Cales_, et l'en nage XX ou XXX
milles a trop grant mesaise, si treuve l'en une grandisme Ysle qui
s'apelle _Bretaingne la Grant_. Elle est a une grant royne et n'en fait
treuage a nulluy. Et ensevelissent lor mors, et ont monnoye de chartres
et d'or et d'argent, et ardent pierres noyres, et vivent de marchandises
et d'ars, et ont toutes choses de vivre en grant habondance mais non pas
a bon marchie. Et c'est une Ysle de trop grant richesce, et li marinier
de celle partie dient que c'est li plus riches royaumes qui soit ou
monde, et qu'il y a li mieudre marinier dou monde et li mieudre coursier
et li mieudre chevalier (ains ne chevauchent mais lonc com Francois).
Ausi ont-il trop bons homes d'armes et vaillans durement (bien que maint
n'y ait), et les dames et damoseles bonnes et loialles, et belles com
lys souef florant. Et quoi vous en diroie-je? Il y a citez et chasteau
assez, et tant de marcheanz et si riches qui font venir tant d'avoir-de-
poiz et de toute espece de marchandise qu'il n'est hons qui la verite en
sceust dire. Font venir _d'Ynde_ et d'autres parties coton a grant
plante, et font venir soye de _Manzi_ et de _Bangala_, et font venir
laine des ysles de la Mer Occeane et de toutes parties. Et si labourent
maintz bouquerans et touailles et autres draps de coton et de laine et
de soye. Encores sachies que ont vaines d'acier assez, et si en
labourent trop soubtivement de tous hernois de chevalier, et de toutes
choses besoignables a ost; ce sont espees et glaive et esperon et heaume
et haches, et toute espece d arteillerie et de coutelerie, et en font
grant gaaigne et grant marchandise. Et en font si grant habondance que
tout li mondes en y puet avoir et a bon marchie".

_Encores cy devise dou dyt roiaume, et de ce qu'en dist Messires
Marcs._

"Et sachies que tient icelle Royne la seigneurie de _l'Ynde majeure_ et
de _Mutfili_ et de _Bangala_, et d'une moitie de _Mien_. Et moult est
saige et noble dame et pourveans, si que est elle amee de chascun. Et
avoit jadis mari; et depuys qu'il mourut bien _XIV_ ans avoit; adonc la
royne sa fame l'ama tant que oncques puis ne se voult marier a nullui,
pour l'amour le prince son baron, ancois moult maine quoye vie. Et tient
son royaume ausi bien ou miex que oncques le tindrent li roy si aioul.
Mes ores en ce royaume li roy n'ont guieres pooir, ains la poissance
commence a trespasser a la menue gent Et distrent aucun marinier de
celes parties a _Monseignour Marc_ que hui-et-le jour li royaumes soit
auques abastardi come je vous diroy. Car bien est voirs que ci-arrieres
estoit ciz pueple de _Bretaingne la Grant_ bonne et granz et loialle
gent qui servoit Diex moult volontiers selonc lor usaige; et tuit li
labour qu'il labouroient et portoient a vendre estoient honnestement
laboure, et dou greigneur vaillance, et chose pardurable; et se
vendoient a jouste pris sanz barguignier. En tant que se aucuns labours
portoit l'estanpille _Bretaingne la Grant_ c'estoit regardei com pleges
de bonne estoffe. Mes orendroit li labours n'est mie tousjourz si bons;
et quand l'en achate pour un quintal pesant de toiles de coton, adonc,
par trop souvent, si treuve l'en de chascun C pois de coton, bien XXX ou
XL pois de plastre de gifs, ou de blanc d'Espaigne, ou de choses
semblables. Et se l'en achate de cammeloz ou de tireteinne ou d'autre
dras de laine, cist ne durent mie, ains sont plain d'empoise, ou de glu
et de balieures.

"Et bien qu'il est voirs que chascuns hons egalement doit de son cors
servir son seigneur ou sa commune, pour aler en ost en tens de
besoingne; et bien que trestuit li autre royaume d'occident tieingnent
ce pour ordenance, ciz pueple de _Bretaingne la Grant_ n'en veult
nullement, ains si dient: 'Veez-la: n'avons nous pas la _Manche_ pour
fosse de nostre pourpris, et pourquoy nous penerons-nous pour nous faire
homes d'armes, en lessiant nos gaaignes et nos soulaz? Cela lairons aus
soudaiers.' Or li preudhome entre eulx moult scevent bien com tiex
paroles sont nyaises; mes si ont paour de lour en dire la verite pour ce
que cuident desplaire as bourjois et a la menue gent.