The Travels of Marco Polo
Chapter 21 : II. SKETCH OF THE STATE OF THE EAST AT THE TIME OF THE JOURNEYS OF THE POLO FAMILY.9. T

II. SKETCH OF THE STATE OF THE EAST AT THE TIME OF THE JOURNEYS OF THE POLO FAMILY.

9. The story of the travels of the Polo family opens in 1260.

[Sidenote: State of the Levant.]

Christendom had recovered from the alarm into which it had been thrown some 18 years before when the Tartar cataclysm had threatened to engulph it. The Tartars themselves were already becoming an object of curiosity rather than of fear, and soon became an object of hope, as a possible help against the old Mahomedan foe. The frail Latin throne in Constantinople was still standing, but tottering to its fall. The successors of the Crusaders still held the Coast of Syria from Antioch to Jaffa, though a deadlier brood of enemies than they had yet encountered was now coming to maturity in the Dynasty of the Mamelukes, which had one foot firmly planted in Cairo, the other in Damascus. The jealousies of the commercial republics of Italy were daily waxing greater. The position of Genoese trade on the coasts of the Aegean was greatly depressed, through the predominance which Venice had acquired there by her part in the expulsion of the Greek Emperors, and which won for the Doge the lofty style of Lord of Three-Eighths of the Empire of Romania. But Genoa was biding her time for an early revenge, and year by year her naval strength and skill were increasing. Both these republics held possessions and establishments in the ports of Syria, which were often the scene of sanguinary conflicts between their citizens. Alexandria was still largely frequented in the intervals of war as the great emporium of Indian wares, but the facilities afforded by the Mongol conquerors who now held the whole tract from the Persian Gulf to the sh.o.r.es of the Caspian and of the Black Sea, or nearly so, were beginning to give a great advantage to the caravan routes which debouched at the ports of Cilician Armenia in the Mediterranean and at Trebizond on the Euxine. Tana (or Azov) had not as yet become the outlet of a similar traffic; the Venetians had apparently frequented to some extent the coast of the Crimea for local trade, but their rivals appear to have been in great measure excluded from this commerce, and the Genoese establishments which so long flourished on that coast, are first heard of some years after a Greek dynasty was again in possession of Constantinople.[1]

[Sidenote: The various Mongol Sovereignties in Asia and Eastern Europe.]

10. In Asia and Eastern Europe scarcely a dog might bark without Mongol leave, from the borders of Poland and the Gulf of Scanderoon to the Amur and the Yellow Sea. The vast empire which Chinghiz had conquered still owned a nominally supreme head in the Great Kaan,[2] but practically it was splitting up into several great monarchies under the descendants of the four sons of Chinghiz, Juji, Chaghatai, Okkodai, and Tuli; and wars on a vast scale were already brewing between them. Hulaku, third son of Tuli, and brother of two Great Kaans, Mangku and Kublai, had become practically independent as ruler of Persia, Babylonia, Mesopotamia, and Armenia, though he and his sons, and his sons' sons, continued to stamp the name of the Great Kaan upon their coins, and to use the Chinese seals of state which he bestowed upon them. The Seljukian Sultans of Iconium, whose dominion bore the proud t.i.tle of Rum (Rome), were now but the struggling bondsmen of the Ilkhans. The Armenian Hayton in his Cilician Kingdom had pledged a more frank allegiance to the Tartar, the enemy of his Moslem enemies.

Barka, son of Juji, the first ruling prince of the House of Chinghiz to turn Mahomedan, reigned on the steppes of the Volga, where a standing camp, which eventually became a great city under the name of Sarai, had been established by his brother and predecessor Batu.

The House of Chaghatai had settled upon the pastures of the Ili and the valley of the Jaxartes, and ruled the wealthy cities of Sogdiana.

Kaidu, the grandson of Okkodai who had been the successor of Chinghiz in the Kaans.h.i.+p, refused to acknowledge the transfer of the supreme authority to the House of Tuli, and was through the long life of Kublai a thorn in his side, perpetually keeping his north-western frontier in alarm. His immediate authority was exercised over some part of what we should now call Eastern Turkestan and Southern Central Siberia; whilst his hordes of hors.e.m.e.n, force of character, and close neighbourhood brought the Khans of Chaghatai under his influence, and they generally acted in concert with him.

The chief throne of the Mongol Empire had just been ascended by Kublai, the most able of its occupants after the Founder. Before the death of his brother and predecessor Mangku, who died in 1259 before an obscure fortress of Western China, it had been intended to remove the seat of government from Kara Korum on the northern verge of the Mongolian Desert to the more populous regions that had been conquered in the further East, and this step, which in the end converted the Mongol Kaan into a Chinese Emperor,[3] was carried out by Kublai.

[Sidenote: China.]

11. For about three centuries the Northern provinces of China had been detached from native rule, and subject to foreign dynasties; first to the _Khitan_, a people from the basin of the Sungari River, and supposed (but doubtfully) to have been akin to the Tunguses, whose rule subsisted for 200 years, and originated the name of KHITAI, Khata, or CATHAY, by which for nearly 1000 years China has been known to the nations of Inner Asia, and to those whose acquaintance with it was got by that channel.[4] The Khitan, whose dynasty is known in Chinese history as the _Liao_ or "Iron,"

had been displaced in 1123 by the Churches or Niu-chen, another race of Eastern Tartary, of the same blood as the modern Manchus, whose Emperors in their brief period of prosperity were known by the Chinese name of Tai-_Kin_, by the Mongol name of the _Altun_ Kaans, both signifying "Golden." Already in the lifetime of Chinghiz himself the northern Provinces of China Proper, including their capital, known as Chung-tu or Yen-King, now Peking, had been wrenched from them, and the conquest of the dynasty was completed by Chinghiz's successor Okkodai in 1234.

Southern China still remained in the hands of the native dynasty of the Sung, who had their capital at the great city now well known as Hang-chau fu. Their dominion was still substantially untouched, but its subjugation was a task to which Kublai before many years turned his attention, and which became the most prominent event of his reign.

[Sidenote: India, and Indo-China.]

12. In India the most powerful sovereign was the Sultan of Delhi, Na.s.siruddin Mahmud of the Turki House of Ilt.i.tmish;[5] but, though both Sind and Bengal acknowledged his supremacy, no part of Peninsular India had yet been invaded, and throughout the long period of our Traveller's residence in the East the Kings of Delhi had their hands too full, owing to the incessant incursions of the Mongols across the Indus, to venture on extensive campaigning in the south. Hence the Dravidian Kingdoms of Southern India were as yet untouched by foreign conquest, and the acc.u.mulated gold of ages lay in their temples and treasuries, an easy prey for the coming invader.

In the Indo-Chinese Peninsula and the Eastern Islands a variety of kingdoms and dynasties were expanding and contracting, of which we have at best but dim and s.h.i.+fting glimpses. That they were advanced in wealth and art, far beyond what the present state of those regions would suggest, is attested by vast and magnificent remains of Architecture, nearly all dating, so far as dates can be ascertained, from the 12th to the 14th centuries (that epoch during which an architectural afflatus seems to have descended on the human race), and which are found at intervals over both the Indo-Chinese continent and the Islands, as at Pagan in Burma, at Ayuthia in Siam, at Angkor in Kamboja, at Borobodor and Brambanan in Java.

All these remains are deeply marked by Hindu influence, and, at the same time, by strong peculiarities, both generic and individual.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Autograph of Hayton, King of Armenia, circa A.D. 1243.

"... e por so qui cestes lettres soient fermes e establis ci avuns escrit l'escrit de notre main vermoil e sayele de notre ceau pendant...."]

[1] See Heyd, _Le Colonie Commerciali degli Italiani_, etc., pa.s.sim.

[2] We endeavour to preserve throughout the book the distinction that was made in the age of the Mongol Empire between _Khan_ and _Kaan_ ([Arabic] and [Arabic] as written by Arabic and Persian authors). The former may be rendered _Lord_, and was applied generally to Tartar chiefs whether sovereign or not; it has since become in Persia, and especially in Afghanistan, a sort of "Esq.," and in India is now a common affix in the names of (Musulman) Hindustanis of all cla.s.ses; in Turkey alone it has been reserved for the Sultan. _Kaan_, again, appears to be a form of _Khakan_, the [Greek: Chaganos] of the Byzantine historians, and was the peculiar t.i.tle of the supreme sovereign of the Mongols; the Mongol princes of Persia, Chaghatai, etc., were ent.i.tled only to the former affix (Khan), though _Kaan_ and _Khakan_ are sometimes applied to them in adulation. Polo always writes _Kaan_ as applied to the Great Khan, and does not, I think, use _Khan_ in any form, styling the subordinate princes by their name only, as _Argon, Alau_, etc. _Ilkhan_ was a special t.i.tle a.s.sumed by Hulaku and his successors in Persia; it is said to be compounded from a word _Il_, signifying tribe or nation. The relation between _Khan_ and _Khakan_ seems to be probably that the latter signifies "_Khan of Khans_" Lord of Lords. Chinghiz, it is said, did not take the higher t.i.tle; it was first a.s.sumed by his son Okkodai. But there are doubts about this. (See _Quatremere's Ras.h.i.+d_, pp. 10 seqq. and _Pavet de Courteille, Dict. Turk-Oriental._) The tendency of swelling t.i.tles is always to degenerate, and when the value of Khan had sunk, a new form, _Khan-khanan_, was devised at the Court of Delhi, and applied to one of the high officers of state.

[Mr. Rockhill writes (_Rubruck_, p. 108, note): "The t.i.tle _Khan_, though of very great antiquity, was only used by the Turks after A.D.

560, at which time the use of the word _Khatun_ came in use for the wives of the Khan, who himself was termed _Ilkhan_. The older t.i.tle of _Shan-yu_ did not, however, completely disappear among them, for Albiruni says that in his time the chief of the Ghuz Turks, or Turkomans, still bore the t.i.tle of _Jenuyeh_, which Sir Henry Rawlinson (_Proc. R. G. S._, v. 15) takes to be the same word as that transcribed _Shan-yu_ by the Chinese (see _Ch'ien Han shu_, Bk. 94, and _Chou shu_, Bk. 50, 2). Although the word _Khakhan_ occurs in Menander's account of the emba.s.sy of Zemarchus, the earliest mention I have found of it in a Western writer is in the _Chronicon_ of Albericus Trium Fontium, where (571), under the year 1239, he uses it in the form _Caca.n.u.s_"--Cf. _Terrien de Lacouperie, Khan, Khakan, and other Tartar t.i.tles_. Lond., Dec. 1888.--H. C.]

[3] "China is a sea that salts all the rivers that flow into it."--_P.

Parrenin_ in _Lett. edif._ XXIV. 58.

[4] E.g. the Russians still call it Khitai. The pair of names, _Khitai_ and _Machin_, or Cathay and China, is a.n.a.logous to the other pair, _Seres_ and _Sinae_. _Seres_ was the name of the great nation in the far East as known by land, _Sinae_ as known by sea; and they were often supposed to be diverse, just as Cathay and China were afterwards.

[5] There has been much doubt about the true form of this name.

_Ilt.i.tmish_ is that sanctioned by Mr. Blochmann (see _Proc. As. Soc.

Bengal_, 1870, p. 181).

III. THE POLO FAMILY. PERSONAL HISTORY OF THE TRAVELLERS DOWN TO THEIR FINAL RETURN FROM THE EAST.

[Sidenote: Alleged origin of the Polos.]

13. In days when History and Genealogy were allowed to draw largely on the imagination for the _origines_ of states and families, it was set down by one Venetian Antiquary that among the companions of King Venetus, or of Prince Antenor of Troy, when they settled on the northern sh.o.r.es of the Adriatic, there was one LUCIUS POLUS, who became the progenitor of our Traveller's Family;[1] whilst another deduces it from PAOLO the first Doge[2] (Paulus Lucas Anafestus of Heraclea, A.D. 696).

More trustworthy traditions, recorded among the Family Histories of Venice, but still no more it is believed than traditions, represent the Family of Polo as having come from Sebenico in Dalmatia, in the 11th century.[3] Before the end of the century they had taken seats in the Great Council of the Republic; for the name of Domenico Polo is said to be subscribed to a grant of 1094, that of Pietro Polo to an act of the time of the Doge Domenico Michiele in 1122, and that of a Domenico Polo to an acquittance granted by the Doge Domenico Morosini and his Council in 1153.[4]

The ascertained genealogy of the Traveller, however, begins only with his grandfather, who lived in the early part of the 13th century.

Two branches of the Polo Family were then recognized, distinguished by the _confini_ or Parishes in which they lived, as Polo of S. Geremia, and Polo of S. Felice. ANDREA POLO of S. Felice was the father of three sons, MARCO, NICOLO, and MAFFEO. And Nicolo was the Father of our Marco.

[Sidenote: Claims to be styled n.o.ble.]

14. Till quite recently it had never been precisely ascertained whether the immediate family of our Traveller belonged to the _n.o.bles_ of Venice properly so called, who had seats in the Great Council and were enrolled in the Libro d'Oro. Ramusio indeed styles our Marco _n.o.bile_ and _Magnifico_, and Rusticiano, the actual scribe of the Traveller's recollections, calls him "_sajes et n.o.ble citaiens de Venece_," but Ramusio's accuracy and Rusticiano's precision were scarcely to be depended on. Very recently, however, since the subject has been discussed with accomplished students of the Venice Archives, proofs have been found establis.h.i.+ng Marco's personal claim to n.o.bility, inasmuch as both in judicial decisions and in official resolutions of the Great Council, he is designated _n.o.bilis Vir_, a formula which would never have been used in such doc.u.ments (I am a.s.sured) had he not been technically n.o.ble.[5]

[Sidenote: Marco the Elder.]

15. Of the three sons of Andrea Polo of S. Felice, Marco seems to have been the eldest, and Maffeo the youngest.[6] They were all engaged in commerce, and apparently in a partners.h.i.+p, which to some extent held good even when the two younger had been many years absent in the Far East.[7]

Marco seems to have been established for a time at Constantinople,[8] and also to have had a house (no doubt of business) at Soldaia, in the Crimea, where his son and daughter, Nicolo and Maroca by name, were living in 1280. This year is the date of the Elder Marco's Will, executed at Venice, and when he was "weighed down by bodily ailment." Whether he survived for any length of time we do not know.

[Sidenote: Nicolo and Maffeo commence their travels.]

16. Nicolo Polo, the second of the Brothers, had two legitimate sons, MARCO, the Author of our Book, born in 1254,[9] and MAFFEO, of whose place in the family we shall have a few words to say presently. The story opens, as we have said, in 1260, when we find the two brothers, Nicolo and Maffeo the Elder, at Constantinople. How long they had been absent from Venice we are not distinctly told. Nicolo had left his wife there behind him; Maffeo apparently was a bachelor. In the year named they started on a trading venture to the Crimea, whence a succession of openings and chances, recounted in the Introductory chapters of Marco's work, carried them far north along the Volga, and thence first to Bokhara, and then to the Court of the Great Kaan Kublai in the Far East, on or within the borders of CATHAY. That a great and civilized country so called existed in the extremity of Asia had already been reported in Europe by the Friars Plano Carpini (1246) and William Rubruquis (1253), who had not indeed reached its frontiers, but had met with its people at the Court of the Great Kaan in Mongolia; whilst the latter of the two with characteristic ac.u.men had seen that they were identical with the Seres of cla.s.sic fame.

[Sidenote: Their intercourse with Kublai Kaan.]

17. Kublai had never before fallen in with European gentlemen. He was delighted with these Venetians, listened with strong interest to all that they had to tell him of the Latin world, and determined to send them back as his amba.s.sadors to the Pope, accompanied by an officer of his own Court. His letters to the Pope, as the Polos represent them, were mainly to desire the despatch of a large body of educated missionaries to convert his people to Christianity. It is not likely that religious motives influenced Kublai in this, but he probably desired religious aid in softening and civilizing his rude kinsmen of the Steppes, and judged, from what he saw in the Venetians and heard from them, that Europe could afford such aid of a higher quality than the degenerate Oriental Christians with whom he was familiar, or the Tibetan Lamas on whom his patronage eventually devolved when Rome so deplorably failed to meet his advances.

[Sidenote: Their return home, and Marco's appearance on the scene.]

18. The Brothers arrived at Acre in April,[10] 1269, and found that no Pope existed, for Clement IV. was dead the year before, and no new election had taken place. So they went home to Venice to see how things stood there after their absence of so many years.

The wife of Nicolo was no longer among the living, but he found his son Marco a fine lad of fifteen.

The best and most authentic MSS. tell us no more than this. But one cla.s.s of copies, consisting of the Latin version made by our Traveller's contemporary, Francesco Pipino, and of the numerous editions based indirectly upon it, represents that Nicolo had left Venice when Marco was as yet unborn, and consequently had never seen him till his return from the East in 1269.[11]

We have mentioned that Nicolo Polo had another legitimate son, by name Maffeo, and him we infer to have been younger than Marco, because he is named last (_Marcus et Matheus_) in the Testament of their uncle Marco the Elder. We do not know if they were by the same mother. They could not have been so if we are right in supposing Maffeo to have been the younger, and if Pipino's version of the history be genuine. If however we reject the latter, as I incline to do, no ground remains for supposing that Nicolo went to the East much before we find him there viz., in 1260, and Maffeo may have been born of the same mother during the interval between 1254 and 1260. If on the other hand Pipino's version be held to, we must suppose that Maffeo (who is named by his uncle in 1280, during his father's second absence in the East) was born of a marriage contracted during Nicolo's residence at home after his first journey, a residence which lasted from 1269 to 1271.[12]