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0246 Cathay and the Way Thither : vol.2
Cathay and the Way Thither : vol.2 / Page 246 (Color Image)

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doi: 10.20676/00000042
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486   TRAVELS OF IBN BATIITA IN BENGAL, CHINA,

must tell you that the first Chinese city that I reached after crossing the sea was ZAITÛN.1 Although Zaitun signifies olives in Arabic, there are no olives here any more than elsewhere in India and China ; only that is the name of the place. It is a great city, superb indeed, and in it they make damasks of velvet as well as those of satin, which are called from the name of the city Zaituniah ;2' they are superior to the stuffs of Khans6 and Kh6nbu lik. The harbour of Zaitun is one of the greatest in the world,—I am wrong : it is the greatest ! I have seen there about one hundred first-class junks together ; as for small ones they were past counting. The harbour is formed by a great estuary which runs inland from the sea until it joins the Great River.

In this, as in every other city of China, every inhabitant has a garden, a field, and his house in the middle of it, exactly as we have it in the city of Segelmessa. It is for

1 Were there doubt as to the identity of Zayton, Abulfeda's notice would settle it. For he tells us expressly that Zayton is otherwise called Shanju (Chin-cheu, the name by which Thsivan-cheu was known to the early Portuguese traders, and by which it still appears in many maps).

2 The words translated after Defrémery as velvet and satin are kimkhw0., and atalas. There may be some doubt whether the former word should be rendered velvet, as it is the original of the European cammocca and the Indian kinkhwa, of which the former seems to have been a damasked silk, and the latter is a silk damasked in gold (see p. 295 supra). The word Atalas seems to correspond closely to the Italian raso, as it signifies both a close-shaven face and a satin texture. It has been domesticated in Germany as the word for satin (Atlass), and is used also in old English travels. I have a strong suspicion that the term Zaituniah in the text is the origin of our word satin. The possible derivation from seta is obvious. But among the textures of the 15th century named in the book of G. Uzzano (supra p. 281) we find repeated mention of Zetani, Zettani vellutati, Zettani broccati tra oro, etc., which looks very like the transition from Zaituni to satin, whilst the ordinary word for silk is by the sanie author always spelt seta. The analogous derivation of so many other names of textures from the places whence they were imported may be quoted in support of this, e.g., Muslin (Mosul), Damask (Damascus), Cambric (Cambray), Arras Diaper (d'Yprès), Calico (Calicut); whilst we know that Genoese merchants traded at Zayton (supra p. 224). I see that F. Johnson's Diet. distinguishes in Persian between " Kamkhc , Damask silk of one colour", and " Kimkhd,, Damask silk of different colours".