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National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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| IIIF Color HighRes |
| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
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PERSONAL HISTORY OF THE TRAVELLERS 21
northern frontier of China they at last reached the presence of
the Kaan, who was at his usual summer retreat at Kai-ping fu,
near the base of the Khingan Mountains, and nearly ioo miles
north of the Great Wall at Kalgan. If there be no mistake in
the time (three years and a half) ascribed to this journey in all
the existing texts, the travellers did not reach the Court till
about May of 1275.*
20. Kúblái received the Venetians with great cordiality,
and took kindly to young Mark, who must have been by this
time one-and-twenty. The Joenne Bacheler, as the
Marco's
story calls him, applied himself to the acquisition of employment
by Kúblái
the languages and written characters in chief use Kaan ; and
his journeys.
among the multifarious nationalities included in the
Kaan's Court and administration ; and Kúblái after a time,
seeing his discretion and ability, began to employ him in the
public service. M. Pauthier has found a record in the Chinese
Annals of the Mongol Dynasty, which states that in the year
1277, a certain POLO was nominated a second-class corn-
missioner or agent attached to the Privy Council, a passage
which we are happy to believe to refer to our young traveller.t
His first mission apparently was that which carried him
through the provinces of Shan-si, Shen-si, and Sze-ch'wan, and
the wild country on the East of Tibet, to the remote province of
Yun-nan, called by the Mongols Karájàng, and which had been
partially conquered by an army under Kúblái himself in 1253,
before his accession to the throne. + Mark, during his stay at
court, had observed the Kaan's delight in hearing of strange
countries, their marvels, manners, and oddities, and had heard
* Half a year earlier, if we suppose the three years and a half to count from Venice rather than Acre. But at that season (November) Kúblái would not have been at Kai-ping fu (otherwise Shang-tu).
Pauthier, p. ix., and p. 361.
$ That this was Marco's first mission is positively stated in the Ramusian edition ; and though this may be only an editor's gloss it seems well-founded. The French texts say only that the Great Kaan, " l'envoia en un message en une terre ou bien avoit vj. mois de chemin." The traveller's actual Itinerary affords to Vochan (Yung-ch'ang), on the frontier of Burma, 147 days' journey, which with halts might well be reckoned six months in round estimate. And we are enabled by various circumstances to fix the date of the Yun-nan journey between 1277 and 1280. The former limit is determined by Polo's account of the battle with the Burmese, near Vochan, which took place according to the Chinese Annals in 1277. The latter is fixed by bis mention of Kúblái's son, Mangalai, as governing at Kenjanfu (Si-ngan fu), a prince who died in 1280. (See vol. ii. pp. 24, 31, also 64, So.)
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