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| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
i
92
INTRODUCTION
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56. I I. The next Type is that of the French MSS. on which
M. Pauthier's Text is based, and for which he claims the highest
Second ; authority, as having had the mature revision and
the re-
modelled sanction of the Traveller. There are, as far as I know,
Text, fol. five MSS. which may be classed together under this
lowed by
Pauthier. type, three in the Great Paris Library, one at Bern, and
one in the Bodleian.
The high claims made by Pauthier on behalf of this class of
MSS. (on the first three of which his Text is formed) rest mainly
upon the kind of certificate which two of them bear regarding
the presentation of a copy by Marco Polo to Thibault de Cepoy,
which we have already quoted (supra, p. 69). This certificate is
held by Pauthier to imply that the original of the copies which
bear it, and of those having a general correspondence with them,
had the special seal of Marco's revision and approval. To
some considerable extent their character is corroborative of such
a claim, but they are far from having the perfection which
Pauthier attributes to them, and which leads him into many
paradoxes.
It is not possible to interpret rigidly the bearing of this so-
called certificate, as if no copies had previously been taken of
any form of the Book ; nor can we allow it to impugn the
authenticity of the Geographic Text, which demonstratively
represents an older original, and has been (as we have seen) the
parent of all other versions, including some very old ones,
Italian and Latin, which certainly owe nothing to this revision.
The first idea apparently entertained by d'Avezac and
Paulin Paris was that the Geographic Text was itself the
copy given to the Sieur de Cepoy, and that the differences in
the copies of the class which we describe as Type II. merely
resulted from the modifications which would naturally arise in
the process of transcription into purer French. But closer
examination showed the differences to be too great and too
marked to admit of this explanation. These differences consist
not only in the conversion of the rude, obscure, and half Italian
language of the original into good French of the period. There
is also very considerable curtailment, generally of tautology, but
also extending often to circumstances of substantial interest ;
whilst we observe the omission of a few notably erroneous
statements or expressions ; and a few insertions of small im-
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