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| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
r_
134
INTRODUCTION
~
Mediceo (in the Laurentian Library), of which an extract is
engraved in the atlas of Baldelli-Boni's Polo. I need not
The Catalan
describe it however, because I cannot satisfy myself
Map of 1375, that it makes much use of Polo's contributions, and
the most
complete its facts have been embodied in a more ambitious
mediwval
embodiment work of the next generation, the celebrated Catalan
of Polo's
Geography. Map of 1375 in the great Library of Paris. This also,
but on a larger scale and in a more comprehensive manner, is
an honest endeavour to represent the known world on the basis
of collected facts, casting aside all theories pseudo-scientific or
pseudo-theological ; and a very remarkable work it is. In this
map it seems to me Marco Polo's influence, I will not say on
geography, but on map-making, is seen to the greatest advan-
tage. His Book is the basis of the Map as regards Central
and Further Asia, and partially as regards India. His names
are often sadly perverted, and it is not always easy to under-
stand the view that the compiler took of his itineraries. Still
we have Cathay admirably placed in the true position of China,
as a great Empire filling the south-east of Asia. The Eastern
Peninsula of India is indeed absent altogether, but the Penin-
sula of Hither India is for the first time in the History of
Geography represented with a fair approximation to its correct
form and position,* and Sumatra also (Jaua) is not badly
placed. Carajan, Vocian, Mien, and Bangala, are located with
a happy conception of their relation to Cathay and to India.
Many details in India foreign to Polo's book,* and some in
Cathay (as well as in Turkestan and Siberia, which have been
entirely derived from other sources) have been embodied
in the Map. But the study of his Book has, I conceive, been
essentially the basis of those great portions which I have
specified, and the additional matter has not been in mass
sufficient to perplex the compiler. Hence we really see
* I do not see that al-Birúni deserves the credit in this respect assigned to him by Professor Peschel, so far as one can judge from the data given by Sprenger (Peschel, p. 128 ; Post und Reise-Routen, SI-82.)
t For example, Delli, which Polo does not name ; Dio, il (Deogír) ; on the Coromandel coast Setemelti, which I take to be a clerical error for Sette- Templi, the Seven Pagodas ; round the Gulf of Cambay we have Cambetltm (Kambayat), Cocintaya (Kokan-Tana, see vol. ii. p. 396), Goga, Barocke, Neruala (Anharwala), and to the north Mo/tan. Below Multan are Hocibelch and Bargelidoa, two puzzles. The former is, I think, Uch-baligh, showing that part of the information was from Perso-Mongol sources.
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