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| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
144 MARCO POLO 13ooK I.
The Arabic narrative is too long to extract. It is from a kind of historical romance called The Itle,noij s of Hakim, the date of which Hammer unfortunately omits to give. Its close coincidence in substance with Polo's story is quite remarkable. After a detailed description of the Paradise, and the transfer into it of the aspirant under the influence of bans, on his awaking and seeing his chief enter, he says, " O chief ! am I awake or am I dreaming ? " To which the chief : " O such an One, take heed that thou tell not the dream to any stranger. Know that Ali thy Lord hath vouchsafed to show thee the place destined for thee in Paradise. . . . Hesitate not a moment therefore in the service of the Imam who thus deigns to intimate his contentment with thee," and so on.
William de Nangis thus speaks of the Syrian Shaikh, who alone was known to the Crusaders, though one of their historians (Jacques de Vitry, in Bongars, I. 1062) shows knowledge that the headquarters of the sect was in Persia : " He was much dreaded far and near, by both Saracens and Christians, because he so often caused princes of both classes indifferently to be murdered by his emissaries. For he used to bring up in his palace youths belonging to his territory, and had them taught a variety of languages, and above all things to fear their Lord and obey him unto death, which would thus become to them an entrance into the joys of Paradise. And whosoever of them thus perished in carrying out his Lord's behests was worshipped as an angel." As an instance of the implicit obedience rendered by the Fidáwí or devoted disciples of the Shaikh, Fra Pipino and Marino Sanuto relate that when Henry Count of Champagne (titular King of Jerusalem) was on a visit to the Old Man of Syria, one day as they walked together they saw some lads in white sitting on the top of a high tower. The Shaikh, turning to the Count, asked if he had any subjects as obedient as his own ? and without giving time for reply made a sign to two of the boys, who immediately leapt from the tower, and were killed on the spot. The same story is told in the Cento Novelle Antiche, as happening when the Emperor Frederic was on a visit (imaginary) to the Veglio. And it is introduced likewise as an incident in the Romance of Bauduin de Sebourc :
" Voilés veioir merveilles ? dist li Rois Seignouris "
to Bauduin and his friends, and on their assenting he makes the signal to one of his men on the battlements, and in a twinkling
" Quant le vinrent en l'air salant de tel avis,
Et aussi liément, et aussi esj ois,
Qu'il deust conquester mil livres de parisis !
Ains qu'il venist a tiére il fut mors et fenis,
Suries roches agues desrompis corps et pis," " etc.
(Cathay, 153 ; Rémusat, Nouv. lllil. I. 178 ; Mines de l'Orient, III. 201 senq. ; Nangis in Duchesne, V. 332 ; Pipino in 1lluratori, IX. 705 : DefrJmely in J. As. sér. V. tom. v. 34 seqq. ; Cent. Nov. Antiche, Firenze, 1572, p. 91 ; Bauduin de
Sebourc, I. 359. )
The following are some of the more notable murders or attempts at murder
ascribed to the Ismailite emissaries either from Syria or from Persia :-
A.D. 1092. Nizum-ul-Mulk, formerly the powerful minister of Malik Shah, Seljukian sovereign of Persia, and a little later his two sons. 1102. The Prince of Horns, in the chief Mosque of that city. 1113. Maudúd, Prince of Mosul, in the chief Mosque of Damascus. About 1114. Abul Muzafar 'Ali, Wazir of Sanjár Shah, and Chakar Beg, grand-uncle of the latter. 1116. Ahmed Yel, Prince of Maragha, at Baghdad, in the presence of Mahomed, Sultan of Persia. 1121. The Amir
* This story has been transferred to Peter the Great, who is alleged to have exhibited the docility of his subjects in the same way to the King of Denmark, by ordering a Cossack to jump from the Round Tower at Copenhagen, on the summit of which they were standing.
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