The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1 / Page 738 (Color Image)

0738	The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1

424

MARCO POLO BOOK II.

larger, one tornesel ; one, a little larger still, is worth

half a silver groat of Venice ; another a whole groat ;

others yet two groats, five groats, and ten groats.

There is also a kind worth one Bezant of gold, and

others of three Bezants, and so up to ten. All these

pieces of paper are [issued with as much solemnity and

authority as if they were of pure gold or silver ; and on

every piece a variety of officials, whose duty it is, have to

write their names, and to put their seals. And when all

is prepared duly, the chief officer deputed by the Kaan

smears the Seal entrusted to him with vermilion, and

impresses it on the paper, so that the form of the Seal

remains printed upon it in red ; the Money is then

authentic. Any one forging it would be punished with

death.] And the Kaan causes every year to be made

such a vast quantity of this money, which costs him

nothing, that it must equal in amount all the treasure

in the world.

With these pieces of paper, made as I have described,

he causes all payments on his own account to be made ;

and he makes them to pass current universally over all

his kingdoms and provinces and territories, and whither-

soever his power and sovereignty extends. And nobody,

however important he may think himself, dares to refuse

them on pain of death. And indeed everybody takes

them readily, for wheresoever a person may go through-

out the Great Kaan's dominions he shall find these

pieces of paper current, and shall be able to transact all

såles and purchases of goods by means of them just as

well as if they were coins of pure gold. And all the

while they are so light that ten bezants' worth does not

weigh one golden bezant.

Furthermore all merchants arriving from India or

other countries, and bringing with them gold or silver

or gems and pearls, are prohibited from selling to any one

National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books