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| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.2 |
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Citation Information
6o
MARCO POLO BOOK 11.
This was the Cassia, and I can find no words more suitable to describe it than those of Polo which I have just used."—H. C.]
Ethnology.—The Chinese at Ch'êng-tu fu, according to Richthofen, classify the aborigines of the Sze-ch'wan frontier as Man-tzű, Lolo, Si fan, and Tibetan. Of these the Si-fan are furthest north, and extend far into Tibet. The Man-tzú (properly so called) are regarded as the remnant of the ancient occupants of Sze-ch'wan, and now dwell in the mountains about the parallel 30°, and along the Lhása road, Ta-t'sien lu being about the centre of their tract. The Lolo are the wildest and most independent, occupying the mountains on the left of the Kin-sha Kiang where it runs northwards (see above p. 48, and below p. 69) and also to some extent on its right. The Tibetan tribes lie to the west of the Man-tzú, and to the west of Kien-ch'ang. (See next chapter.)
Towards the Lan-ts'ang Kiang is the quasi-Tibetan tribe called by the Chinese Mossos, by the Tibetans Guions, and between the Lan-ts'ang and the Lú-Kiang or Salwen are the Lissús, wild hill-robbers and great musk hunters, like those described by Polo at p. 45. Garnier, who gives these latter particulars, mentions that near the confluence of the Yalung and Kin-sha Kiang there are tribes called Pa-i, as there are in the south of Yun-nan, and, like the latter, of distinctly Shan or Laotian character. He also speaks of Si fan tribes in the vicinity of Li-kiang fu, and coming south of the Kin-sha Kiang even to the east of Ta-li. Of these are told such loose tales as Polo tells of Tebet and Caindu.
[In the Topography of the Yun-nan Province (edition of 1836) there is a catalogue of 141 classes of aborigines, each with a separate name and illustration, without any attempt to arrive at a broader classification. Mr. Bourne has been led to the conviction that exclusive of the Tibetans (including Si-fan and Ku-tsung), there are but three great non-Chinese races in Southern China : the Lolo, the Shan, and the Miao-tzű. (Report, China, No. 1, 1888, p. 87.) This classification is adopted by Dr. Deblenne. (Mission Lyonnaise.)
Man-tzű, Man, is a general name for " barbarian " (see my note in Odoric de Pordenone, p. 248 segq.) ; it is applied as well to the Lolo as to the Si-fan.
Mr. Parker remarks (China Review, XX. p. 345) that the epithet of Man-tzű, or " barbarians," dates from the time when the Shans, Annamese, Miao-tzil, etc., occupied nearly all South China, for it is essentially to the Indo-Chinese that the term Man-tzű belongs.
Mr. Hosie writes (Three years in W. China, 122) : " At the time when Marco Pol© passed through Caindu, this country was in the possession of the Si-fans. . . . At the present day, they occupy the country to the west, and are known under the generic name of Man-tzű."
" It has already been remarked that Si fan, convertible with Man-tzű, is a loose Chinese expression of no ethnological value, meaning nothing more than Western barbarians ; but in a more restricted sense it is used to designate a people (or peoples) which inhabits the valley of the Yalung and the upper T'ung, with contiguous valleys and ranges, from about the twenty-seventh parallel to the borders of Koko-nor. This people is sub-divided into eighteen tribes." (Baber, p. 81.)
Si-fan or Pa-tsiu is the name by which the Chinese call the Tibetan tribes which occupy part of Western China. (Devéria, p. 167.)
Dr. Bretschneider writes (Med. Res. II. p. 24) : " The north-eastern part of Tibet was sometimes designated by the Chinese name Si-fan, and Hyacinth [Bitchurin] is of opinion that in ancient times this name was even applied to the whole of Tibet. Si fan means, `Western Barbarians.' The biographer of HiuenTsang reports that when this traveller, in 629, visited Liang-chau (in the province of Kan-Suh), this city was the entrepôt for merchants from Si fan and the countries east of the Ts'ung-ling mountains. In the history of the Hia and Tangut Empire (in the Sung ski) we read, s. a. 1003, that the founder of this Empire invaded Si fan and then proceeded to Si-liang (Liang-chau). The Yuen-shi reports, s. a. 1268 : ' The (Mongol) Emperor ordered Meng-gu-dai to invade Si fan with 6000 men.' The
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