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| The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.2 |
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Citation Information
CHAP. LXXIV. MASSACRE OF THE ALANS
179
way in, they lighted upon some good wine. Of this they
drank until they were all drunk, and then they lay down
and slept like so many swine. So when night fell, the
'townspeople, seeing that they were all dead-drunk, fell
upon them and slew them all ; not a man escaped.
And when I3ayan heard that the townspeople had thus
treacherously slain his men, he sent another Admiral of
his with a great force, and stormed the city, and put the
whole of the inhabitants to the sword ; not a man of
them escaped death. And thus the whole population of
that city was exterminated.3
Now we will go on, and I will tell you of another city
called Suju.
NOTE .—Both the position and the story which follows identify this city with CIIANG-CHAU. The name is written in Pauthier's MSS. Chingin,zay, in the G. T. Ciug jaw i and Cingkiiz ui, in Ram usio Tinguigui.
The capture of Chang-chau by Gordon's force, I i th May 1864, was the final achievement of that " Ever Victorious Army."
Regarding the territory here spoken of, once so rich and densely peopled, Mr. Medhurst says, in reference to the effects of the T'ai-P'ing insurrection : " I can conceive of no more melancholy sight than the acres of ground that one passes through strewn with remains of once thriving cities, and the miles upon miles of rich land, once carefully parcelled out into fields and gardens, but now only growing coarse grass and brambles—the home of the pheasant, the deer, and the wild pig." (Foreigner in Far Cathay, p. 94.)
NOTE 2.—The relics of the Alans were settled on the northern skirts of the Caucasus, where they made a stout resistance to the Mongols, but eventually became subjects of the Khans of Sarai. The name by which they were usually known in Asia in the Middle Ages was Aas, and this name is assigned to them by Carpini, Rubruquis, and josafat Barbaro, as well as by Ibn Batuta. Mr. Iloworth has lately denied the identity of Alans and Aas ; but he treats the question as all one with the identity of Alans and Ossethi, which is another matter, as may be seen in Vivien de St. Martin's elaborate paper on the Alans (N. Ann. des Voyages, 1848, tom. 3, p. I29 seqq.). The Alans are mentioned by the Byzantine historian, Pachymeres, among nations whom the Mongols had assimilated to themselves and adopted into their military service. Gaubil, without being aware of the identity of the Asu (as the name Aas appears to be expressed in the Chinese Annals), beyond the fact that they dwelt somewhere near the Caspian, observes that this people, after they were conquered, furnished many excellent officers to the Mongols ; and he mentions also that when the Mongol army was first equipt for the conquest of Southern China, many officers took service therein from among the Uighúrs, Persians, and Arabs, Kincha (people of hipchak), the Asu and other foreign nations. We find also, at a later period of the Mongol history (1336), letters reaching Pope Benedict XII. from several Christian Alans holding high office at the court of Cambaluc—one of them being a Ching-sang or Minister of the First Rank, and another a Fanchang or Minister of the Second Order—in which they conveyed their urgent request for the nomination of an Arch-
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