The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.2 / Page 375 (Color Image)

0375	The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.2

CHAP. XV. HISTORV OF SAGAMONI BORCAN

319

to life again as an ox ; and then he died as an ox and

came to life again as a horse, and so on until he had

died fourscore and four times ; and every time he

became some kind of animal. But when he died the

eighty-fourth time they say he became a god. And

they do hold him for the greatest of all their gods.

And they tell that the aforesaid image of him was the

first idol that the Idolaters ever had ; and from that

have originated all the other idols. And this befel in the

Island of Seilan in India.

The Idolaters come thither on pilgrimage from very

long distances and with great devotion, just as

Christians go to the shrine of Messer Saint James in

Gallicia. And they maintain that the monument on the

mountain is that of the king's son, according to the story

I have been telling you ; and that the teeth, and the

hair, and the dish that are there were those of the same

king's son, whose name was Sagamoni Borcan, or

Sagamoni the Saint. But the Saracens also come

thither on pilgrimage in great numbers, and /hey say

that it is the sepulchre of Adam our first father, and

that the teeth, and the hair, and the dish were those of

Adam.5

Whose they were in truth, God knoweth ; howbeit,

according to the Holy Scripture of our Church, the

sepulchre of Adam is not in that part of the world.

Now it befel that the Great Kaan heard how on

that mountain there was the sepulchre of our first father

Adam, and that some of his hair and of his teeth, and

the dish from which he used to eat, were still preserved

there. So he thought he would get hold of them

somehow or another, and despatched a great embassy

for the purpose, in the year of Christ, 1284. The

ambassadors, with a great company, travelled on by sea

and by land until they arrived at the island of Seilan,

41.

-it

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