IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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| IIIF Color HighRes |
| Marco Polo : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
| THE DESCRIPTION OF THE WORLD, AND A FOUNTAIN OF OIL for their beasts. And in a certain village which is called Paperth there is a very large silver mine; z and this village is found as one goes from Trepesonde to Tauris. And again I tell you that in the middle of this Great Armenie is the ark of Noe, as it is said, on a great mountain. z VB It is indeed a very great and high mountain like a cube,'upon which Noe's ark is said to have z rested, and from this that mountain is called the mount of Noe's Ark. And it is so broad and long that it could not be encircled in two days ; and on the top of the mountain there is always so abundant a quantity of snow that none is able to go up to the top, because the snow never melts altogether, • but one falls upon the other and so it grows. • And this ark is seen from R I very far because the mountain on which it is is very high, and there is snow there almost all the year, and in one part there is as it were a spot and a large black thing is seen from far amidst those snows ; but close by nothing of it is seen. For this Armenie has many very great and high mountains and among others there is a certain mountain which is called Mount Baris or Mount Olympus, and this mountain seems as if to touch the sky. And some say that many were saved there from the waters of the great Mood. In those parts Noe's ark is called the ship of the world. And they speak as little about it as íf it were not there, unless visitors ask about this thing, and then they speak; it is said that that black thing is the ship of the world.. But on the slopes toward the plain, owing to the moisture of the snow which runs down when R it melts, the mountain is so fat and abounding in grass that in the summer all the flocks around are brought together from far to stay there ; nor do they ever fail there. And moreover through the running down of the snow deep mud is formed on the mountain.• Now on the borders z of Armenie toward the south are these provinces, Mosul, Mus, and Meridin, about which it will be told below ; and there are many others which it would be long to recount. It is bounded from the direction of midday toward the sunrising by a city and kingdom VB which is called Mosul, who are Christian people ; they are Jacobites and Nestorians ; of whom I will tell you below ; on which here we shall only touch. Towards tramontaine VB it is bounded by the Giorgiens of whom again I shall speak below. And on this boundary towards the Giorgiens to the north is a fountain which sends up a liquid P VB like oil in great abundance so that sometimes a hundred great ships' can load &' do load P I z there easily at one time ; but it is not good to eat. But it is good to burn, and to I anoint men and any animals for the scab, [and]the camels for the itch and for the mange. z And the men come for this oil from very far, and all the country round they burn no other oil but this liquid or oil from that fountain, • and it avails for many diseases. Now VB Z let us leave the great Armenie and we will tell you of the province of the Giorgiens. |
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| 1 Or perhaps, "cup". 2 Z makes it "ships of the desert", mile cameli V: qnto ganbeli Just below both Z & LT read simul & semel, where semel is hard to understand. | ||||||
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