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
.94•
THE SPLENDOUR OF THE CACCIA MODUN CAMP ,MARCO POLO
L L has its door towards midday. And in this hall like a porch the noblemen and barons and other people stay. And there is another tent which is joined with this and is
toward sunsetting. And in this dwells the lord, for it also is like his private lodging. And this is joined to the first, and there is a passage from one to the other, and when he wishes LT to speak to any one he makes him come inside. And inside behind the great hall
is a great room and beautiful where the great lord sleeps, which itself too is joined to the said two tents. And there are also other rooms and other tents, but they are VA not joined with the great tent; and in them are halls & rooms, but they are not made in FB this way. For you may know quite truly that the two large halls of which I have FB told you and the chamber where he sleeps are made as I shall describe to you. Each of
L R the said halls has three [42d] posts' of spice wood very well worked and gilt. Then FB again these two halls and the chamber where he sleeps, they are all covered outside with FB lion skins which last for ever very beautiful, for they are all striped with black and
with white and with red. And they are the natural colours, for there are many lions so TA coloured in those regions. They are so well arranged that wind nor rain nor anything else
L VA cannot hurt those inside nor do harm to that skin, because they keep it off very well. And VA FB L inside those halls & rooms they are all lined with ermine and with sable skins. These are both the most beautiful furs and the most rich and of greater value than any VA furs that may be in the world. But indeed it is true that the skin of the sable, as
v much as may be lining for one man's robe, the fine is worth quite 2000 bezants FB of gold, but the common is worth at the least i000 bezants; and the Tartars call it VA LT in their tongue the king of skins.' And they are of the size of the skin of a polecat. And FB with these two skins of which I have told you are these two great halls of the great FB VA P lord lined and worked and decorated so cunningly that it is a great wonder and a VA delight to see. And the room & the tent where the lord sleeps, which is joined with the two halls, is also of lion skins outside and of sable and ermine pelts inside, TA FB neither more nor less, and it is very nobly made and planned. And all the cords which FB hold the halls and the room are all of silk. So that I tell you in truth that they are of FB so great value and cost so much, these three tents, that is the two halls and the room, that a small king could not pay for them. And round these tents are all' the other
grant com ie uos dirai. La tende The other texts consulted leave the words out.
1 TA',3,V: quatro chollone Others "three".
2 les roides pelames This, as Y. pointed out, troubled the early translators. TA: leroide pelame LT: lenoide pellome VA: lapelano . . . rondes P: Animalia illa de quibus huiusmodi pelles habentur dicuntur rodes R: regina delle pelli, & gl'animali, si chiamano Rondes FA,FB,V have it rightly. L omits.
3 ha & sunt toutes B.: ha ausint toutes supported by FA: si sont Others omit ha &
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