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| IIIF Color HighRes |
| Marco Polo : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
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s I 46 • NICOLAU MAFEU AND MARC MAKE MANGONELS r"MARCO POLO
continue this resistance. The great lord said, It must be done in such a way that that FB city may be taken. Then the two brothers' Master Nicolau Pol and Master Mafeu his FB R brother and their son Master Marc, those of whom this book is written, .who were at the FB court of the great Kaan, when this came to their ears went immediately to him and •said that
they would find such a sort of device and engine that the city would be taken and that it would surrender itself perforce; (which device and engines one calls them mangonels, very fine engines and very noble which would throw into the town so great and so heavy stones and from so far
R that they would confound all that ever the said stones should reach, •killing the people and FB ruining the houses. • When the great lord and the other barons who were there all round about,
and likewise the messengers of the army to the lord who were come there to tell him news that the city would not surrender itself, heard these news they all wondered greatly because I tell you that in all those parts they do not know what mangonels are nor engines nor trebuchets, for they did not use them nor were accustomed to use them in their armies, all the less because they did not know what it was, nor had they ever seen any of them; so were they very glad and much astonished at them). They said, Great lord, we have with us in our household men
R who will make such mangonels in the manner of the West as shall throw so great
stones that those of the city will not be able to endure but will give themselves
up immediately when the mangonel, that is the trebuchet, shall have thrown in
FB FB there. And the great lord, when he heard it, was very glad for it and said to Master
FB Nicolau and to his brother and to his son that he wished it very willingly and that
it pleased him much, and said that they should have that mangonel made as soon as
FB they could. For the great Kaan and all the others who were there about had a very great
desire to see it, and especially because it was a new and strange thing and one of which they
TA had never seen any. Then these Venetians Master Nicolau and his brother & his son,
FB FB FB who had with them in their household two men, one an Alamainz from Alemaigne, a
FB FB Christian, and the other was a Nestorian Christian, who knew and were good masters
of this work,' told them that they should make two mangonels or three which
1 V: quel christian
2 VA: E feno far a do maistrj dellegniame che era nati de soa fameia Et erano xpistianj R: & subito ordina, che li fussero dati fabri eccellenti, & maestri di legnami, de quali, ne erano alcuni christiani Nestorini, che sapeuano benissimo lauorare. It seems to be clear that neither VA nor V (p. 317, note 3 above) understood alamainz to mean either an Alan or a German; while R almost indicates a way of reconciling Marco Polo with the Chinese story, though it does not remove the difficulty of the date. VL : Alora Jo Marcho polo el qual tolsi in mi questa faticha congregai certi venetiani i quali trouai in quele parte dotti e discreti nel fato dele arme e feci fabrichare tre gran mangani i quali gitana libre mille di peso per zascuno . . . S goes so far as to attribute the first report that the city could not be taken to Marco.
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