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Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

18   MARCO POLO.   VOL. I. BK. I.

Francisque-Michel (I., p. 3 t6) remarks : " De ce que Marco

Polo se borne à nommer Tauris comme la ville de Perse où il

se fabriquait maints draps d'or et de soie, il ne faudrait pas en

conclure que cette industrie n'existât pas sur d'autres points du

même royaume. Pour n'en citer qu'un seul, la ville d'Arsacie,

ancienne capitale des Parthes, connue aujourd'hui sous le nom

de Caswin, possédait vraisemblablement déjà cette industrie

des beaux draps d'or et de soie qui existait encore au temps de

Huet, c'est-à-dire au XVIIe siècle."

XI II., p. 78. " Messer Marco Polo found a village there which goes by the name of CALA ATAPERISTAN, which is as much as to say, ` The

Castle of the Fire-worshippers.' "

With regard to Kal'ah-i Atashparastān, Prof. A. V. W.

Jackson writes (Persia, 1906, p. 413) : " And the name is rightly

applied, for the people there do worship fire. In an article

entitled The Magi in Marco Polo (Journ. Ani. Or. Soc., 26, 79-83)

I have given various reasons for identifying the so-called ` Castle

of the Fire-Worshippers ' with Kashan, which Odoric mentions

or a village in its vicinity, the only rival to the claim being the

town of Nain, whose Gabar Castle has already been mentioned

above."

XIV., p. 78.

PERSIA.

Speaking of Saba and of Cala Ataperistan, Prof. E. H.

Parker (Asiatic Ouart. Rev., Jan., 1904, p. 134) has the following

remarks : " It is not impossible that certain unexplained state-

ments in the Chinese records may shed light upon this obscure

subject. In describing the Arab Conquest of Persia, the Old

and New T'ang Histories mention the city of Hia-lah as being

amongst those captured ; another name for it was Sam (according

to the Chinese initial and final system of spelling words). A

later Chinese poet has left the following curious line on record :

All the priests venerate Hia-lah.' The allusion is vague and

undated, but it is difficult to imagine to what else it can refer.

The term sêng, or ` bonze,' here translated ` priests,' was

frequently applied to Nestorian and Persian priests, as in this

case."

XIV., p. 80. " Three Kings."

Regarding the legend of the stone cast into a well, cf.

F. W. K. MÜLLER, Uigurica, pp. 5-IO (Pelliot).