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Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

I06   MARCO POLO.   VOL. II. BK. III.

reaching the former. Batang, girt all round by dangerous reefs,

is inaccessible except to small boats. So is Bintang, with the

exception of its south-western side, where is now Riāu, and

where, a little further towards the north, was the settlement at

which the chief of the island resided in the fourteenth century.

There was no reason for Marco Polo's junk to take that round-

about way in order to call at such, doubtlessly insignificant place.

And the channel (i.e. Rhio Strait) has far more than four paces'

depth of water, whereas there are no more than two fathoms at

the western entrance to the Old Singapore Strait."

Marco Polo says (II., p. 280) : " Throughout this distance

[from Pentam] there is but four paces' depth of water, so that

great ships in passing this channel have to lift their rudders, for

they draw nearly as much water as that." Gerini remarks that

it is unmistakably the Old Singapore Strait, and that there is no

channel so shallow throughout all those parts except among

reefs. " The Old Strait or Selat Tebrau, says N. B. Dennys,

Descriptive Dict. of British Malaya, separating Singapore from

Johore. Before the settlement of the former, this was the only

known route to China ; it is generally about a mile broad, but

in some parts little more than three furlongs. Crawfurd went

through it in a ship of 400 tons, and found the passage tedious

but safe." Most of Sinologists, Beal, Chavannes, Pelliot, Bul.

Ecole Ext. Orient., I V., 1904, pp. 321-2, 323-4,332-3,341,347,

place the Malaiur of Marco Polo at Palembang in Sumatra.

VIII., pp. 281, n. 283 n.

TANA-MALAYU.

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" On a traduit Tānah Malāyu par ' Pays des Malais,' mais

cette traduction n'est pas rigoureusement exacte. Pour prendre

une expression parallèle, Tānah Djāwa signifie ' Pays de Java,'

mais non ' Pays des Javanais.'

" En réalité, tānah ` terre, sol, pays, contrée ' s'emploie seule-

ment avec un toponyme qui doit étre rendu par un toponyme

équivalent. Le nom des habitants du pays s'exprime, en malais,

en ajoutant oran ' homme, personne, gens, numéral des êtres

humains ' au nom du pays : ' oran Malāyu ' Malais, litt. ' gens de

Malāyu ' ; oran Djāwa Javanais, litt. ' gens de Java.' Tānali

Malāyu a donc très nettement le sens de ' pays de Maläyu ' ;

cf. l'expression kawi correspondante dans le Nāgarakrêtāgama :

tanah ri Malayu ' pays de Malāyu' où chaque mot français

recouvre exactement le substantif, la préposition et le toponyme