Notes on Marco Polo : vol.1 / Page 605 (Grayscale High Resolution Image)

0605	Notes on Marco Polo : vol.1

« moving *shêng* » cannot have lasted much after 1283, since it has left no trace in the later admi-
nistrative geography of the Mongol period, as described in *YS*, 62, 9 *a*. Perhaps the *hsing-shêng*
of Chang-chou, if it existed, was never more than a *fên* [分] *hsing-shêng*, a « detached moving
Secretariat », as it seems to have been again at the time of the rebellions which finally brought the
dynasty to an end (cf. PHILLIPS, *ibid*. 26).

But it was Ch'üan-chou, and Ch'üan-chou alone, which, in the first years following the
conquest of southern China by the Mongols, alternated with Fu-chou as the seat of the real
« moving Grand Secretariat » of Fu-chien. The connection between the two cities had always
been very close. As I have shown above, the very name of Ch'üan-chou was at first an official
designation of Fu-chou, that is before it was transferred in 711 to the modern Ch'üan-chou.
When the Mongols crossed to south of the Yang-tzŭ, they resorted, for the administration of the
newly acquired provinces, to many temporary measures, some of which have left but insufficient
traces in our sources; the geographical section of the *YS* is explicit only in regard to the organi-
zation that obtained half a century later. It summarizes the successive changes (though not
always correctly) as follows (*YS*, 62, 8 *a*) :

« [Moving Grand Secretariat of Chiang-chê and other places... (= of Hang-chou, of which
Fu-chien formed part, after Qubilai)] :

« *Lu* of Fu-chou... Under the Sung, it was the *lu* of Fu-chien. In the 15th *chih-yüan* year
(1278) of the Yüan, it became the *lu* of Fu-chou. In the 18th year (1281), [the seat of] the
moving Secretariat of Ch'üan-chou was transferred to this *chou* (*i. e.* to Fu-chou). In the
19th year (1282), it again returned to Ch'üan-chou. In the 20th year (1283), it was trans-
ferred once more to this *chou*. In the 22nd year (1285), it was [suppressed and ] merged with
Hang-chou. »

« *Lu* of Ch'üan-chou... In the 14th *chih-yüan* year (1277) of the Yüan, [the Yüan] established
[there] a moving *hsüan-wei-ssŭ* which attended at the same time to the affairs of the moving
' generalissimo's office for repression in the south' (*chêng-nan yüan-shuai fu*). In the 15th *chih-
yüan* year (1278), the *hsüan-wei-ssŭ* became a moving Grand Secretariat (*hsing chung shu-shêng*),
and [Ch'üan-chou] was promoted to a General administrative office of the *lu* of Ch'üan-chou
(*Ch'üan-chou tsung-kuan-fu*). In the 18th year (1281), the moving *shêng* was transferred to the
[seat of the] *lu* of Fu-chou (*i. e.* to Fu-chou). In the 19th year (1282), it again returned to
Ch'üan-chou. In the 20th year (1283), it was transferred once more to the [seat of the] *lu* of
Fu-chou.

There can be no doubt that, in agreement with YULE's conclusions, the alternations between
Ch'üan-chou and Fu-chou in the texts of the geographical section of the *YS* correspond to Rašidu-
'd-Dīn's indications as to the alternations between Zāitūn and Fu-ju, and this again is decisive for the
identification of Zāitūn with Ch'üan-chou. But the history of the « moving *shêng* », as summed
up in that section of the *YS*, is only a rough approximation; the real facts, which we are not
always in a position to retrace in full detail, are much more intricate, as may be seen from the
following texts in the *pên-chi* :

1. (*YS*, 10, 1*b*) : « In the 15th *chih-yüan* year, ... the third month, ... on [the day] *i-yu*
(March 26, 1278), an Imperial edict [prescribed] that Mêng-ku-tai (*Moŋyutai?, *Moŋyoltai?;

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National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books