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

CHAP. XXXIX. p. 197.   CITY OF LOP.   47

Sir Aurel Stein remarks (Ancient Khotan, I., p. 436) : Marco

Polo's description, too, ` of the Province of Charchan ' would

agree with the assumption that the route west of Charchan

was not altogether devoid of settlements even as late as the

thirteenth century. . . . [His] account of the route agrees

accurately with the conditions now met with between Niya and

Charchan. Yet in the passage immediately following, the

Venetian tells us how ` when an army passes through the land,

the people escape with their wives, children, and cattle a distance

of two or three days' journey into the sandy waste ; and, knowing

the spots where water is to be had, they are able to live there,

and to keep their cattle alive, while it is impossible to discover

them.' It seems to me clear that Marco Polo alludes here to the

several river courses which, after flowing north of the Niya-

Charchan route, lose themselves in the desert. The jungle belt

of their terminal areas, no doubt, offered then, as it would offer

now, safe places of refuge to any small settlements established

along the route southwards."

XXXIX., p. 197.

Y

OF THE CITY OF LOP.

Stein remarks, Ruins of Desert Cathay, I., p. 343 : " Broad

geographical facts left no doubt for any one acquainted with

local conditions that Marco Polo's Lop, ` a large town at the

edge of the Desert ' where ` travellers repose before entering on

the Desert ' en route for Sha chou and China proper, must have

occupied the position of the present Charklik. Nor could I see

any reason for placing elsewhere the capital of that ' ancient

kingdom of Na-fo-po, the same as the territory of Lou-lan,'

which Hivan Tsang reached after ten marches to the north-east

of Chü-mo or Charchan, and which was the pilgrim's last stage

before his return to Chinese soil."

In his third journey (1913-1916), Stein left Charchan on

New Year's Eve, 1914, and arrived at Charkhlik on January 8,

saying : " It was from this modest little oasis, the only settlement

of any importance in the Lop region, representing Marco Polo's

City of Lop,' that I had to raise the whole of the supplies,

labour, and extra camels needed by the several parties for the

explorations I had carefully planned during the next three

months in the desert between Lop-nor and Tunhuang."

" The name of LOB appears under the form Lo you in the

Yuan-shi, s.a. 1282 and 1286. In 1286, it is mentioned as a