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

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BOOK SECOND.

PART II. JOURNEY TO THE WEST AND SOUTH-WEST

OF CATHAY.

~~I

XXXVII., p. 13. " There grow here [Taianfu] many excellent

vines, supplying great plenty of wine ; and in all Cathay this is the

only place where wine is produced. It is carried hence all over the

country."

Dr. B. Laufer makes the following remarks to me : Polo is

quite right in ascribing vines and wine to T'aY Yüan-fu in Shan

Si, and is in this respect upheld by contemporary Chinese sources.

The Yin shan cheng yao written in 133o by Ho Se-hui, contains

this account 1 : ` There are numerous brands of wine : that corn-

ing from Qara-Khodja 2 (Ha-1ahwo) is very strong, that coming

from Tibet ranks next. Also the wines from Ping Yang and

T'aY Yüan (in Shan Si) take the second rank. According to

some statements, grapes, when stored for a long time, will develop

into wine through a natural process. This wine is fragrant,

sweet, and exceedingly strong : this is the genuine grape-wine.'

Ts'ao mu tse, written in 1378 par Ye Tse-k'1,3 contains the follow-

ing information : ` Under the Yüan Dynasty grape-wine was

manufactured in Ki-ning and other circuits of Shan Si Province.

In the eighth month they went to the T'ai hang Mountain, 4 in

order to test the genuine and adulterated brands : the genuine

j Pen ts'ao kang mu, Ch. 25, p. 14b.

2 Regarding this name and its history, see PELLIOT, 7ourn. A4siatique, 1912, I., p. 582. Qara Khodja was celebrated for its abundance of grapes. (BRETSCHNEIDER, Mediæval Res., I., p. 65.) J. DUDGEON (The Beverages of the Chinese, p. 27) misreading it Ha-so-hwo, took it for the designation of a sort of wine. STUART (Chinese Materia Medica, p. 459) mistakes it for a transliteration of " hollands," or may be „ alcohol." The latter word has never penetrated into China in any form.

3 This work is also the first that contains the word a-la-ki, from Arabic 'araq. (See T'oung Pao, 1916, p. 483.)

4 A range of mountains separating Shan Si from Chi li and Igo Nan,