The Travels of Marco Polo Volume II Part 17

[2] In the Narrative of Phayre's Mission, ch. ii.

[3] Dr. Anderson has here hastily a.s.sumed a discrepancy of sixty years between the chronology of the Shan doc.u.ment and that of the Chinese Annals. But this is merely because he arbitrarily identifies the Chinese invasion here recorded with that of Kublai in the preceding century. (See _Anderson's Western Yunnan_, p. 8.) We see in the quotation above from Amyot that the Chinese Annals also contain an obscure indication of the later invasion.

[4] Compare the old Chinese Pilgrims Hwui Seng and Seng Yun, in their admiration of a vast paG.o.da erected by the great King Kanishka in Gandhara (at Peshawur in fact): "At sunrise the gilded disks of the vane are lit up with dazzling glory, whilst the gentle breeze of morning causes the precious bells to tinkle with a pleasing sound."

(_Beal_, p. 204.)

CHAPTER LV.

CONCERNING THE PROVINCE OF BANGALA.

Bangala is a Province towards the south, which up to the year 1290, when the aforesaid Messer Marco Polo was still at the Court of the Great Kaan, had not yet been conquered; but his armies had gone thither to make the conquest. You must know that this province has a peculiar language, and that the people are wretched Idolaters. They are tolerably close to India.

There are numbers of eunuchs there, insomuch that all the Barons who keep them get them from that Province.[NOTE 1]

The people have oxen as tall as elephants, but not so big.[NOTE 2] They live on flesh and milk and rice. They grow cotton, in which they drive a great trade, and also spices such as spikenard, galingale, ginger, sugar, and many other sorts. And the people of India also come thither in search of the eunuchs that I mentioned, and of slaves, male and female, of which there are great numbers, taken from other provinces with which those of the country are at war; and these eunuchs and slaves are sold to the Indian and other merchants who carry them thence for sale about the world.

There is nothing more to mention about this country, so we will quit it, and I will tell you of another province called Caugigu.

NOTE 1.--I do not think it probable that Marco even touched at any port of Bengal on that mission to the Indian Seas of which we hear in the prologue; but he certainly never reached it from the Yun-nan side, and he had, as we shall presently see (infra, ch. lix. note 6), a wrong notion as to its position. Indeed, if he had visited it at all, he would have been aware that it was essentially a part of India, whilst in fact he evidently regarded it as an _Indo-Chinese_ region, like Zardandan, Mien, and Caugigu.

There is no notice, I believe, in any history, Indian or Chinese, of an attempt by Kublai to conquer Bengal. The only such attempt by the Mongols that we hear of is one mentioned by Firishta, as made by way of Cathay and Tibet, during the reign of Alauddin Masa'ud, king of Delhi, in 1244, and stated to have been defeated by the local officers in Bengal. But Mr.

Edward Thomas tells me he has most distinctly ascertained that this statement, which has misled every historian "from Badauni and Firishtah to Briggs and Elphinstone, is founded purely on an erroneous reading" (and see a note in Mr. Thomas's _Pathan Kings of Dehli_, p. 121).

The date 1290 in the text would fix the period of Polo's final departure from Peking, if the dates were not so generally corrupt.

The subject of the last part of this paragraph, recurred to in the next, has been misunderstood and corrupted in Pauthier's text, and partially in Ramusio's. These make the _escuilles_ or _escoilliez_ (vide _Ducange_ in v. _Escodatus_, and _Raynouard, Lex. Rom._ VI. 11) into _scholars_ and what not. But on comparison of the pa.s.sages in those two editions with the Geographic Text one cannot doubt the correct reading. As to the fact that Bengal had an evil notoriety for this traffic, especially the province of Silhet, see the _Ayeen Akbery_, II. 9-11, _Barbosa's _chapter on Bengal, and _De Barros_ (_Ramusio_ I. 316 and 391).

On the cheapness of slaves in Bengal, see _Ibn Batuta_, IV. 211-212. He says people from Persia used to call Bengal _Duzakh pur-i ni'amat_, "a h.e.l.l crammed with good things," an appellation perhaps provoked by the official style often applied to it of _Jannat-ul-balad_ or "Paradise of countries."

Professor H. Blochmann, who is, in admirable essays, redeeming the long neglect of the history and archaeology of Bengal Proper by our own countrymen, says that one of the earliest pa.s.sages, in which the name _Bangalah_ occurs, is in a poem of Hafiz, sent from s.h.i.+raz to Sultan Gbia.s.suddin, who reigned in Bengal from 1367 to 1373. Its occurrence in our text, however, shows that the name was in use among the Mahomedan foreigners (from whom Polo derived his nomenclature) nearly a century earlier. And in fact it occurs (though corruptly in some MSS.) in the history of Ras.h.i.+duddin, our author's contemporary. (See _Elliot_, I. p.

72.)

NOTE 2.--"Big as elephants" is only a _facon de parler_, but Marsden quotes modern exaggerations as to the height of the _Arna_ or wild buffalo, more specific and extravagant. The unimpeachable authority of Mr.

Hodgson tells us that the Arna in the Nepal Tarai sometimes does reach a height of 6 ft. 6 in. at the shoulder, with a length of 10 ft. 6 in.

(excluding tail), and horns of 6 ft. 6 in. (_J.A.S.B._, XVI. 710.) Marco, however, seems to be speaking of _domestic_ cattle. Some of the breeds of Upper India are very tall and n.o.ble animals, far surpa.s.sing in height any European oxen known to me; but in modern times these are rarely seen in Bengal, where the cattle are poor and stunted. The _Ain Akbari_, however, speaks of Sharifabad in Bengal, which appears to have corresponded to modern Bardwan, as producing very beautiful white oxen, of great size, and capable of carrying a load of 15 _mans_, which at Prinsep's estimate of Akbar's _man_ would be about 600 lbs.

CHAPTER LVI.

DISCOURSES OF THE PROVINCE OF CAUGIGU.

Caugigu is a province towards the east, which has a king.[NOTE 1] The people are Idolaters, and have a language of their own. They have made their submission to the Great Kaan, and send him tribute every year. And let me tell you their king is so given to luxury that he hath at the least 300 wives; for whenever he hears of any beautiful woman in the land, he takes and marries her.

They find in this country a good deal of gold, and they also have great abundance of spices. But they are such a long way from the sea that the products are of little value, and thus their price is low. They have elephants in great numbers, and other cattle of sundry kinds, and plenty of game. They live on flesh and milk and rice, and have wine made of rice and good spices. The whole of the people, or nearly so, have their skin marked with the needle in patterns representing lions, dragons, birds, and what not, done in such a way that it can never be obliterated. This work they cause to be wrought over face and neck and chest, arms and hands, and belly, and, in short, the whole body; and they look on it as a token of elegance, so that those who have the largest amount of this embroidery are regarded with the greatest admiration.

NOTE 1.--No province mentioned by Marco has given rise to wider and wilder conjectures than this, _Cangigu_ as it has been generally printed.

M. Pauthier, who sees in it Laos, or rather one of the states of Laos called in the Chinese histories _Papesifu_, seems to have formed the most probable opinion hitherto propounded by any editor of Polo. I have no doubt that Laos or some part of that region is meant to be _described_, and that Pauthier is right regarding the general direction of the course here taken as being through the regions east of Burma, in a north-easterly direction up into Kwei-chau. But we shall be able to review the geography of this tract better, as a whole, at a point more advanced. I shall then speak of the name CAUGIGU, and why I prefer this reading of it.

I do not believe, for reasons which will also appear further on, that Polo is now following a route which he had traced in person, unless it be in the latter part of it.

M. Pauthier, from certain indications in a Chinese work, fixes on Chiangmai or Kiang-mai, the Zimme of the Burmese (in about lat.i.tude 18 48' and long. 99 30') as the capital of the Papesifu and of the Caugigu of our text. It can scarcely however be the latter, unless we throw over entirely all the intervals stated in Polo's itinerary; and M. Garnier informs me that he has evidence that the capital of the Papesifu at this time was _Muang-Yong_, a little to the south-east of Kiang-Tung, where he has seen its ruins.[1] That the people called by the Chinese Papesifu were of the great race of Laotians, Shans, or _Thai_, is very certain, from the vocabulary of their language published by Klaproth.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Script _Pa-pe_.]

Pauthier's Chinese authority gives a puerile interpretation of _Papesifu_ as signifying "the kingdom of the 800 wives," and says it was called so because the Prince maintained that establishment. This may be an indication that there were popular stories about the numerous wives of the King of Laos, such as Polo had heard; but the interpretation is doubtless rubbish, like most of the so-called etymologies of proper names applied by the Chinese to foreign regions. At best these seem to be merely a kind of _Memoria Technica_, and often probably bear no more relation to the name in its real meaning than Swift's _All-eggs-under-the-grate_ bears to Alexander Magnus. How such "etymologies" arise is obvious from the nature of the Chinese system of writing. If we also had to express proper names by combining monosyllabic words already existing in English, we should in fact be obliged to write the name of the Macedonian hero much as Swift travestied it. As an example we may give the Chinese name of Java, _Kwawa_, which signifies "gourd-sound," and was given to that Island, we are told, because the voice of its inhabitants is very like that of a dry gourd rolled upon the ground! It is usually stated that Tungking was called _Kiao-chi_ meaning "crossed-toes," because the people often exhibit that malformation (which is a fact), but we may be certain that the syllables were originally a phonetic representation of an indigenous name which has no such meaning. As another example, less ridiculous but not more true, _Chin-tan_, representing the Indian name of China, _Chinasthana_, is explained to mean "Eastern-Dawn" (_Aurore Orientale_).

(_Amyot_, XIV. 101; _Klapr. Mem._ III. 268.)

The states of Laos are shut out from the sea in the manner indicated; they abound in domestic elephants to an extraordinary extent; and the people do tattoo themselves in various degrees, most of all (as M. Garnier tells me) about Kiang Hung. The _style_ of tattooing which the text describes is quite that of the Burmese, in speaking of whom Polo has omitted to mention the custom: "Every male Burman is tattooed in his boyhood from the middle to his knees; in fact he has a pair of breeches tattooed on him. The pattern is a fanciful medley of animals and arabesques, but it is scarcely distinguishable, save as a general tint, except on a fair skin." (_Mission to Ava_, 151.)

[1] Indeed doc.u.ments in Klaproth's _Asia Polyglotta_ show that the _Pape_ state was also called _Muang-Yong_ (pp. 364-365). I observe that the river running to the east of Pu-eul and Ssemao (Puer and Esmok) is called _Papien_-Kiang, the name of which is perhaps a memorial of the Pape.

[The old Laocian kingdom of _Xieng-mai_ [Kiang-mai], called _Muong-Yong_ by the Pa-y, was inhabited by the _Pa-pe Si-fu_ or Bat-ba T'uc-phu; the inhabitants called themselves Thai-niai or great Thai.

(_Deveria, Frontiere_, p. 100. Ch. ix. of the Chinese work _Sze-i-kwan-kao_ is devoted to Xieng-mai _Pa-pe_), which includes the subdivisions of Laos, Xieng Hung [Kiang Hung] and Muong-Ken.

(_Deveria, Mel. de Harlez_, p. 97.)--H.C.]

CHAPTER LVII.

CONCERNING THE PROVINCE OF ANIN.

Anin is a Province towards the east, the people of which are subject to the Great Kaan, and are Idolaters. They live by cattle and tillage, and have a peculiar language. The women wear on the legs and arms bracelets of gold and silver of great value, and the men wear such as are even yet more costly. They have plenty of horses which they sell in great numbers to the Indians, making a great profit thereby. And they have also vast herds of buffaloes and oxen, having excellent pastures for these. They have likewise all the necessaries of life in abundance.[NOTE 1]

Now you must know that between Anin and Caugigu, which we have left behind us, there is a distance of [25] days' journey;[NOTE 2] and from Caugigu to Bangala, the third province in our rear, is 30 days' journey. We shall now leave Anin and proceed to another province which is some 8 days' journey further, always going eastward.

NOTE 1.--Ramusio, the printed text of the Soc. de Geographie, and most editions have _Amu_; Pauthier reads _Aniu_ and considers the name to represent Tungking or Annam, called also _Nan-yue_. The latter word he supposes to be converted into _Anyue_, _Aniu_. And accordingly he carries the traveller to the capital of Tungking.

Leaving the name for the present, according to the scheme of the route as I shall try to explain it below, I should seek for Amu or Aniu or _Anin_ in the extreme south-east of Yun-nan. A part of this region was for the first time traversed by the officers of the French expedition up the Mekong, who in 1867 visited Sheu-ping, Lin-ngan and the upper valley of the River of Tungking on their way to Yun-nan-fu. To my question whether the description in the text, of Aniu or Anin and its fine pastures, applied to the tract just indicated, Lieut. Garnier replied on the whole favourably (see further on), proceeding: "The population about Sheu-ping is excessively mixt. On market days at that town one sees a gathering of wild people in great number and variety, and whose costumes are highly picturesque, as well as often very rich. There are the _Pa-is_, who are also found again higher up, the _Ho-nhi_, the _Khato_, the _Lope_, the _Shentseu_. These tribes appear to be allied in part to the Laotians, in part to the Kakhyens.... The wilder races about Sheuping are remarkably handsome, and you see there types of women exhibiting an extraordinary regularity of feature, and at the same time a complexion surprisingly _white_. The Chinese look quite an inferior race beside them.... I may add that all these tribes, especially the Ho-nhi and the Pa-, wear large amounts of silver ornament; great collars of silver round the neck, as well as on the legs and arms."

Though the _whiteness_ of the people of Anin is not noticed by Polo, the distinctive manner in which he speaks in the next chapter of the _dark_ complexion of the tribes described therein seems to indicate the probable omission of the opposite trait here.

The prominent position a.s.signed in M. Garnier's remarks to a race called _Ho-nhi_ first suggested to me that the reading of the text might be ANIN instead of _Aniu_. And as a matter of fact this seems to my eyes to be clearly the reading of the Paris _Livre des Merveilles_ (Pauthier's MS.

B), while the Paris No. 5631 (Pauthier's A) has _Auin_, and what may be either _Aniu_ or _Anin_. _Anyn_ is also found in the Latin Brandenburg MS.

of Pipino's version collated by Andrew Muller, to which, however, we cannot ascribe much weight. But the two words are so nearly identical in mediaeval writing, and so little likely to be discriminated by scribes who had nothing to guide their discrimination, that one need not hesitate to adopt that which is supported by argument. In reference to the suggested ident.i.ty of _Anin_ and _Ho-nhi_, M. Garnier writes again: "All that Polo has said regarding the country of Aniu, though not containing anything _very_ characteristic, may apply perfectly to the different indigenous tribes, at present subject to the Chinese, which are dispersed over the country from Talan to Sheuping and Lin-ngan. These tribes bearing the names (given above) relate that they in other days formed an independent state, to which they give the name of _Muang Shung_. Where this Muang was situated there is no knowing. These tribes have _langage par euls_, as Marco Polo says, and silver ornaments are worn by them to this day in extraordinary profusion; more, however, by the women than the men. They have plenty of horses, buffaloes and oxen, and of sheep as well. It was the first locality in which the latter were seen. The plateau of Lin-ngan affords pasture-grounds which are exceptionally good for that part of the world.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Ho-nhi and other Tribes in the Department of Lin-ngan in S.