The Travels of Marco Polo Volume I Part 77

(_Sir T. Browne_, I. 293; _Bongars_, I. 1104; _Cahier et Martin_, III.

271; _Cardan, de Rer. Varietate_, VII. 33; _Alb. Mag. Opera_, 1551, II.

227, 233; _Fr. Michel, Recherches_, etc., II. 91; _Gerv. of Tilbury_, p.

13; _N. et E._ II. 493; _D. des Tissus_, II. 1-12; _J. N. China Branch R.

A. S._, December, 1867, p. 70.) [_Berger de Xivrey, Traditions teratologiques_, 457-458, 460-463.--H. C.]

[1] The late Mr. Atkinson has been twice alluded to in this note. I take the opportunity of saying that Mr. Ney Elias, a most competent judge, who has travelled across the region in question whilst admitting, as every one must, Atkinson's vagueness and sometimes very careless statements, is not at all disposed to discredit the truth of his narrative.

CHAPTER XLIII.

OF THE PROVINCE OF SUKCHUR.

On leaving the province of which I spoke before,[NOTE 1] you ride ten days between north-east and east, and in all that way you find no human dwelling, or next to none, so that there is nothing for our book to speak of.

At the end of those ten days you come to another province called SUKCHUR, in which there are numerous towns and villages. The chief city is called SUKCHU.[NOTE 2] The people are partly Christians and partly Idolaters, and all are subject to the Great Kaan.

The great General Province to which all these three provinces belong is called TANGUT.

Over all the mountains of this province rhubarb is found in great abundance, and thither merchants come to buy it, and carry it thence all over the world.[NOTE 3] [Travellers, however, dare not visit those mountains with any cattle but those of the country, for a certain plant grows there which is so poisonous that cattle which eat it lose their hoofs. The cattle of the country know it and eschew it.[NOTE 4]] The people live by agriculture, and have not much trade. [They are of a brown complexion. The whole of the province is healthy.]

NOTE 1.--Referring apparently to Shachau; see Note 1 and the closing words of last chapter.

NOTE 2.--There is no doubt that the province and city are those of SUHCHAU, but there is a great variety in the readings, and several texts have a marked difference between the name of the province and that of the city, whilst others give them as the same. I have adopted those to which the resultants of the readings of the best texts seem to point, viz.

_Succiur_ and _Succiu_, though with considerable doubt whether they should not be identical. Pauthier declares that _Suctur_, which is the reading of his favourite MS., is the exact p.r.o.nunciation, after the vulgar Mongol manner, of _Suh-chau-lu_, the _Lu_ or circuit of Suhchau; whilst Neumann says that the Northern Chinese constantly add an euphonic particle _or_ to the end of words. I confess to little faith in such refinements, when no evidence is produced.

[Suhchau had been devastated and its inhabitants ma.s.sacred by Chinghiz Khan in 1226.--H. C.]

Suhchau is called by Ras.h.i.+duddin, and by Shah Rukh's amba.s.sadors, _Sukchu_, in exact correspondence with the reading we have adopted for the name of the city, whilst the Russian Envoy Boikoff, in the 17th century, calls it "_Suktsey_, where the rhubarb grows"; and Anthony Jenkinson, in Hakluyt, by a slight metathesis, _Sowchick_. Suhchau lies just within the extreme north-west angle of the Great Wall. It was at Suhchau that Benedict Goes was detained, waiting for leave to go on to Peking, eighteen weary months, and there he died just as aid reached him.

NOTE 3.--The real rhubarb [_Rheum palmatum_] grows wild, on very high mountains. The central line of its distribution appears to be the high range dividing the head waters of the Hw.a.n.g-Ho, Yalung, and Min-Kiang. The chief markets are Siningfu (see ch. lvii.), and Kwan-Kian in Szechwan. In the latter province an inferior kind is grown in fields, but the genuine rhubarb defies cultivation. (See _Richthofen_, Letters, No. VII. p. 69.) Till recently it was almost all exported by Kiakhta and Russia, but some now comes via Hankau and Shanghai.

["See, on the preparation of the root in China, Gemelli-Careri.

(_Churchill's Collect._, Bk. III. ch. v. 365.) It is said that when Chinghiz Khan was pillaging Tangut, the only things his minister, Yeh-lu Ch'u-ts'ai, would take as his share of the booty were a few Chinese books and a supply of rhubarb, with which he saved the lives of a great number of Mongols, when, a short time after, an epidemic broke out in the army."

(_D'Ohsson_, I. 372.--_Rockhill, Rubruck_, p. 193, note.)

"With respect to rhubarb ... the _Suchowchi_ also makes the remark, that the best rhubarb, with golden flowers in the breaking, is gathered in this province (district of _Shan-tan_), and that it is equally beneficial to men and beasts, preserving them from the pernicious effects of the heat."

(_Palladius_, l.c. p. 9.)--H. C.]

NOTE 4.--_Erba_ is the t.i.tle applied to the poisonous growth, which may be either "plant" or "gra.s.s." It is not unlikely that it was a plant akin to the _Andromeda ovalifolia_, the tradition of the poisonous character of which prevails everywhere along the Himalaya from Nepal to the Indus.

It is notorious for poisoning sheep and goats at Simla and other hill sanitaria; and Dr. Cleghorn notes the same circ.u.mstance regarding it that Polo heard of the plant in Tangut, viz. that its effects on flocks imported from the plains are highly injurious, whilst those of the hills do not appear to suffer, probably because they shun the young leaves, which alone are deleterious. Mr. Marsh attests the like fact regarding the _Kalmia angustifolia_ of New England, a plant of the same order (_Ericaceae_). Sheep bred where it abounds almost always avoid browsing on its leaves, whilst those brought from districts where it is unknown feed upon it and are poisoned.

Firishta, quoting from the _Zafar-Namah_, says: "On the road from Kashmir towards Tibet there is a plain on which no other vegetable grows but a poisonous gra.s.s that destroys all the cattle that taste of it, and therefore no hors.e.m.e.n venture to travel that route." And Abbe DesG.o.dins, writing from E. Tibet, mentions that sheep and goats are poisoned by rhododendron leaves. (_Dr. Hugh Cleghorn_ in _J. Agricultural and Hortic.

Society of India_, XIV. part 4; _Marsh's Man and Nature_, p. 40; _Briggs Firishta_, IV. 449; _Bul. de la Soc. de Geog._ 1873, I. 333.)

["This poisonous plant seems to be the _Stipa inebrians_ described by the late Dr. Hance in the _Journal of Bot._ 1876, p. 211, from specimens sent to me by Belgian Missionaries from the Ala Shan Mountains, west of the Yellow River." (_Bretschneider, Hist. of Bot. Disc._ I. p. 5.)

"M. Polo notices that the cattle not indigenous to the province lose their hoofs in the Suh-chau Mountains; but that is probably not on account of some poisonous gra.s.s, but in consequence of the stony ground."

(_Palladius_, l.c. p. 9.)--H. C.]

CHAPTER XLIV.

OF THE CITY OF CAMPICHU.

Campichu is also a city of Tangut, and a very great and n.o.ble one. Indeed it is the capital and place of government of the whole province of Tangut.[NOTE 1] The people are Idolaters, Saracens, and Christians, and the latter have three very fine churches in the city, whilst the Idolaters have many minsters and abbeys after their fas.h.i.+on. In these they have an enormous number of idols, both small and great, certain of the latter being a good ten paces in stature; some of them being of wood, others of clay, and others yet of stone. They are all highly polished, and then covered with gold. The great idols of which I speak lie at length.[NOTE 2]

And round about them there are other figures of considerable size, as if adoring and paying homage before them.

Now, as I have not yet given you particulars about the customs of these Idolaters, I will proceed to tell you about them.

You must know that there are among them certain religious recluses who lead a more virtuous life than the rest. These abstain from all lechery, though they do not indeed regard it as a deadly sin; howbeit if any one sin against nature they condemn him to death. They have an Ecclesiastical Calendar as we have; and there are five days in the month that they observe particularly; and on these five days they would on no account either slaughter any animal or eat flesh meat. On those days, moreover, they observe much greater abstinence altogether than on other days.[NOTE 3]

Among these people a man may take thirty wives, more or less, if he can but afford to do so, each having wives in proportion to his wealth and means; but the first wife is always held in highest consideration. The men endow their wives with cattle, slaves, and money, according to their ability. And if a man dislikes any one of his wives, he just turns her off and takes another. They take to wife their cousins and their fathers'

widows (always excepting the man's own mother), holding to be no sin many things that we think grievous sins, and, in short, they live like beasts.[NOTE 4]

Messer Maffeo and Messer Marco Polo dwelt a whole year in this city when on a mission.[NOTE 5]

Now we will leave this and tell you about other provinces towards the north, for we are going to take you a sixty days' journey in that direction.

NOTE 1.--Campichiu is undoubtedly Kanchau, which was at this time, as Pauthier tells us, the chief city of the administration of _Kansuh_ corresponding to Polo's Tangut. _Kansuh_ itself is a name compounded of the names of the two cities _Kan_-chau and _Suh_-chau.

[Kanchau fell under the Tangut dominion in 1208. (_Palladius_, p. 10.) The Musulmans mentioned by Polo at Shachau and Kanchau probably came from Khotan.--H. C.]

The difficulties that have been made about the form of the name _Campiciou_, etc., in Polo, and the attempts to explain these, are probably alike futile. Quatremere writes the Persian form of the name after Abdurrazzak as _Kamtcheou_, but I see that Erdmann writes it after Ras.h.i.+d, I presume on good grounds, as _Ckamidschu_, i.e. _Kamiju_ or _Kamichu_. And that this _was_ the Western p.r.o.nunciation of the name is shown by the form which Pegolotti uses, _Camexu_, i.e. Camechu. The _p_ in Polo's spelling is probably only a superfluous letter, as in the occasional old spelling of _dampnum_, _contempnere_, _hympnus_, _tirampnus_, _sompnour_, _Dampne Deu_. In fact, Marignolli writes Polo's _Quinsai_ as _Campsay_.

It is worthy of notice that though Ramusio's text prints the names of these two cities as _Succuir_ and _Campion_, his own p.r.o.nunciation of them appears to have been quite well understood by the Persian traveller Hajji Mahomed, for it is perfectly clear that the latter recognized in these names Suhchau and Kanchau. (See _Ram._ II. f. 14v.) The second volume of the _Navigationi_, containing Polo, was published after Ramusio's death, and it is possible that the names as he himself read them were more correct (e.g. _Succiur, Campjou_).

[Ill.u.s.tration: Colossal Figure, Buddha entering Nirvana.

"Et si voz di qu'il ont de ydres que sunt grant dix pas.... Ceste grant ydres gigent."...]

NOTE 2.--This is the meaning of the phrase in the G. T.: "_Ceste grande ydre_ gigent," as may be seen from Ramusio's _giaciono distesi_. Lazari renders the former expression, "giganteggia un idolo," etc., a phrase very unlike Polo. The circ.u.mstance is interesting, because this rec.u.mbent Colossus at Kanchau is mentioned both by Hajji Mahomed and by Shah Rukh's people. The latter say: "In this city of Kanchu there is an Idol-Temple 500 cubits square. In the middle is an idol lying at length which measures 50 paces. The sole of the foot is nine paces long, and the instep is 21 cubits in girth. Behind this image and overhead are other idols of a cubit (?) in height, besides figures of _Baks.h.i.+s_ as large as life. The action of all is. .h.i.t off so admirably that you would think they were alive."

These great rec.u.mbent figures are favourites in Buddhist countries still, e.g. in Siam, Burma, and Ceylon. They symbolise Sakya Buddha entering _Nirvana_. Such a rec.u.mbent figure, perhaps the prototype of these, was seen by Hiuen Tsang in a Vihara close to the Sal Grove at Kusinagara, where Sakya entered that state, i.e. died. The stature of Buddha was, we are told, 12 cubits; but Brahma, Indra, and the other G.o.ds vainly tried to compute his dimensions. Some such rude metaphor is probably embodied in these large images. I have described one 69 feet long in Burma (represented in the cut), but others exist of much greater size, though probably none equal to that which Hiuen Tsang, in the 7th century, saw near Bamian, which was 1000 feet in length! I have heard of but one such image remaining in India, viz. in one of the caves at Dhamnar in Malwa.

This is 15 feet long, and is popularly known as "Bhim's Baby." (_Cathay_, etc., pp. cciii., ccxviii.; _Mission to Ava_, p. 52; _V. et V. de H. T._, p. 374: _Cunningham's Archael. Reports_, ii. 274; _Tod_, ii. 273.)

["The temple, in which M. Polo saw an idol of Buddha, represented in a lying position, is evidently _Wo-fo-sze_, i.e. 'Monastery of the lying Buddha.' It was built in 1103 by a Tangut queen, to place there three idols representing Buddha in this posture, which have since been found in the ground on this very spot." (_Palladius_, l.c. p. 10.)

Rubruck (p. 144) says, "A Nestorian, who had come from Cathay told me that in that country there is an idol so big that it can be seen from two days off." Mr. Rockhill (_Rubruck_, p. 144, _note_) writes, "The largest stone image I have seen is in a cave temple at Yung kan, about 10 miles north-west of Ta t'ung Fu in Shan-si. Pere Gerbillon says the Emperor K'ang hsi measured it himself and found it to be 57 _chih_ high (61 feet).

(_Duhalde, Description_, IV. 352.) I have seen another colossal statue in a cave near Pinchou in north-west Shan-si, and there is another about 45 miles south of Ning hsia Fu, near the left bank of the Yellow River.

(_Rockhill, Land of the Lamas_, 26, and _Diary_, 47.) The great rec.u.mbent figure of the 'Sleeping Buddha' in the Wo Fo ssu, near Peking, is of clay."