From Peking to Bengal

Let us now leave the city of Khan-balik and travel into Cathay, so that you may learn something of its grandeurs and its treasures.

You must understand that Messer Marco himself was sent by the Great Khan as an emissary towards the west, on a journey of fully four months from Khan-balik. So we will tell you what he saw on the way, going and coming.

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On leaving Ch'êng-tu-fu the traveller rides for five days through plain and valley, passing villages and hamlets in plenty. The people here live on the yield of the earth. The country is infested with lions, bears, and other wild beasts. There is some local industry, in the weaving of fine sendal and other fabrics. This country is part of Ch'êng-tu-fu province. But at the end of the five days the route enters another province whose name is Tibet.

The province of Tibet is terribly devastated, for it was ravaged in a campaign by Mongu Khan. There are many towns and villages and hamlets lying ruined and desolate.

This country produces canes of immense size and girth; indeed I can assure you that they grow to about three palms in circumference and a good fifteen paces in length, the distance from one knot to the next amounting to fully three palms. Merchants and other travellers who are passing through this country at night use these canes as fuel because, when they are alight, they make such a popping and banging that lions and bears and other beasts of prey are scared away in terror and dare not on any account come near the fire. So fires of this sort are made by travellers to protect their own animals from the savage predators with which the country is infested. Let me tell you — or it is well worth telling — how it happens that the crackling of these canes is so loud and terrifying and what effect it produces. You must understand that the canes are taken when quite green and thrown on a fire made of a substantial pile of logs. When they have lain for some time on a fire of this size, they begin to warp and to burst, and then they make such a bang that it can be heard at nights fully ten miles away. Anyone who is not accustomed to the noise is startled out of his wits by it; it is such a terrifying sound to hear. I assure you that horses that have never heard it before are so scared when they hear it that they snap their halters and all the cords that tether them and take to their heels. Many travellers have experienced this. So, when they have horses that are known never to have heard this noise, they bandage their eyes and shackle all the feet with iron fetlocks. Then, when they hear the crackling of the canes, however hard they try to bolt, they cannot do it. And by this means travellers keep safe at nights; both they and their beasts, from the lions and ounces and other dangerous beasts that abound in these parts.

This desolate country, infested by dangerous wild beasts, extends for twenty days' journey, without shelter or food except perhaps every third or fourth day, when the traveller may find some habitation where he can renew his stock of provisions. Then he reaches a region with villages and hamlets in plenty and a few towns perched on precipitous crags. Here there prevails a marriage custom of which I will tell you. It is such that no man would ever on any account take a virgin to wife. For they say that a woman is worthless unless she has had knowledge of many men. They argue that she must have displeased the gods, because if she enjoyed the favour of their idols then men would desire her and consort with her. So they deal with their womenfolk in this way. When it happens that men from a foreign land are passing through this country and have pitched their tents and made a camp, the matrons from neighbouring villages and hamlets bring their daughters to these camps, to the number of twenty or forty, and beg the travellers to take them and lie with them. So these choose the girls who please them best, and the others return home disconsolate. So long as they remain, the visitors are free to take their pleasure with the women and use them as they will, but they are not allowed to carry them off anywhere else. When the men have worked their will and are ready to be gone, then it is the custom for every man to give to the woman with whom he has lain some trinket or token so that she can show, when she comes to marry, that she has had a lover. In this way custom requires every girl to wear more than a score of such tokens hung round her neck to show that she has had lovers in plenty and plenty of men have lain with her. And she who has most tokens and can show that she has had most lovers and that most men have lain with her is the most highly esteemed and the most acceptable as a wife; for they say that she is the most favoured by the gods. And when they have taken a wife in this way they prize her highly; and they account it a grave offence for any man to touch another's wife, and they all strictly abstain from such an act. So much, then, for this marriage custom, which fully merits a description. Obviously the country is a fine one to visit for a lad from sixteen to twenty-four.

The natives are idolaters and out-and-out bad. They deem it no sin to rob and maltreat and are the greatest rogues and the greatest robbers in the world. They live by the chase and by their herds and the fruits of the earth. The country abounds with animals that produce musk, which in their language are called gudderi . They are so plentiful that you can smell musk everywhere. I have already explained that a sac in the form of a tumour and filled with blood grows next to the beast's navel, and this blood is musk. But I must add that once in every moon the sac becomes overcharged with blood and discharges its contents. So it happens, since these animals are very plentiful here, that they discharge their musk in many places, so that the whole country is pervaded with the scent. The rascally natives have many excellent dogs, who catch great numbers of these animals; so they have no lack of musk.

The natives have no coinage and do not use the Khan's paper currency; but for money they use salt. They are very poorly clad, in skins, canvas, and buckram. They speak a language of their own and call themselves ‘Tibet’.

This province of Tibet is of immense size and lies on the confines of Manzi and many other provinces. The natives are idolaters and notorious brigands. The province is so huge that it contains eight kingdoms and a great many cities and towns. In many places there are rivers and lakes and mountains, in which gold-dust is found in great quantity. There is also great abundance of cinnamon. In this province coral fetches a high price, for it is hung round the necks of women and of idols with great joy. The province produces plenty of camlets and other cloths of gold, silk, and fustian, and many sorts of spice that were never seen in our country. Here are to be found the most skilful enchanters and the best astrologers according to their usage that exist in any of the regions hereabouts. Among other wonders they bring on tempests and thunder-storms when they wish and stop them at any time. They perform the most potent enchantments and the greatest marvels to hear and to behold by diabolic arts, which it is better not to relate in our book, or men might marvel over-much. Their customs are disagreeable. They have mastiffs as big as donkeys, very good at pulling down game, including wild cattle, which are plentiful there and of great size and ferocity. They also have a great variety of other hunting dogs, besides excellent lanner and saker falcons, good fliers and apt for hawking. Before leaving Tibet, of which we have now given a full account, let me make it clear that it belongs to the Great Khan, as do all the other kingdoms and provinces and regions described in this book, except only the provinces mentioned at the beginning of our book which belong to the son of Arghun, as I have told you. So you may understand from this, without further indication, that with this exception the provinces described in this book are all subject to the Great Khan.

We will tell you next of the province of Kaindu, which lies towards the west. It has only one king. The people are idolaters and subject to the Great Khan. It has cities and towns in plenty. The chief city, also called Kaindu, lies near the entrance to the province. There is also a lake in which are found many pearls — pure white but not round, being rather knobbly as though four, five, six, or more were joined together. The Great Khan will not let anyone take them; for if all the pearls that were found there were taken out, so many would be taken that they would be cheap and lose their value. So the Great Khan, when he has a mind, has pearls taken from it for his own use only; but no one else may take them on pain of death. There is also a mountain there in which is found a sort of stone called turquoise. These are very fine gems and very plentiful. But the Great Khan does not allow them to be taken except at his bidding.

Let me tell you that in this province there prevails a usage concerning women such as I will describe to you. A man does not think it an outrage if a stranger or some other man makes free with his wife or daughter or sister or any woman he may have in his house. But it is taken as a favour when anyone lies with them. For they say that by this act their gods and idols are propitiated, so as to enrich them with temporal blessings in great abundance. And for that reason they deal with their wives in the following open-handed fashion. You must know that when a man of this country sees that a stranger is coming to his house to lodge, or that he is entering his house without intending to lodge, he immediately walks out, telling his wife to let the stranger have his will without reservation. Then he goes his way to his fields or vineyards and does not return so long as the stranger remains in his house. And I assure you that he often stays three days and lies in bed with this wittol's wife. And as a sign that he is in the house he hangs out his cap or some other token. This is an indication that he is within. And the wretched wittol, so long as he sees this sign in his house, does not return. This usage prevails throughout the province. The Great Khan has forbidden it; but they continue to observe it nonetheless, since, as they are all addicted to it, there is no one to accuse another. There are some residents in the villages and homesteads perched on crags by the wayside who have beautiful wives and offer them freely to passing traders, And the traders give the women a piece of some fine cloth, perhaps a yard or so, or some other trinket of trifling value. Having taken his pleasure for a while, the trader mounts his horse and rides away. Then the husband and wife call after him in mockery; ‘Hi, you there — you that are riding off! Show us what you are taking with you that is ours! Let us see, ne'er-do-well, what profit you have made! Look at what you have left to us — what you have thrown away and forgotten.’ And he flourishes the cloth they have gained from him. ‘We have got this of yours, you poor fool, and you have nothing to show for it!’ So they mock at him. And so they continue to act.

Let me tell you next about their money. They have gold in bars and weigh it out by saggi ; and it is valued according to its weight. But they have no coined money bearing a stamp. For small change they do as follows. They have salt water from which they make salt by boiling it in pans. When they have boiled it for an hour, they let it solidify in moulds, forming blocks of the size of a twopenny loaf, flat below and rounded on top. When the blocks are ready, they are laid on heated-stones beside the fire to dry and harden. On these blocks they set the Great Khan's stamp. And currency of this sort is made only by his agents. Eighty of these blocks are worth a saggio of gold. But traders come with these blocks to the people who live among the mountains in wild and out-of-the-way places and receive a saggio of gold for sixty, fifty, or forty blocks, according as the place is more isolated and cut off from cities and civilized people. Here the natives cannot dispose of their gold and other wares, such as musk, for want of purchasers. So they sell their gold cheap, because they find it in rivers and lakes as you have heard. These traders travel all over the highlands of Tibet, where the salt money is also current. They make an immense profit, because these people use this salt in food as well as for buying the necessities of life; but in the cities they almost invariably use fragments of the blocks for food and spend the unbroken blocks.

There are vast numbers here of the beasts that produce musk, and hunters catch them and take great quantities of the musk. There are plenty of good fish, which are caught in the same lake that produces the pearls. There are also lions, lynxes, bears, stags, and roebuck in plenty, and birds of every sort abound. There is no grape wine, but wine is made of wheat and rice with many spices, and a very good drink it is. The province is also a great source of cloves, which grow on a little tree with leaves like laurel but slightly longer and narrower, and little white flowers like clove-pinks. There is also ginger in abundance and cinnamon, not to speak of spices that never come to our country.

When the traveller leaves the city of Kaindu, he rides for ten days through a country not lacking in towns and villages, and well stocked with game, both bird and beast. The people have the same manners and customs as those I have described. At the end of these ten days he reaches a great river called Brius, which is the farther boundary of the province of Kaindu. In it are found great quantities of gold dust. The district is also rich in cinnamon. This river runs into the Ocean.

On the farther side of the river Brius lies Kara-jang, a province of such size that it contains no less than seven kingdoms. It lies towards the west, and the inhabitants are idolaters and subject to the Great Khan. Its king is his son, whose name is Essen-Temur, a very great king and rich and powerful. He rules his land well and justly; for he is a wise and upright man.

After leaving the river, the traveller continues westwards for five days, through a country with numerous cities and towns which breeds excellent horses. The people live by rearing animals and tilling the soil. They speak a language of their own, which is very difficult to understand. At the end of the five days he reaches the capital of the kingdom, which is called Yachi, a large and splendid city. Here there are traders and craftsmen in plenty. The inhabitants are of several sorts: there are some who worship Mahomet, some idolater, and a few Nestorian Christians. Both wheat and rice are plentiful; but wheat bread is not eaten because in this province it is unwholesome. The natives eat rice, and also make it into a drink with spices, which is very fine and clear and makes a man drunk like wine. For money they use white cowries, i.e. the sea-shells that are used to make necklaces for dogs: 80 cowries are equivalent to 1 saggio of silver, which is worth 2 Venetian groats, and 8 saggi of fine silver may be taken to equal 1 of fine gold. They also have brine wells, from which they make salt that is used for food by all the inhabitants of the country. And I assure you that the king derives great profit from this salt. The men here do not mind if one touches another's wife, so long as it is with her consent.

Before leaving this kingdom let me tell you something which I had forgotten. There is a lake here, some 100 miles in circumference, in which there is a vast quantity of fish, the best in the world. They are of great size and of all kinds. The natives eat flesh raw — poultry, mutton, beef, and buffalo meat. The poorer sort go to the shambles and take the raw liver as soon as it is drawn from the beasts; then they chop it small, put it in garlic sauce and eat it there and then. And they do likewise with every other kind of flesh. The gentry also eat their meat raw; but they have it minced very small, put it in garlic sauce flavoured with spices and then eat it as readily as we eat cooked meat.

On leaving Yachi and continuing westwards for ten days, the traveller reaches the kingdom of Kara-jang, the capital of which is also called Kara-jang. The people are idolaters and subject to the Great Khan. The king is Hukaji, a son of the Great Khan. In this province gold dust is found in the rivers, and gold in bigger nuggets in the lakes and mountains. They have so much of it that they give a saggio of gold for six of silver. Here too the cowries of which I have spoken are used for money. They are not found in this province, but come here from India.

In this province live huge snakes and serpents of such a size that no one could help being amazed even to hear of them. They are loathsome creatures to behold. Let me tell you just how big they are. You may take it for a fact that there are some of them ten paces in length that are as thick as a stout cask: for their girth runs to about ten palms. These are the biggest. They have two squat legs in front near the head, which have no feet but simply three claws, two small and one bigger, like the claws of a falcon or a lion. They have enormous heads and eyes so bulging that they are bigger than loaves. Their mouth is big enough to swallow a man at one gulp. Their teeth are huge. All in all, the monsters are of such inordinate bulk and ferocity that there is neither man nor beast but goes in fear of them. There are also smaller ones, not exceeding eight paces in length, or six or it may be five.

Let me tell you now how these monsters are trapped. You must know that by day they remain underground because of the great heat; at nightfall, they sally out to hunt and feed and seize whatever prey they can come by. They go down to drink at streams and lakes and springs. They are so bulky and heavy and of such a girth that when they pass through sand on their nightly search for food or drink they scoop out a furrow through the sand that looks as if a butt full of wine had been rolled that way. Now the hunters who set out to catch them lay traps at various places in the trails that show which way the snakes are accustomed to go down the banks into the water. These are made by embedding in the earth a stout wooden stake to which is fixed a sharp steel tip like a razor-blade or lance-head, projecting about a palm's breadth beyond the stake and slanting in the direction from which the serpents approach. This is covered with sand, so that nothing of the stake is visible. Traps of this sort are laid in great numbers. When the snake, or rather the serpent, comes down the trail to drink, he runs full-tilt into the steel, so that it pierces his chest and rips his belly right to the navel and he dies on the spot. The hunter knows that the serpent is dead by the cry of the birds, and then he ventures to approach his prey. Otherwise he dare not draw near.

When hunters have trapped a serpent by this means, they draw out the gall from the belly and sell it for a high price, for you must know that it makes a potent medicine. If a man is bitten by a mad dog, he is given a drop of it to drink — the weight of a halfpenny — and he is cured forthwith. And when a woman is in labour and cries aloud with the pangs of travail, she is given a drop of the serpent's gall and as soon as she has drunk it she is delivered of her child forthwith. Its third use is when someone is afflicted by any sort of growth: he puts a drop of this gall on it and is cured in a day or two. For these reasons the gall of this serpent is highly prized in these provinces. The flesh also commands a good price, because it is very good to eat and is esteemed as a delicacy.

Another thing about these serpents: they go to the dens where lions and bears and other beasts of prey have their cubs and gobble them up — parents as well as young — if they can get at them.

Let me tell you further that this province produces a sturdy breed of horses, which are exported when young for sale in India. And you must know that it is the custom to remove two or three joints of the tail-bone, so that the horse cannot flick the rider with its tail or swish it when galloping; for it is reckoned unsightly for a horse to gallop with swishing tail. The horsemen here ride with long stirrups after the French fashion — long, that is, in contrast to the short stirrups favoured by the Tartars and most other races who go in for archery, since they use their stirrups for standing upright when they shoot.

For armour they wear cuirasses of buffalo hide. They carry lances and shields. They also use crossbows, with all the quarrels dipped in poison. All the natives, women as well as men, especially those who are bent on evil courses, carry poison about with them. If it should chance that anyone is caught after committing a crime for which he is liable to suffer torture, rather than face the penalty of the scourge, he puts the poison in his mouth and swallows it, so as to die as quickly as possible. But, since the authorities are well aware of this trick, they always have some dog's dung handy, so that if a prisoner swallows poison for this purpose he is immediately made to swallow the dung and so vomit up the poison. Such is the remedy they have found for this practice, and it is a well-tried one. Another practice of theirs, before they were conquered by the Great Khan, was this. If it happened that a gentleman of quality, with a fine figure, or a ‘good shadow’, came to lodge in the house of a native of this province, they would murder him in the night, by poison or other means, so that he died. You must not suppose that they did this in order to rob him; they did it rather because they believed that his ‘good shadow’ and the good grace with which he was blessed and his intelligence and soul would remain in the house. In this way many met their deaths before the conquest. Since then — that is, during the last thirty-five years or so — they have abandoned this evil practice for fear of the Great Khan, who has strictly forbidden it. hYrY4WlMxtQOTqGpakbVb5E4D+x8bsCJwpf/Bddq0hgTYzsom4vQaKfc4j7GZytT