Looking for Marco Polo (22 page)

The money letters that the thirteenth-century merchant-financiers sent to one another were a means for a buyer in one place to arrange for payment from funds far distant without having to ship specie. See Frederic C. Lane and Reinhold C. Mueller’s
Money and Banking in Medieval and Renaissance Venice
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1985); Mueller’s
The Venetian Money Market: Banks, Panics, and the Public Debt, 1200–1500
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997); and Edmund B. Fryde’s
Studies in Medieval Trade and Finance
(London: Hambledon Press, 1983).

For information about Mongol maps, see Jack Weatherford’s
Genghis Khan and the Making of the Modern World
(New York: Three Rivers Press, 2004), especially chap. 9, “The Golden Light,” pp. 222–223.

Chapter 12, How Marco’s Story Got Told
: Concerning Islamic calligraphy, see Sheila S. Blair’s
Islamic Calligraphy
(Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2006).
For a more general discussion of the art of Islam, E. H. Gombrich’s
The Story of Art
(Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice-Hall, Inc., 1984) has an excellent brief discussion, “Looking Eastwards,” chap. 7 in the 14th edition.

For information about the immense Chinese junks and the compass used by Oriental navigators, see Mansel Davies’s
A Selection from the Writings of Joseph Needham,
edited by Mansel Davies (London: McFarland & Company, 1994), specifically “China, Europe, and the Seas Between,” pp. 166–177; and Sean McGrail’s “Marco Polo” in
Boats of the World from the Stone Age to Medieval Times
(London: Oxford University Press, 2001), section 10.6, pp. 377–381.

The sea fight with Genoa probably took place in 1298. It is described in Frederic C. Lane’s
Venetian Ships and Shipbuilders of the Renaissance
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1934).

For more about the battle and Marco’s capture and how Marco’s book got written, see Y-C, Introduction, p. 6; section 6, “The Jealousies and Naval Wars of Venice and Genoa,” pp. 41–55; and section 7, “Rusticiano or Rustichello of Pisa, Marco Polo’s Fellow-Prisoner at Genoa, the Scribe Who Wrote Down the Travels,” pp. 55–64.

For more about different versions and editions of
The Travels,
see John Larner’s
Marco Polo and the Discovery of the World
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999), pp. 3–7, 58.

Concerning the nickname “Marco Milione” and the Venetian masque figures, see Y-C, Introduction, pp. 67–68.

Chapter 13, To the Court of Kublai Khan
: I’ve drawn some of the desert detail from Doughty and Lawrence. Both borrowed from Marco’s telling.

The account of mountain travel with yaks and the setting I’ve used for my description of Marco recovering from his illness are drawn from Shor. The gap-vaulting yak is hers.

Marco’s description of the post stations and bell-wearing runners is taken from M-P, pp. 242–245.

Chapter 14, Marco Meets Kublai
: Xanadu and Kublai’s tent palace are described in Y-C, vol. 1, book 1, chap. 61, pp. 298–304, and see notes 2–5, pp. 304–308.

Marco’s description of the humbling bar is taken from M-P, p. 219. His illness approaching the Pamir highlands is taken from M-P, p. 142. For a map, see Y-C, vol. 1, “Marco Polo Itineraries,” no. 3, pp. 178–179.

Concerning the stitched vessels the Polos spurned, see Y-C, vol. 1, chap. 19, and note 3, pp. 117–119. A useful feature of such craft was their flexibility—they were not as likely to break up landing in surf as was a more rigid spike-secured plank vessel. For more about them, see Sean McGrail’s
Boats of the World from the Stone Age to Medieval Times,
section 6.7.3, pp. 269–272.

As for the unhealthy heat and deadly winds of Hormuz—“a very sickly place,” in Marco’s words—see Y-C, vol. 1, book 1, chap. 19, note 4, pp. 119–120, and note 5, p. 120, “History of Hormuz,” note 6, pp. 120–121.

Hormuz and the sewn plank boats are also described in M-P, pp. 123–125.

Oil for camel itch: See Y-C, vol. 1, book 1, chap. 3, p. 46, and note 5 on p. 49 about the “springs of naphtha” on the Baku Peninsula on the Caspian Sea “supplying the whole country as far as Baghdad.” The itch was probably mange.

The village wiped out by Kublai’s grandfather may have been Balkh. See Thubron, pp. 234–235.

Chapter 15, On the Gobi
: For more about the oasis wells and their purging salts, see Y-C, vol. 1, book 1, chap. 20, p. 123, and note 2 on p. 124.

The story of the camel following the pelt of her dead calf is taken from Lawrence, p. 247.

Marco’s description of the shrines at Dunhuang is in M-P, pp. 150–159.

Chapter 16, A Great Miracle
: For Marco on paper money, see M-P, pp. 238–240, and Jonathan M. Bloom,
Paper Before Print
(New Haven: Yale University Press, 2001), pp. 139–141.

Chapter 17, His Impertinence Beards the Emperor
: The Marco Milione mask and its use in the Venetian masques is noted in Y-C, Introduction, p. 67. Koumiss is fermented mares’ milk. It is nourishing, effervescent, unpleasantly pungent, and somewhat alcoholic. For more about it, see Y-C, vol. 1, “Kimiz or Kumiz,” note 2 to chapter 53, pp. 259–260.

The eye ointment Marco describes—“tutty”—we know as zinc oxide. Marco’s account is given in Y-C, vol. 1, book 1, chap. 21, p. 125, and see note 2, p. 126.

Solomon’s dream is recounted in I Kings 3:9.

Chapter 18, The Wonders of China
: For more about Chinese astronomy and the preparation of the all-important almanacs, see Nathan Sivin’s
Granting the Seasons: The Chinese Astronomical Reform of 1280,
with an Annotated Translation and Study of Its Many Dimensions.
I am grateful to Dr. Sivin for sharing with me an early draft of parts of his book concerning Kublai’s interest in astronomy in connection with preparing the Chinese calendar and his reliance on Muslim astronomists to help read heavenly signs and portents.

For a description of how Marco’s
Travels
inspired Columbus, see S. E. Morison’s
Admiral of the Ocean Sea: A Life of Christopher Columbus
(Boston: Little, Brown and Company, Inc., 1942), pp. 64–69, 237–238, and Y-C, Introduction, p. 106.

Marco never mentions taking notes as he traveled, and none have turned up, but I think he must have, so I’ve imagined his method.

Burial rites are described in M-P, pp. 151–152.

Kublai’s secret garden and Marco’s contributions are my conjecture. For more about his elephants, see M-P, pp. 210–211.

Marco’s description of Kublai’s priest is given in Y-C, book 1, chap. 61, pp. 301–303, and see notes 8–10, pp. 309–314.

Kublai also employed Kashmirian conjurers. These are described in Y-C, book 1, chap. 31, and see note 2, p. 168.

The story of the sparrow in the castle is based on
the Venerable Bede’s
Ecclesiastical History of the English People.
The speech in favor of Christianity is by one of King Edwin’s Saxon noblemen. Professor Michèle Mulcahey, Department of Medieval History, School of History, University of St. Andrews, suggested this when I asked her how Marco might have described his faith to Kublai.

The stories Marco tells Kublai are drawn not in order from the Y-C edition of
The Travels.

The capture of Baghdad story is in Y-C, book 1, chap. 6, “Of the Great City of Baudas, and How It Was Taken,” pp. 63–68. I’ve added my imagining of the battle to Marco’s account.

Chapter 19, The Plot
: Kublai suffered from gout—the accumulation of crystals of ureic acid around the joints (usually in the feet)—for which, as then, there is no sure remedy, although a change of diet can help (reduced protein, simpler food), and certain drugs can be prescribed to reduce the body’s tendency to accumulate ureic acid.

The fine dust Marco encountered is called loess, a kind of silt that forms a fertile topsoil in several parts of the world.

I’ve imagined the plot and the confrontation with Kublai.

Chapter 20, Escape!
: The story is given in Y-C, vol. 1, “Prologue,” chaps. 17–18, pp. 31–37.

For more about the Strait of Malacca, see Peter Gwin’s “Dangerous Straits,”
National Geographic,
vol. 212, no. 4 (October 2007), p. 126.

Noble Mauricio, the princess’s gray donkey, does not appear in
The Travels.
He owes his presence and some of his habits to Mary Ellen Chase’s
The Golden Asse and Other Essays
(New York: Henry Holt & Co, 1929).

Concerning cholera, see Sandra Hempel’s
The Medical Detective: John Snow and the Mystery of Cholera
(London: Grantia Books, 2006).

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