The Travels of Marco Polo Volume II Part 38

CHAPTER IV.

CONCERNING THE FASHION OF THE IDOLS.

Now you must know that the Idols of Cathay, and of Manzi, and of this Island, are all of the same cla.s.s. And in this Island as well as elsewhere, there be some of the Idols that have the head of an ox, some that have the head of a pig, some of a dog, some of a sheep, and some of divers other kinds. And some of them have four heads, whilst some have three, one growing out of either shoulder. There are also some that have four hands, some ten, some a thousand! And they do put more faith in those Idols that have a thousand hands than in any of the others.[NOTE 1] And when any Christian asks them why they make their Idols in so many different guises, and not all alike, they reply that just so their forefathers were wont to have them made, and just so they will leave them to their children, and these to the after generations. And so they will be handed down for ever. And you must understand that the deeds ascribed to these Idols are such a parcel of devilries as it is best not to tell. So let us have done with the Idols, and speak of other things.

But I must tell you one thing still concerning that Island (and 'tis the same with the other Indian Islands), that if the natives take prisoner an enemy who cannot pay a ransom, he who hath the prisoner summons all his friends and relations, and they put the prisoner to death, and then they cook him and eat him, and they say there is no meat in the world so good!--But now we _will_ have done with that Island and speak of something else.

You must know the Sea in which lie the Islands of those parts is called the SEA OF CHIN, which is as much as to say "The Sea over against Manzi."

For, in the language of those Isles, when they say _Chin_, 'tis Manzi they mean. And I tell you with regard to that Eastern Sea of Chin, according to what is said by the experienced pilots and mariners of those parts, there be 7459 Islands in the waters frequented by the said mariners; and that is how they know the fact, for their whole life is spent in navigating that sea. And there is not one of those Islands but produces valuable and odorous woods like the lignaloe, aye and better too; and they produce also a great variety of spices. For example in those Islands grows pepper as white as snow, as well as the black in great quant.i.ties. In fact the riches of those Islands is something wonderful, whether in gold or precious stones, or in all manner of spicery; but they lie so far off from the main land that it is hard to get to them. And when the ships of Zayton and Kinsay do voyage thither they make vast profits by their venture.[NOTE 2]

It takes them a whole year for the voyage, going in winter and returning in summer. For in that Sea there are but two winds that blow, the one that carries them outward and the other that brings them homeward; and the one of these winds blows all the winter, and the other all the summer. And you must know these regions are so far from India that it takes a long time also for the voyage thence.

Though that Sea is called the Sea of Chin, as I have told you, yet it is part of the Ocean Sea all the same. But just as in these parts people talk of the Sea of England and the Sea of Roch.e.l.le, so in those countries they speak of the Sea of Chin and the Sea of India, and so on, though they all are but parts of the Ocean.[NOTE 3]

Now let us have done with that region which is very inaccessible and out of the way. Moreover, Messer Marco Polo never was there. And let me tell you the Great Kaan has nothing to do with them, nor do they render him any tribute or service.

So let us go back to Zayton and take up the order of our book from that point.[NOTE 4]

NOTE 1.--"Several of the (Chinese) G.o.ds have horns on the forehead, or wear animals' heads; some have three eyes.... Some are represented in the Indian manner with a multiplicity of arms. We saw at Yang-cheu fu a G.o.ddess with thirty arms." (_Deguignes_, I. 364-366.)

The reference to any particular form of idolatry here is vague. But in Tibetan Buddhism, with which Marco was familiar, all these extravagances are prominent, though repugnant to the more orthodox Buddhism of the South.

When the Dalai Lama came to visit the Altun Khan, to secure the reconversion of the Mongols in 1577, he appeared as a manifest embodiment of the Bodhisatva Avalokitecvara, with _four hands_, of which two were always folded across the breast! The same Bodhisatva is sometimes represented with eleven heads. Manjushri manifests himself in a golden body with 1000 hands and 1000 _Patras_ or vessels, in each of which were 1000 figures of Sakya visible, etc. (_Koeppen_, II. 137; _Va.s.silyev_, 200.)

NOTE 2.--Polo seems in this pa.s.sage to be speaking of the more easterly Islands of the Archipelago, such as the Philippines, the Moluccas, etc., but with vague ideas of their position.

NOTE 3.--In this pa.s.sage alone Polo makes use of the now familiar name of CHINA. "_Chin_" as he says, "in the language of those Isles means _Manzi_." In fact, though the form _Chin_ is more correctly Persian, we do get the exact form _China_ from "the language of those Isles," i.e. from the _Malay_. _China_ is also used in j.a.panese.

What he says about the Ocean and the various names of its parts is nearly a version of a pa.s.sage in the geographical Poem of Dionysius, ending:--

[Greek: Outos Okeans peridedrome gaian hapasan Toios en ka toia met' andrasin ounomath' elkon] (42-3).

So also Abulfeda: "This is the sea which flows from the Ocean Sea....

This sea takes the names of the countries it washes. Its eastern extremity is called the Sea of Chin ... the part west of this is called the Sea of India ... then comes the Sea of Fars, the Sea of Berbera, and lastly the Sea of Kolzum" (Red Sea).

NOTE 4.--The Ramusian here inserts a short chapter, shown by the awkward way in which it comes in to be a very manifest interpolation, though possibly still an interpolation by the Traveller's hand:--

"Leaving the port of Zayton you sail westward and something south-westward for 1500 miles, pa.s.sing a gulf called CHEINAN, having a length of two months' sail towards the north. Along the whole of its south-east side it borders on the province of Manzi, and on the other side with Anin and Coloman, and many other provinces formerly spoken of. Within this Gulf there are innumerable Islands, almost all well-peopled; and in these is found a great quant.i.ty of gold-dust, which is collected from the sea where the rivers discharge. There is copper also, and other things; and the people drive a trade with each other in the things that are peculiar to their respective Islands. They have also a traffic with the people of the mainland, selling them gold and copper and other things; and purchasing in turn what they stand in need of. In the greater part of these Islands plenty of corn grows. This gulf is so great, and inhabited by so many people, that it seems like a world in itself."

This pa.s.sage is translated by Marsden with much forcing, so as to describe the China Sea, embracing the Philippine Islands, etc.; but, as a matter of fact, it seems clearly to indicate the writer's conception as of a great gulf running up into the continent between Southern China and Tong-king for a length equal to two months' journey.

The name of the gulf, Cheinan, i.e. _Heinan_, may either be that of the Island so called, or, as I rather incline to suppose, _'An-nan_, i.e.

Tong-king. But even by Camoens, writing at Macao in 1559-1560, the Gulf of Hainan is styled an unknown sea (though this perhaps is only appropriate to the prophetic speaker):--

"Ves, corre a costa, que Champa se chama, Cuja mata he do pao cheiroso ornada: Ves, Cauchichina esta de escura fama, _E de Ainao ve a incognita enseada_" (X. 129).

And in Sir Robert Dudley's _Arcano del Mare_ (Firenze, 1647), we find a great bottle-necked gulf, of some 5-1/2 in length, running up to the north from Tong-king, very much as I have represented the Gulf of Cheinan in the attempt to realise Polo's Own Geography. (See map in Introductory Essay.)

CHAPTER V.

OF THE GREAT COUNTRY CALLED CHAMBA.

You must know that on leaving the port of Zayton you sail west-south-west for 1500 miles, and then you come to a country called CHAMBA,[NOTE 1] a very rich region, having a king of its own. The people are Idolaters and pay a yearly tribute to the Great Kaan, which consists of elephants and nothing but elephants. And I will tell you how they came to pay this tribute.

It happened in the year of Christ 1278 that the Great Kaan sent a Baron of his called, Sagatu with a great force of horse and foot against this King of Chamba, and this Baron opened the war on a great scale against the King and his country.

Now the King [whose name was Accambale] was a very aged man, nor had he such a force as the Baron had. And when he saw what havoc the Baron was making with his kingdom he was grieved to the heart. So he bade messengers get ready and despatched them to the Great Kaan. And they said to the Kaan: "Our Lord the King of Chamba salutes you as his liege-lord, and would have you to know that he is stricken in years and long hath held his realm in peace. And now he sends you word by us that he is willing to be your liegeman, and will send you every year a tribute of as many elephants as you please. And he prays you in all gentleness and humility that you would send word to your Baron to desist from harrying his kingdom and to quit his territories. These shall henceforth be at your absolute disposal, and the King shall hold them of you."

When the Great Kaan had heard the King's amba.s.sage he was moved with pity, and sent word to that Baron of his to quit that kingdom with his army, and to carry his arms to the conquest of some other country; and as soon as this command reached them they obeyed it. Thus it was then that this King became va.s.sal of the Great Kaan, and paid him every year a tribute of 20 of the greatest and finest elephants that were to be found in the country.

But now we will leave that matter, and tell you other particulars about the King of Chamba.

You must know that in that kingdom no woman is allowed to marry until the King shall have seen her; if the woman pleases him then he takes her to wife; if she does not, he gives her a dowry to get her a husband withal.

In the year of Christ 1285, Messer Marco Polo was in that country, and at that time the King had, between sons and daughters, 326 children, of whom at least 150 were men fit to carry arms.[NOTE 2]

There are very great numbers of elephants in this kingdom, and they have lignaloes in great abundance. They have also extensive forests of the wood called _Bonus_, which is jet-black, and of which chessmen and pen-cases are made. But there is nought more to tell, so let us proceed.[NOTE 3]

NOTE 1.--+The name CHAMPA is of Indian origin, like the adjoining Kamboja and many other names in Indo-China, and was probably taken from that of an ancient Hindu city and state on the Ganges, near modern Bhagalpur. Hiuen Tsang, in the 7th century, makes mention of the Indo-Chinese state as Mahachampa (_Pel. Boudd_, III. 83.)

The t.i.tle of Champa down to the 15th century seems to have been applied by Western Asiatics to a kingdom which embraced the whole coast between Tong-king and Kamboja, including all that is now called Cochin China outside of Tong-king. It was termed by the Chinese _Chen-Ching_. In 1471 the King of Tong-king, Le Thanh-tong, conquered the country, and the genuine people of Champa were reduced to a small number occupying the mountains of the province of Binh Thuan at the extreme south-east of the Coch. Chinese territory. To this part of the coast the name Champa is often applied in maps. (See _J.A._ ser. II. tom. xi. p. 31, and _J. des Savans_, 1822, p. 71.) The people of Champa in this restricted sense are said to exhibit Malay affinities, and they profess Mahomedanism. ["The Mussulmans of Binh-Thuan call themselves _Bani_ or _Orang Bani_, 'men mussulmans,'

probably from the Arabic _beni_ 'the sons,' to distinguish them from the Chams _Djat_ 'of race,' which they name also _Kaphir_ or _Akaphir_, from the Arabic word _kafer_ 'pagans.' These names are used in _Binh-Thuan_ to make a distinction, but Banis and Kaphirs alike are all Chams.... In Cambodia all Chams are Mussulmans." (_E. Aymonier, Les Tchames_, p. 26.) The religion of the pagan Chams of Binh-Thuan is degenerate Brahmanism with three chief G.o.ds, Po-Nagar, Po-Rome, and Po-Klong-Gara. (Ibid., p.

35.)--H.C.] The books of their former religion they say (according to Dr.

Bastian) that they received from Ceylon, but they were converted to Islamism by no less a person than 'Ali himself. The Tong-king people received their Buddhism from China, and this tradition puts Champa as the extreme flood-mark of that great tide of Buddhist proselytism, which went forth from Ceylon to the Indo-Chinese regions in an early century of our era, and which is generally connected with the name of Buddaghosha.

The prominent position of Champa on the route to China made its ports places of call for many ages, and in the earliest record of the Arab navigation to China we find the country noticed under the identical name (allowing for the deficiencies of the Arabic Alphabet) of _Sanf_ or _Chanf_. Indeed it is highly probable that the [Greek: Zaba] or [Greek: Zabai] of Ptolemy's itinerary of the sea-route to the _Sinae_ represents this same name.

["It is true," Sir Henry Yule wrote since (1882), "that Champa, as known in later days, lay to the east of the Mekong delta, whilst Zabai of the Greeks lay to the west of that and of the [Greek: mega akrotaerion]--the Great Cape, or C. Cambodia of our maps. Crawford (_Desc. Ind. Arch._ p. 80) seems to say that the Malays include under the name _Champa_ the whole of what we call Kamboja. This may possibly be a slip. But it is certain, as we shall see presently, that the Arab _Sanf_--which is unquestionably Champa--also lay west of the Cape, i.e. within the Gulf of Siam. The fact is that the Indo-Chinese kingdoms have gone through unceasing and enormous vicissitudes, and in early days Champa must have been extensive and powerful, for in the travels of Hiuen Tsang (about A.D. 629) it is called _maha_-Champa. And my late friend Lieutenant Garnier, who gave great attention to these questions, has deduced from such data as exist in Chinese Annals and elsewhere, that the ancient kingdom which the Chinese describe under the name of _Fu-nan_, as extending over the whole peninsula east of the Gulf of Siam, was a kingdom of the _Tsiam_ or Champa race. The locality of the ancient port of Zabai or Champa is probably to be sought on the west coast of Kamboja, near the Campot, or the Kang-kao of our maps. On this coast also was the _Komar_ and _Kamarah_ of Ibn Batuta and other Arab writers, the great source of aloes-wood, the country then of the _Khmer_ or Kambojan People." (_Notes on the Oldest Records of the Sea-Route to China from Western Asia, Proc.R.G.S._ 1882, pp. 656-657.)

M. Barth says that this identification would agree well with the testimony of his inscription XVIII. B., which comes from Angkor and for which _Campa_ is a part of the _Dakshinapatha_, of the southern country. But the capital of this rival State of Kamboja would thus be very near the Treang province where inscriptions have been found with the names of _Bhavavarman_ and of Icanavarman. It is true that in 627, the King of Kamboja, according to the Chinese Annals (_Nouv. Mel. As._ I. p. 84), had subjugated the kingdom of Fu-nan identified by Yule and Garnier with _Campa_. Abel Remusat (_Nouv.

Mel. As._ I. pp. 75 and 77) identifies it with Tong-king and Stan. Julien (_J. As._ 4 Ser. X. p. 97) with Siam. (_Inscrip. Sanscrites du Cambodge_, 1885, pp. 69-70, note.)

Sir Henry Yule writes (l.c. p. 657): "We have said that the Arab _Sanf_, as well as the Greek _Zabai_, lay west of Cape Cambodia. This is proved by the statement that the Arabs on their voyage to China made a ten days' run from _Sanf_ to Pulo Condor." But Abulfeda (transl. by _Guyard_, II. ii. p. 127) distinctly says that the Komar Peninsula (Khmer) is situated _west_ of the Sanf Peninsula; between Sanf and Komar there is not a day's journey by sea.

We have, however, another difficulty to overcome.

I agree with Sir Henry Yule and Marsden that in ch. vii. infra, p. 276, the text must be read, "When you leave _Chamba_," instead of "When you leave _Java_." Coming from Zayton and sailing 1500 miles, Polo arrives at Chamba; from Chamba, sailing 700 miles he arrives at the islands of Sondur and Condur, identified by Yule with Sundar Fulat (Pulo Condore); from Sundar Fulat, after 500 miles more, he finds the country called Locac; then he goes to Pentam (Bintang, 500 miles), Malaiur, and Java the Less (Sumatra).

Ibn Khordadhbeh's itinerary agrees pretty well with Marco Polo's, as Professor De Goeje remarks to me: "Starting from Mait (Bintang), and leaving on the left Tiyuma (Timoan), in five days' journey, one goes to Kimer (Kmer, Cambodia), and after three days more, following the coast, arrives to Sanf; then to Lukyn, the first point of call in China, 100 parasangs by land or by sea; from Lukyn it takes four days by sea and twenty by land to go to Kanfu." [Canton, see note, supra p. 199.] (See _De Goeje's Ibn Khordadhbeh_, p. 48 et seq.) But we come now to the difficulty.

Professor De Goeje writes to me: "It is strange that in the _Relation des Voyages_ of Reinaud, p. 20 of the text, reproduced by Ibn al Fakih, p. 12 seq., Sundar Fulat (Pulo Condore) is placed between Sanf and the China Sea (_Sandjy_); it takes ten days to go from Sanf to Sundar Fulat, and then a month (seven days of which between mountains called the Gates of China.) In the _Livre des Merveilles de l'Inde_ (pp. 85, 86) we read: 'When arrived between Sanf and the China coast, in the neighbourhood of Sundar Fulat, an island situated at the entrance of the Sea of Sandjy, which is the Sea of China....' It would appear from these two pa.s.sages that Sanf is to be looked for in the Malay Peninsula. This Sanf is different from the Sanf of Ibn Khordadhbeh and of Abulfeda." (_Guyard's transl._ II. ii. 127.)