The Travels of Marco Polo Volume II Part 52

CONCERNING THE KINGDOM OF MUTFILI.

When you leave Maabar and go about 1,000 miles in a northerly direction you come to the kingdom of MUTFILI. This was formerly under the rule of a King, and since his death, some forty years past, it has been under his Queen, a lady of much discretion, who for the great love she bore him never would marry another husband. And I can a.s.sure you that during all that s.p.a.ce of forty years she had administered her realm as well as ever her husband did, or better; and as she was a lover of justice, of equity, and of peace, she was more beloved by those of her kingdom than ever was Lady or Lord of theirs before. The people are Idolaters, and are tributary to n.o.body. They live on flesh, and rice, and milk.[NOTE 1]

It is in this kingdom that diamonds are got; and I will tell you how.

There are certain lofty mountains in those parts; and when the winter rains fall, which are very heavy, the waters come roaring down the mountains in great torrents. When the rains are over, and the waters from the mountains have ceased to flow, they search the beds of the torrents and find plenty of diamonds. In summer also there are plenty to be found in the mountains, but the heat of the sun is so great that it is scarcely possible to go thither, nor is there then a drop of water to be found.

Moreover in those mountains great serpents are rife to a marvellous degree, besides other vermin, and this owing to the great heat. The serpents are also the most venomous in existence, insomuch that any one going to that region runs fearful peril; for many have been destroyed by these evil reptiles.

Now among these mountains there are certain great and deep valleys, to the bottom of which there is no access. Wherefore the men who go in search of the diamonds take with them pieces of flesh, as lean as they can get, and these they cast into the bottom of a valley. Now there are numbers of white eagles that haunt those mountains and feed upon the serpents. When the eagles see the meat thrown down they pounce upon it and carry it up to some rocky hill-top where they begin to rend it. But there are men on the watch, and as soon as they see that the eagles have settled they raise a loud shouting to drive them away. And when the eagles are thus frightened away the men recover the pieces of meat, and find them full of diamonds which have stuck to the meat down in the bottom. For the abundance of diamonds down there in the depths of the valleys is astonishing, but n.o.body can get down; and if one could, it would be only to be incontinently devoured by the serpents which are so rife there.

There is also another way of getting the diamonds. The people go to the nests of those white eagles, of which there are many, and in their droppings they find plenty of diamonds which the birds have swallowed in devouring the meat that was cast into the valleys. And, when the eagles themselves are taken, diamonds are found in their stomachs.

So now I have told you three different ways in which these stones are found. No other country but this kingdom of Mutfili produces them, but there they are found both abundantly and of large size. Those that are brought to our part of the world are only the refuse, as it were, of the finer and larger stones. For the flower of the diamonds and other large gems, as well as the largest pearls, are all carried to the Great Kaan and other Kings and Princes of those regions; in truth they possess all the great treasures of the world.[NOTE 2]

In this kingdom also are made the best and most delicate buckrams, and those of highest price; in sooth they look like tissue of spider's web!

There is no King nor Queen in the world but might be glad to wear them.

[NOTE 3] The people have also the largest sheep in the world, and great abundance of all the necessaries of life.

There is now no more to say; so I will next tell you about a province called Lar from which the Abraiaman come.

NOTE 1.--There is no doubt that the kingdom here spoken of is that of TELINGANA (_Tiling_ of the Mahomedan writers), then ruled by the Kakateya or Ganapati dynasty reigning at Warangol, north-east of Hyderabad. But Marco seems to give the kingdom the name of that place in it which was visited by himself or his informants. MUTFILI is, with the usual Arab modification (e.g. Perlec, Ferlec--Pattan, Faitan), a port called MOTUPALLe, in the Gantur district of the Madras Presidency, about 170 miles north of Fort St. George. Though it has dropt out of most of our modern maps it still exists, and a notice of it is to be found in W.

Hamilton, and in Milburne. The former says: "_Mutapali_, a town situated near the S. extremity of the northern Circars. A considerable coasting trade is carried on from hence in the craft navigated by natives," which can come in closer to sh.o.r.e than at other ports on that coast.--[Cf.

_Hunter_, _Gaz. India_, _Motupalli_, "now only an obscure fishing village."--It is marked in _Constable's Hand Atlas of India_.--H.C.]

The proper territory of the Kingdom of Warangol lay inland, but the last reigning prince before Polo's visit to India, by name Kakateya Pratapa Ganapati Rudra Deva, had made extensive conquests on the coast, including Nellore, and thence northward to the frontier of Orissa. This prince left no male issue, and his widow, RUDRAMA DEVI, daughter of the Raja of Devagiri, a.s.sumed the government and continued to hold it for twenty-eight, or, as another record states, for thirty-eight years, till the son of her daughter had attained majority. This was in 1292, or by the other account 1295, when she transferred the royal authority to this grandson Pratapa Vira Rudra Deva, the "Luddur Deo" of Firishta, and the last Ganapati of any political moment. He was taken prisoner by the Delhi forces about 1323. We have evidently in Rudrama Devi the just and beloved Queen of our Traveller, who thus enables us to attach colour and character to what was an empty name in a dynastic list. (Compare _Wilson's Mackenzie_, I. cx.x.x.; _Taylor's Or. Hist. MSS._ I. 18; _Do.'s Catalogue Raisonne_, III. 483.)

Mutfili appears in the _Carta Catalana_ as _Butiflis_, and is there by some mistake made the site of St. Thomas's Shrine. The distance from Maabar is in Ramusio only 500 miles--a preferable reading.

NOTE 2.--Some of the Diamond Mines once so famous under the name of Golconda are in the alluvium of the Kistna River, some distance above the Delta, and others in the vicinity of Kadapa and Karnul, both localities being in the territory of the kingdom we have been speaking of.

The strange legend related here is very ancient and widely diffused. Its earliest known occurrence is in the Treatise of St. Epiphanius, Bishop of Salamis in Cyprus, concerning the twelve Jewels in the _Rationale_ or Breastplate of the Hebrew High Priest, a work written before the end of the 4th century, wherein the tale is told of the _Jacinth_. It is distinctly referred to by Edrisi, who a.s.signs its locality to the land of the _Kirkhir_ (probably Khirghiz) in Upper Asia. It appears in Kazwini's _Wonders of Creation_, and is a.s.signed by him to the Valley of the Moon among the mountains of Serendib. Sindbad the Sailor relates the story, as is well known, and his version is the closest of all to our author's. [So _Les Merveilles de l'Inde_, pp. 128-129.--H.C.] It is found in the Chinese Narrative of the Campaigns of Hulaku, translated by both Remusat and Pauthier. [We read in the _Si Shi Ki_, of Ch'ang Te, Chinese Envoy to Hulaku (1259), translated by Dr. Bretschneider (_Med. Res._ I. p. 151): "The _kinkang tsuan_ (diamonds) come from _Yin-du_ (Hindustan). The people take flesh and throw it into the great valleys (of the mountains). Then birds come and eat this flesh, after which diamonds are found in their excrements."--H.C.] It is told in two different versions, once of the Diamond, and again of the Jacinth of Serendib, in the work on precious stones by Ahmed Taifashi. It is one of the many stories in the sc.r.a.p-book of Tzetzes. Nicolo Conti relates it of a mountain called Albenigaras, fifteen days' journey in a northerly Direction from Vijayanagar; and it is told again, apparently after Conti, by Julius Caesar Scaliger. It is related of diamonds and Bala.s.ses in the old Genoese MS., called that of Usodimare. A feeble form of the tale is quoted contemptuously by Garcias from one Francisco de Tamarra. And Haxthausen found it as a popular legend in Armenia. (_S. Epiph. de_ XIII. _Gemmis_, etc., Romae, 1743; _Jaubert, Edrisi_, I. 500; _J.A.S.B._ XIII. 657; _Lane's Ar. Nights_, ed. 1859, III. 88; _Rem. Nouv. Mel. Asiat._ I. 183; _Raineri, Fior di Pensieri di Ahmed Teifascite_, pp. 13 and 30; _Tzetzes, Chil._ XI. 376; _India in XVth Cent._ pp. 29-30; _J. C. Scal. de Subtilitate_, CXIII. No. 3; _An. des Voyages_, VIII. 195; _Garcias_, p. 71; _Transcaucasia_, p. 360; _J.A.S.B._ I. 354.)

The story has a considerable resemblance to that which Herodotus tells of the way in which cinnamon was got by the Arabs (III. 111). No doubt the two are ramifications of the same legend.

NOTE 3.--Here _buckram_ is clearly applied to fine cotton stuffs. The districts about Masulipatam were long famous both for muslins and for coloured chintzes. The fine muslins of _Masalia_ are mentioned in the Periplus. Indeed even in the time of Sakya Muni Kalinga was already famous for diaphanous muslins, as may be seen in a story related in the Buddhist Annals. (_J.A.S.B._ VI. 1086.)

CHAPTER XX.

CONCERNING THE PROVINCE OF LAR WHENCE THE BRAHMINS COME.

Lar is a Province lying towards the west when you quit the place where the Body of St. Thomas lies; and all the _Abraiaman_ in the world come from that province.[NOTE 1]

You must know that these Abraiaman are the best merchants in the world, and the most truthful, for they would not tell a lie for anything on earth. [If a foreign merchant who does not know the ways of the country applies to them and entrusts his goods to them, they will take charge of these, and sell them in the most loyal manner, seeking zealously the profit of the foreigner and asking no commission except what he pleases to bestow.] They eat no flesh, and drink no wine, and live a life of great chast.i.ty, having intercourse with no women except with their wives; nor would they on any account take what belongs to another; so their law commands. And they are all distinguished by wearing a thread of cotton over one shoulder and tied under the other arm, so that it crosses the breast and the back.

They have a rich and powerful King who is eager to purchase precious stones and large pearls; and he sends these Abraiaman merchants into the kingdom of Maabar called Soli, which is the best and n.o.blest Province of India, and where the best pearls are found, to fetch him as many of these as they can get, and he pays them double the cost price for all. So in this way he has a vast treasure of such valuables.[NOTE 2]

These Abraiaman are Idolaters; and they pay greater heed to signs and omens than any people that exists. I will mention as an example one of their customs. To every day of the week they a.s.sign an augury of this sort. Suppose that there is some purchase in hand, he who proposes to buy, when he gets up in the morning takes note of his own shadow in the sun, which he says ought to be on that day of such and such a length; and if his shadow be of the proper length for the day he completes his purchase; if not, he will on no account do so, but waits till his shadow corresponds with that prescribed. For there is a length established for the shadow for every individual day of the week; and the merchant will complete no business unless he finds his shadow of the length set down for that particular day. [Also to each day in the week they a.s.sign one unlucky hour, which they term _Choiach_. For example, on Monday the hour of Half-tierce, on Tuesday that of Tierce, on Wednesday Nones, and so on.[NOTE 3]]

Again, if one of them is in the house, and is meditating a purchase, should he see a tarantula (such as are very common in that country) on the wall, provided it advances from a quarter that he deems lucky, he will complete his purchase at once; but if it comes from a quarter that he considers unlucky he will not do so on any inducement. Moreover, if in going out, he hears any one sneeze, if it seems to him a good omen he will go on, but if the reverse he will sit down on the spot where he is, as long as he thinks that he ought to tarry before going on again. Or, if in travelling along the road he sees a swallow fly by, should its direction be lucky he will proceed, but if not he will turn back again; in fact they are worse (in these whims) than so many Patarins![NOTE 4]

These Abraiaman are very long-lived, owing to their extreme abstinence in eating. And they never allow themselves to be let blood in any part of the body. They have capital teeth, which is owing to a certain herb they chew, which greatly improves their appearance, and is also very good for the health.

There is another cla.s.s of people called _Chughi_, who are indeed properly Abraiaman, but they form a religious order devoted to the Idols.

They are extremely long-lived, every man of them living to 150 or 200 years. They eat very little, but what they do eat is good; rice and milk chiefly. And these people make use of a very strange beverage; for they make a potion of sulphur and quicksilver mixt together and this they drink twice every month. This, they say, gives them long life; and it is a potion they are used to take from their childhood.[NOTE 5]

There are certain members of this Order who lead the most ascetic life in the world, going stark naked; and these worship the Ox. Most of them have a small ox of bra.s.s or pewter or gold which they wear tied over the forehead. Moreover they take cow-dung and burn it, and make a powder thereof; and make an ointment of it, and daub themselves withal, doing this with as great devotion as Christians do show in using Holy Water.

[Also if they meet any one who treats them well, they daub a little of this powder on the middle of his forehead.[NOTE 6]]

They eat not from bowls or trenchers, but put their victuals on leaves of the Apple of Paradise and other big leaves; these, however, they use dry, never green. For they say the green leaves have a soul in them, and so it would be a sin. And they would rather die than do what they deem their Law p.r.o.nounces to be sin. If any one asks how it comes that they are not ashamed to go stark naked as they do, they say, "We go naked because naked we came into the world, and we desire to have nothing about us that is of this world. Moreover, we have no sin of the flesh to be conscious of, and therefore we are not ashamed of our nakedness, any more than you are to show your hand or your face. You who are conscious of the sins of the flesh do well to have shame, and to cover your nakedness."

They would not kill an animal on any account, not even a fly, or a flea, or a louse,[NOTE 7] or anything in fact that has life; for they say these have all souls, and it would be sin to do so. They eat no vegetable in a green state, only such as are dry. And they sleep on the ground stark naked, without a sc.r.a.p of clothing on them or under them, so that it is a marvel they don't all die, in place of living so long as I have told you.

They fast every day in the year, and drink nought but water. And when a novice has to be received among them they keep him awhile in their convent, and make him follow their rule of life. And then, when they desire to put him to the test, they send for some of those girls who are devoted to the Idols, and make them try the continence of the novice with their blandishments. If he remains indifferent they retain him, but if he shows any emotion they expel him from their society. For they say they will have no man of loose desires among them.

They are such cruel and perfidious Idolaters that it is very devilry! They say that they burn the bodies of the dead, because if they were not burnt worms would be bred which would eat the body; and when no more food remained for them these worms would die, and the soul belonging to that body would bear the sin and the punishment of their death. And that is why they burn their dead!

Now I have told you about a great part of the people of the great Province of Maabar and their customs; but I have still other things to tell of this same Province of Maabar, so I will speak of a city thereof which is called Cail.

NOTE 1.--The form of the word _Abraiaman, -main or -min_, by which Marco here and previously denotes the Brahmans, probably represents an incorrect Arabic plural, such as _Abrahamin_; the correct Arabic form is _Barahimah_.

What is said here of the Brahmans coming from "_Lar_, a province west of St. Thomas's," of their having a special King, etc., is all very obscure, and that I suspect through erroneous notions.

Lar-Desa, "The Country of Lar," properly _Lat-desa_, was an early name for the territory of Guzerat and the northern Konkan, embracing _Saimur_ (the modern Chaul, as I believe), Tana, and Baroch. It appears in Ptolemy in the form _Larike_. The sea to the west of that coast was in the early Mahomedan times called the Sea of Lar, and the language spoken on its sh.o.r.es is called by Mas'udi _Lari_. Abulfeda's authority, Ibn Said, speaks of Lar and Guzerat as identical. That position would certainly be very ill described as lying west of Madras. The kingdom most nearly answering to that description in Polo's age would be that of the Bellal Rajas of Dwara Samudra, which corresponded in a general way to modern Mysore. (_Mas'udi_, I. 330, 381; II. 85; _Gildem._ 185; _Elliot_, I. 66.)

That Polo's ideas on this subject were incorrect seems clear from his conception of the Brahmans as a cla.s.s of _merchants_. Occasionally they may have acted as such, and especially as agents; but the only case I can find of Brahmans as a cla.s.s adopting trade is that of the Konkani Brahmans, and they are said to have taken this step when expelled from Goa, which was their chief seat, by the Portuguese. Marsden supposes that there has been confusion between Brahmans and Banyans; and, as Guzerat or Lar was the country from which the latter chiefly came, there is much probability in this.

The high virtues ascribed to the Brahmans and Indian merchants were perhaps in part matter of tradition, come down from the stories of Palladius and the like; but the eulogy is so constant among mediaeval travellers that it must have had a solid foundation. In fact it would not be difficult to trace a chain of similar testimony from ancient times down to our own. Arrian says no Indian was ever accused of falsehood. Hiuen Tsang ascribes to the people of India eminent uprightness, honesty, and disinterestedness. Friar Jorda.n.u.s (circa 1330) says the people of Lesser India (Sind and Western India) were true in speech and eminent in justice; and we may also refer to the high character given to the Hindus by Abul Fazl. After 150 years of European trade indeed we find a sad deterioration. Padre Vincenzo (1672) speaks of fraud as greatly prevalent among the Hindu traders. It was then commonly said at Surat that it took three Jews to make a Chinaman, and three Chinamen to make a Banyan. Yet Pallas, in the last century, noticing the Banyan colony at Astrakhan, says its members were notable for an upright dealing that made them greatly preferable to Armenians. And that wise and admirable public servant, the late Sir William Sleeman, in our own time, has said that he knew no cla.s.s of men in the world more strictly honourable than the mercantile cla.s.ses of India.

We know too well that there is a very different aspect of the matter. All extensive intercourse between two races far asunder in habits and ideas, seems to be demoralising in some degrees to both parties, especially to the weaker. But can we say that deterioration has been all on one side? In these days of lying labels and plastered shirtings does the character of English trade and English goods stand as high in Asia as it did half a century ago! (_Pel. Boudd._ II. 83; _Jorda.n.u.s_, p. 22; _Ayeen Akb._ III.

8; _P. Vincenzo_, p. 114; _Pallas, Beytrage_, III. 85; _Rambles and Recns._ II. 143.)

NOTE 2.--The kingdom of Maabar called _Soli_ is CHOLA or SOLADESAM, of which Kanchi (Conjeveram) was the ancient capital.[1] In the Ceylon Annals the continental invaders are frequently termed _Solli_. The high terms of praise applied to it as "the best and n.o.blest province of India,"

seem to point to the well-watered fertility of Tanjore; but what is said of the pearls would extend the territory included to the sh.o.r.es of the Gulf of Manar.

NOTE 3.--Abraham Roger gives from the Calendar of the Coromandel Brahmans the character, lucky or unlucky, of every hour of every day of the week; and there is also a chapter on the subject in _Sonnerat_ (I. 304 seqq.).

For a happy explanation of the term _Choiach_ I am indebted to Dr.

Caldwell: "This apparently difficult word can be identified much more easily than most others. Hindu astrologers teach that there is an unlucky hour every day in the month, i.e. during the period of the moon's abode in every _nakshatra_, or lunar mansion, throughout the lunation. This inauspicious period is called _Tyajya_, 'rejected.' Its mean length is one hour and thirty-six minutes, European time. The precise moment when this period commences differs in each nakshatra, or (which comes to the same thing) in every day in the lunar month. It sometimes occurs in the daytime and sometimes at night;--see _Colonel Warren's Kala Sankatila_, Madras, 1825, p. 388. The Tamil p.r.o.nunciation of the word is _tiyacham_, and when the nominative case-termination of the word is rejected, as all the Tamil case-terminations were by the Mahomedans, who were probably Marco Polo's informants, it becomes _tiyach_, to which form of the word Marco's _Choiach_ is as near as could be expected." (MS. Note.)[2]

The phrases used in the pa.s.sage from Ramusio to express the time of day are taken from the canonical hours of prayer. The following pa.s.sage from _Robert de Borron's Romance of Merlin_ ill.u.s.trates these terms: Gauvain "quand il se levoit le matin, avoit la force al millor chevalier del monde; et quant vint a heure de prime si li doubloit, et a heure de tierce aussi; et quant il vint a eure de midi si revenoit a sa premiere force ou il avoit este le matin; et quant vint a eure de nonne et a toutes les seures de la nuit estoit-il toudis en sa premiere force." (Quoted in introd. to _Messir Gauvain_, etc., edited by _C. Hippeau_, Paris, 1862, pp. xii.-xiii.) The term _Half Tierce_ is frequent in mediaeval Italian, e.g. in Dante:--

"Levati sut disse'l Maestro, in piede: La via e lunga, e'l cammino e malvagio: E gia il Sole a mezza terza riede." (Inf. x.x.xiv,)

_Half-prime_ we have in Chaucer:--