The Travels of Marco Polo Volume II Part 71

NOTE 2.--We see that Polo's information in this chapter extends over the whole lat.i.tude of Siberia; for the great White Bears and the Black Foxes belong to the sh.o.r.es of the Frozen Ocean; the Wild a.s.ses only to the southern parts of Siberia. As to the Pharaoh's Rat, see vol. i. p. 254.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Siberian Dog-sledge.

"E sus ceste treies hi se mete sus un cuir d'ors, e puis hi monte sus un mesaje; e ceste treies moinent six chiens de celz grant qe je vos ai contes; et cesti chienz ne les moine nulz, mes il vont tout droit jusque a l'autre poste, et trainent la treies mout bien."]

NOTE 3.--No dog-sledges are now known, I believe, on this side of the course of the Obi, and there not south of about 61 30'. But in the 11th century they were in general use between the Dwina and Petchora. And Ibn Batuta's account seems to imply that in the 14th they were in use far to the south of the present limit: "It had been my wish to visit the Land of Darkness, which can only be done from Bolghar. There is a distance of 40 days' journey between these two places. I had to give up the intention however on account of the great difficulty attending the journey and the little fruit that it promised. In that country they travel only with small vehicles drawn by great dogs. For the steppe is covered with ice, and the feet of men or the shoes of horses would slip, whereas the dogs having claws their paws don't slip upon the ice. The only travellers across this wilderness are rich merchants, each of whom owns about 100 of these vehicles, which are loaded with meat, drink, and firewood. In fact, on this route there are neither trees nor stones, nor human dwellings. The guide of the travellers is a dog who has often made the journey before!

The price of such a beast is sometimes as high as 1000 dinars or thereabouts. He is yoked to the vehicle by the neck, and three other dogs are harnessed along with him. He is the chief, and all the other dogs with their carts follow his guidance and stop when he stops. The master of this animal never ill-uses him nor scolds him, and at feeding-time the dogs are always served before the men. If this be not attended to, the chief of the dogs will get sulky and run off, leaving the master to perdition" (II.

399-400).

[Mr. Parker writes (_China Review_, xiv. p. 359), that dog-sledges appear to have been known to the Chinese, for in a Chinese poem occurs the line: "Over the thick snow in a dog-cart."--H.C.]

The bigness attributed to the dogs by Polo, Ibn Batuta, and Rubruquis, is an imagination founded on the work ascribed to them. Mr. Kennan says they are simply half-domesticated Arctic wolves. Erman calls them the height of European spaniels (qu. setters?), but much slenderer and leaner in the flanks. A good draught-dog, according to Wrangell, should be 2 feet high and 3 feet in length. The number of dogs attached to a sledge is usually greater than the old travellers represent,--none of whom, however, had _seen_ the thing.

Wrangell's account curiously ill.u.s.trates what Ibn Batuta says of the Old Dog who guides: "The best-trained and most intelligent dog is often yoked in front.... He often displays extraordinary sagacity and influence over the other dogs, e.g. in keeping them from breaking after game. In such a case he will sometimes turn and bark in the opposite direction; ... and in crossing a naked and boundless _tundra_ in darkness or snow-drift he will guess his way to a hut that he has never visited but once before" (I.

159). Kennan also says: "They are guided and controlled entirely by the voice and by a lead-dog, who is especially trained for the purpose." The like is related of the Esquimaux dogs. (_Kennarts Tent Life in Siberia_, pp. 163-164; _Wood's Mammalia_, p. 266.)

NOTE 4.--On the _Erculin_ and _Ercolin_ of the G.T., written Arculin in next chapter, _Arcolino_ of Ramusio, _Herculini_ of Pipino, no light is thrown by the Italian or other editors. One supposes of course some animal of the ermine or squirrel kinds affording valuable fur, but I can find no similar name of any such animal. It may be the Argali or Siberian Wild Sheep, which Rubruquis mentions: "I saw another kind of beast which is called _Arcali_; its body is just like a ram's, and its horns spiral like a ram's also, only they are so big that I could scarcely lift a pair of them with one hand. They make huge drinking-vessels out of these" (p.

230). [See I. p. 177.]

_Vair_, so often mentioned in mediaeval works, appears to have been a name appropriate to the fur as prepared rather than to the animal. This appears to have been the Siberian squirrel called in French _pet.i.t-gris_, the back of which is of a fine grey and the belly of a brilliant white. In the _Vair_ (which is perhaps only _varius_ or variegated) the backs and bellies were joined in a kind of checquer; whence the heraldic checquer called by the same name. There were two kinds, _menu-vair_ corrupted into _minever_, and _gros-vair_, but I cannot learn clearly on what the distinction rested. (See _Douet d'Arcq_, p. x.x.xv.) Upwards of 2000 _ventres de menuvair_ were sometimes consumed in one complete suit of robes (Ib. x.x.xii.).

The traps used by the Siberian tribes to take these valuable animals are described by Erman (I. 452), only in the English translation the description is totally incomprehensible; also in Wrangell, I. 151.

NOTE 5.--The country chiefly described in this chapter is probably that which the Russians, and also the Arabian Geographers, used to term _Yugria_, apparently the country of the Ostyaks on the Obi. The winter-dwellings of the people are not, strictly speaking, underground, but they are flanked with earth piled up against the walls. The same is the case with those of the Yakuts in Eastern Siberia, and these often have the floors also sunk 3 feet in the earth. Habitations really subterranean, of some previous race, have been found in the Samoyed country. (_Klaproth's Mag. Asiatique, II. 66._)

CHAPTER XXI.

CONCERNING THE LAND OF DARKNESS.

Still further north, and a long way beyond that kingdom of which I have spoken, there is a region which bears the name of DARKNESS, because neither sun nor moon nor stars appear, but it is always as dark as with us in the twilight. The people have no king of their own, nor are they subject to any foreigner, and live like beasts. [They are dull of understanding, like half-witted persons.[NOTE 1]]

The Tartars however sometimes visit the country, and they do it in this way. They enter the region riding mares that have foals, and these foals they leave behind. After taking all the plunder that they can get they find their way back by help of the mares, which are all eager to get back to their foals, and find the way much better than their riders could do.

[NOTE 2]

Those people have vast quant.i.ties of valuable peltry; thus they have those costly Sables of which I spoke, and they have the Ermine, the Arculin, the Vair, the Black Fox, and many other valuable furs. They are all hunters by trade, and ama.s.s amazing quant.i.ties of those furs. And the people who are on their borders, where the Light is, purchase all those furs from them; for the people of the Land of Darkness carry the furs to the Light country for sale, and the merchants who purchase these make great gain thereby, I a.s.sure you.[NOTE 3]

The people of this region are tall and shapely, but very pale and colourless. One end of the country borders upon Great Rosia. And as there is no more to be said about it, I will now proceed, and first I will tell you about the Province of Rosia.

NOTE 1.--In the Ramusian version we have a more intelligent representation of the facts regarding the _Land of Darkness_: "Because for most part of the winter months the sun appears not, and the air is dusky, as it is just before the dawn when you see and yet do not see;" and again below it speaks of the inhabitants catching the fur animals "in summer when they have continuous daylight." It is evident that the writer of this version _did_ and the writer of the original French which we have translated from _did not_ understand what he was writing. The whole of the latter account implies belief in the perpetuity of the darkness. It resembles Pliny's hazy notion of the northern regions:[1] "pars mundi d.a.m.nata a rerum natura et densa mersa caligine." Whether the fault is due to Rustician's ignorance or is Polo's own, who can say? We are willing to debit it to the former, and to credit Marco with the improved version in Ramusio. In the _Masalak-al-Absar_, however, we have the following pa.s.sage in which the conception is similar: "Merchants do not ascend (the Wolga) beyond Bolghar; from that point they make excursions through the province of Julman (supposed to be the country on the Kama and Viatka). The merchants of the latter country penetrate to Yughra, which is the extremity of the North. Beyond that you see no trace of habitation except a great Tower built by Alexander, after which there is nothing but Darkness." The narrator of this, being asked what he meant, said: "It is a region of desert mountains, where frost and snow continually reign, where the sun never shines, no plant vegetates, and no animal lives. Those mountains border on the Dark Sea, on which rain falls perpetually, fogs are ever dense, and the sun never shows itself, and on tracts perpetually covered with snow." (_N. et Ex._ XIII. i. 285.)

NOTE 2.--This is probably a story of great antiquity, for it occurs in the legends of the mythical _Ughuz_, Patriarch of the Turk and Tartar nations, as given by Rashiduddin. In this hero's campaign towards the far north, he had ordered the old men to be left behind near Almalik; but a very ancient sage called Bushi Khwaja persuaded his son to carry him forward in a box, as they were sure sooner or later to need the counsel of experienced age.

When they got to the land of _Kara Hulun_, Ughuz and his officers were much perplexed about finding their way, as they had arrived at the Land of Darkness. The old Bushi was then consulted, and his advice was that they should take with them 4 mares and 9 she-a.s.ses that had foals, and tie up the foals at the entrance to the Land of Darkness, but drive the dams before them. And when they wished to return they would be guided by the scent and maternal instinct of the mares and she-a.s.ses. And so it was done. (See _Erdmann Temudschin_, p. 478.) Ughuz, according to the Mussulman interpretation of the Eastern Legends, was the great-grandson of j.a.phet.

The story also found its way into some of the later Greek forms of the Alexander Legends. Alexander, when about to enter the Land of Darkness, takes with him only picked young men. Getting into difficulties, the King wants to send back for some old sage who should advise. Two young men had smuggled their old father with them in antic.i.p.ation of such need, and on promise of amnesty they produce him. He gives the advice to use the mares as in the text. (See _Muller's ed._ of _Pseudo-Callisthenes_, Bk. II. ch.

x.x.xiv.)

NOTE 3.--Ibn Batuta thus describes the traffic that took place with the natives of the Land of Darkness: "When the Travellers have accomplished a journey of 40 days across this Desert tract they encamp near the borders of the Land of Darkness. Each of them then deposits there the goods that he has brought with him, and all return to their quarters. On the morrow they come back to look at their goods, and find laid beside them skins of the Sable, the Vair, and the Ermine. If the owner of the goods is satisfied with what is laid beside his parcel he takes it, if not he leaves it there. The inhabitants of the Land of Darkness may then (on another visit) increase the amount of their deposit, or, as often happens, they may take it away altogether and leave the goods of the foreign merchants untouched. In this way is the trade conducted. The people who go thither never know whether those with whom they buy and sell are men or goblins, for they never see any one!" (II. 401.)

["Ibn Batuta's account of the market of the 'Land of Darkness' ... agrees almost word for word with Dr. Mirth's account of the 'Spirit Market, taken from the Chinese.'" (_Parker, China Review_, XIV. p. 359.)--H.C.]

Abulfeda gives exactly the same account of the trade; and so does Herberstein. Other Oriental writers ascribe the same custom to the _Wisu_, a people three months' journey from Bolghar. These Wisu have been identified by Fraehn with the _Wesses_, a people spoken of by Russian historians as dwelling on the sh.o.r.es of the Bielo Osero, which Lake indeed is alleged by a Russian author to have been anciently called _Wusu_, misunderstood into _Weissensee_, and thence rendered into Russian Bielo Osero ("White Lake"). (_Golden Horde_, App. p. 429; _Busching_, IV.

359-360; _Herberstein_ in _Ram._ II. 168 v.; _Fraehn, Bolghar_, pp. 14, 47; Do., _Ibn Fozlan_, 205 seqq., 221.) Dumb trade of the same kind is a circ.u.mstance related of very many different races and periods, e.g., of a people beyond the Pillars of Hercules by Herodotus, of the Sabaean dealers in frankincense by Theophrastus, of the Seres by Pliny, of the Sasians far south of Ethiopia by Cosmas, of the people of the Clove Islands by Kazwini, of a region beyond Segelmessa by Mas'udi, of a people far beyond Timbuctoo by Cadamosto, the Veddas of Ceylon by Marignolli and more modern writers, of the Poliars of Malabar by various authors, by Paulus Jovius of the Laplanders, etc. etc.

Pliny's attribution, surely erroneous, of this custom to the Chinese [see supra, H.C.], suggests that there may have been a misunderstanding by which this method of trade was confused with that other curious system of dumb higgling, by the pressure of the knuckles under a shawl, a masonic system in use from Peking to Bombay, and possibly to Constantinople.

The term translated here "Light," and the "Light Country," is in the G.T.

"_a la Carte_," "_a la Cartes_." This puzzled me for a long time, as I see it puzzled Mr. Hugh Murray, Signor Bartoli, and Lazari (who pa.s.ses it over). The version of Pipino, "_ad_ Lucis _terras finitimas deferunt_,"

points to the true reading;--_Carte_ is an error for _Clarte_.

The reading of this chapter is said to have fired Prince Rupert with the scheme which resulted in the establishment of the Hudson's Bay Company.

[1] That is, in one pa.s.sage of Pliny (iv. 12); for in another pa.s.sage from his multifarious note book, where Thule is spoken of, the Arctic day and night are much more distinctly characterised (IV. 16).

CHAPTER XXII.

DESCRIPTION OF ROSIA AND ITS PEOPLE. PROVINCE OF LAC.

Rosia is a very great province, lying towards the north. The people are Christians, and follow the Greek doctrine. There are several kings in the country, and they have a language of their own. They are a people of simple manners, but both men and women very handsome, being all very white and [tall, with long fair hair]. There are many strong defiles and pa.s.ses in the country; and they pay tribute to n.o.body except to a certain Tartar king of the Ponent, whose name is TOCTAI; to him indeed they pay tribute, but only a trifle. It is not a land of trade, though to be sure they have many fine and valuable furs, such as Sables, in abundance, and Ermine, Vair, Ercolin, and Fox skins, the largest and finest in the world [and also much wax]. They also possess many Silver-mines, from which they derive a large amount of silver.[NOTE 1]

There is nothing else worth mentioning; so let us leave Rosia, and I will tell you about the Great Sea, and what provinces and nations lie round about it, all in detail; and we will begin with Constantinople.--First, however, I should tell you of a province that lies between north and north-west. You see in that region that I have been speaking of, there is a province called LAC, which is conterminous with Rosia, and has a king of its own. The people are partly Christians and partly Saracens. They have abundance of furs of good quality, which merchants export to many countries. They live by trade and handicrafts.[NOTE 2]

There is nothing more worth mentioning, so I will speak of other subjects; but there is one thing more to tell you about Rosia that I had forgotten.

You see in Rosia there is the greatest cold that is to be found anywhere, so great as to be scarcely bearable. The country is so great that it reaches even to the sh.o.r.es of the Ocean Sea, and 'tis in that sea that there are certain islands in which are produced numbers of gerfalcons and peregrine falcons, which are carried in many directions. From Russia also to OROECH it is not very far, and the journey could be soon made, were it not for the tremendous cold; but this renders its accomplishment almost impossible.[NOTE 3]

Now then let us speak of the Great Sea, as I was about to do. To be sure many merchants and others have been there, but still there are many again who know nothing about it, so it will be well to include it in our Book.

We will do so then, and let us begin first with the Strait of Constantinople.

NOTE 1.--Ibn Fozlan, the oldest Arabic author who gives any detailed account of the Russians (and a very remarkable one it is), says he "never saw people of form more perfectly developed; they were tall as palm-trees, and ruddy of countenance," but at the same time "the most uncleanly people that G.o.d hath created," drunken, and frightfully gross in their manners.

(_Fraehn's Ibn Fozlan_, p. 5 seqq.) Ibn Batuta is in some respects less flattering; he mentions the silver-mines noticed in our text: "At a day's distance from Ukak[1] are the hills of the Russians, who are Christians.

They have red hair and blue eyes; ugly to look at, and crafty to deal with. They have silver-mines, and it is from their country that are brought the _saum_ or ingots of silver with which buying and selling is carried on in this country (Kipchak or the Ponent of Polo). The weight of each _saumah_ is 5 ounces" (II. 414). Mas'udi also says: "The Russians have in their country a silver-mine similar to that which exists in Khorasan, at the mountain of Banjhir" (i.e. _Panjshir_; II. 15; and see supra, vol. i. p. 161). These positive and concurrent testimonies as to Russian silver-mines are remarkable, as modern accounts declare that no silver is found in Russia. And if we go back to the 16th century, Herberstein says the same. There was no silver, he says, except what was imported; silver money had been in use barely 100 years; previously they had used oblong ingots of the value of a ruble, without any figure or legend. (_Ram._ II. 159.)

But a welcome communication from Professor Bruun points out that the statement of Ibn Batuta identifies the silver-mines in question with certain mines of argentiferous lead-ore near the River Mious (a river falling into the sea of Azof, about 22 miles west of Taganrog); an ore which even in recent times has afforded 60 per cent. of lead, and 1/24 per cent. of silver. And it was these mines which furnished the ancient Russian _rubles_ or ingots. Thus the original _ruble_ was the _saumah_ of Ibn Batuta, the _sommo_ of Pegolotti. A ruble seems to be still called by some term like _saumah_ in Central Asia; it is printed _soom_ in the Appendix to Davies's Punjab Report, p. xi. And Professor Bruun tells me that the silver ruble is called _Som_ by the Ossethi of Caucasus.[2]

Franc.-Michel quotes from Fitz-Stephen's Desc. of London (_temp._ Henry II.):--

"_Aurum mitt.i.t Arabs ...

Seres purpureas vestes; Galli sua vina; Norwegi_, Russi, varium, grysium, sabelinas."