The Travels of Marco Polo Volume I Part 33

[Sidenote: Language of the original Work.]

51. As regards the language in which Marco's Book was first committed to writing, we have seen that Ramusio a.s.sumed, somewhat arbitrarily, that it was _Latin_; Marsden supposed it to have been the _Venetian_ dialect; Baldelli Boni first showed, in his elaborate edition (Florence, 1827), by arguments that have been ill.u.s.trated and corroborated by learned men since, that it was _French_.

That the work was originally written in _some_ Italian dialect was a natural presumption, and slight contemporary evidence can be alleged in its favour; for Fra Pipino, in the Latin version of the work, executed whilst Marco still lived, describes his task as a translation _de vulgari_. And in one MS. copy of the same Friar Pipino's Chronicle, existing in the library at Modena, he refers to the said version as made "_ex vulgari idiomate_ Lombardico." But though it may seem improbable that at so early a date a Latin version should have been made at second hand, I believe this to have been the case, and that some internal evidence also is traceable that Pipino translated _not_ from the original but from an Italian _version_ of the original.

The oldest MS. (it is supposed) in any Italian dialect is one in the Magliabecchian Library at Florence, which is known in Italy as _L'Ottima_, on account of the purity of its Tuscan, and as _Della Crusca_ from its being one of the authorities cited by that body in their Vocabulary.[2]

It bears on its face the following note in Italian:--

"This Book called the Navigation of Messer Marco Polo, a n.o.ble Citizen of Venice, was written in Florence by Michael Ormanni my great grandfather by the Mother's side, who died in the Year of Grace One Thousand Three Hundred and Nine; and my mother brought it into our Family of Del Riccio, and it belongs to me Pier del Riccio and to my Brother; 1452."

As far as I can learn, the age which this note implies is considered to be supported by the character of the MS. itself.[3] If it be accepted, the latter is a performance going back to within eleven years _at most_ of the first dictation of the Travels. At first sight, therefore, this would rather argue that the original had been written in pure Tuscan. But when Baldelli came to prepare it for the press he found manifest indications of its being a Translation from the _French_. Some of these he has noted; others have followed up the same line of comparison. We give some detailed examples in a note.[4]

[Sidenote: Old French Text published by the Societe de Geographie.]

52. The French Text that we have been quoting, published by the Geographical Society of Paris in 1824, affords on the other hand the strongest corresponding proof that it is an original and not a Translation. Rude as is the language of the ma.n.u.script (Fr. 1116, formerly No. 7367, of Paris Library), it is, in the correctness of the proper names, and the intelligible exhibition of the itineraries, much superior to any form of the Work previously published.

The language is very peculiar. We are obliged to call it French, but it is not "Frenche of Paris." "Its style," says Paulin Paris, "is about as like that of good French authors of the age, as in our day the natural accent of a German, an Englishman, or an Italian, is like that of a citizen of Paris or Blois." The author is at war with all the practices of French grammar; subject and object, numbers, moods, and tenses, are in consummate confusion. Even readers of his own day must at times have been fain to guess his meaning. Italian words are constantly introduced, either quite in the crude or rudely Gallicized.[5] And words also, we may add, sometimes slip in which appear to be purely Oriental, just as is apt to happen with Anglo-Indians in these days.[6] All this is perfectly consistent with the supposition that we have in this MS. a copy at least of the original words as written down by Rusticiano a Tuscan, from the dictation of Marco an Orientalized Venetian, in French, a language foreign to both.

But the character of the language _as French_ is not its only peculiarity.

There is in the style, apart from grammar or vocabulary, a rude angularity, a rough dramatism like that of oral narrative; there is a want of proportion in the style of different parts, now over curt, now diffuse and wordy, with at times even a hammering reiteration; a constant recurrence of pet colloquial phrases (in which, however, other literary works of the age partake); a frequent change in the spelling of the same proper names, even when recurring within a few lines, as if caught by ear only; a literal following to and fro of the hesitations of the narrator; a more general use of the third person in speaking of the Traveller, but an occasional lapse into the first. All these characteristics are strikingly indicative of the unrevised product of dictation, and many of them would _necessarily_ disappear either in translation or in a revised copy.

Of changes in representing the same proper name, take as an example that of the Kaan of Persia whom Polo calls _Quiacatu_ (Kaikhatu), but also _Acatu, Catu_, and the like.

As an example of the literal following of dictation take the following:--

"Let us leave Rosia, and I will tell you about the Great Sea (the Euxine), and what provinces and nations lie round about it, all in detail; and we will begin with Constantinople--First, however, I should tell you about a province, etc.... 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.... Now then let us speak of the Great Sea as I was about to do. To be sure many merchants and others have been here, 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.

"At the Straits leading into the Great Sea, on the West Side, there is a hill called the Faro.--But since beginning on this matter I have changed my mind, because so many people know all about it, so we will not put it in our description but go on to something else." (See vol. ii. p. 487 seqq.)

And so on.

As a specimen of tautology and hammering reiteration the following can scarcely be surpa.s.sed. The Traveller is speaking of the _Chughi_, i.e. the Indian Jogis:--

"And there are among them certain devotees, called _Chughi_; these are longer-lived than the other people, for they live from 150 to 200 years; and yet they are so hale of body that they can go and come wheresoever they please, and do all the service needed for their monastery or their idols, and do it just as well as if they were younger; and that comes of the great abstinence that they practise, in eating little food and only what is wholesome; for they use to eat rice and milk more than anything else. And again I tell you that these Chughi who live such a long time as I have told you, do also eat what I am going to tell you, and you will think it a great matter. For I tell you that they take quicksilver and sulphur, and mix them together, and make a drink of them, and then they drink this, and they say that it adds to their life; and in fact they do live much longer for it; and I tell you that they do this twice every month. And let me tell you that these people use this drink from their infancy in order to live longer, and without fail those who live so long as I have told you use this drink of sulphur and quicksilver."

(See G. T. p. 213.)

Such talk as this does not survive the solvent of translation; and we may be certain that we have here the nearest approach to the Traveller's reminiscences as they were taken down from his lips in the prison of Genoa.

[Sidenote: Conclusive proof that the Old French Text is the source of all the others.]

53. Another circ.u.mstance, heretofore I believe unnoticed, is in itself enough to demonstrate the Geographic Text to be the source of all other versions of the Work. It is this.

In reviewing the various cla.s.ses or types of texts of Polo's Book, which we shall hereafter attempt to discriminate, there are certain proper names which we find in the different texts to take very different forms, each cla.s.s adhering in the main to one particular form.

Thus the names of the Mongol ladies introduced at pp. 32 and 36 of this volume, which are in proper Oriental form _Bulughan_ and _Kukachin_, appear in the cla.s.s of MSS. which Pauthier has followed as _Bolgara_ and _Cogatra_; in the MSS. of Pipino's version, and those founded on it, including Ramusio, the names appear in the correcter forms _Bolgana_ or _Balgana_ and _Cogacin_. Now _all the forms_ Bolgana, Balgana, Bolgara, _and_ Cogatra, Cocacin _appear in the Geographic Text_.

Kaikhatu Kaan appears in the Pauthier MSS. as _Chiato_, in the Pipinian as _Acatu_, in the Ramusian as _Chiacato. All three forms_, Chiato, Achatu, and Quiacatu _are found in the Geographic Text_.

The city of Koh-banan appears in the Pauthier MSS. as _Cabanant_, in the Pipinian and Ramusian editions as _Cobinam_ or _Cobinan_. _Both forms are found in the Geographic Text_.

The city of the Great Kaan (Khanbalig) is called in the Pauthier MSS.

_Cambaluc_, in the Pipinian and Ramusian less correctly _Cambalu_. _Both forms appear in the Geographic Text_.

The aboriginal People on the Burmese Frontier who received from the Western officers of the Mongols the Persian name (translated from that applied by the Chinese) of _Zardandan_, or Gold-Teeth, appear in the Pauthier MSS. most accurately as Zardandan, but in the Pipinian as _Ardandan_ (still further corrupted in some copies into _Arcladam_). Now _both forms are found in the Geographic Text_. Other examples might be given, but these I think may suffice to prove that this Text was the common source of both cla.s.ses.

In considering the question of the French original too we must remember what has been already said regarding Rusticien de Pise and his other French writings; and we shall find hereafter an express testimony borne in the next generation that Marco's Book was composed _in vulgari Gallico_.

[Sidenote: Greatly diffused employment of French in that age.]

54. But, after all, the circ.u.mstantial evidence that has been adduced from the texts themselves is the most conclusive. We have then every reason to believe both that the work was written in French, and that an existing French Text is a close representation of it as originally committed to paper. And that being so we may cite some circ.u.mstances to show that the use of French or quasi-French for the purpose was not a fact of a very unusual or surprising nature. The French language had at that time almost as wide, perhaps relatively a wider, diffusion than it has now. It was still spoken at the Court of England, and still used by many English writers, of whom the authors or translators of the Round Table Romances at Henry III.'s Court are examples.[7] In 1249 Alexander III. King of Scotland, at his coronation spoke in Latin and French; and in 1291 the English Chancellor addressing the Scotch Parliament did so in French. At certain of the Oxford Colleges as late as 1328 it was an order that the students should converse _colloquio latino vel saltern gallico_.[8] Late in the same century Gower had not ceased to use French, composing many poems in it, though apologizing for his want of skill therein:--

"Et si jeo nai de Francois la faconde * * * * *

Jeo suis Englois; si quier par tiele voie Estre excuse."[9]

Indeed down to nearly 1385, boys in the English grammar-schools were taught to construe their Latin lessons into French.[10] St. Francis of a.s.sisi is said by some of his biographers to have had his original name changed to Frances...o...b..cause of his early mastery of that language as a qualification for commerce. French had been the prevalent tongue of the Crusaders, and was that of the numerous Frank Courts which they established in the East, including Jerusalem and the states of the Syrian coast, Cyprus, Constantinople during the reign of the Courtenays, and the princ.i.p.alities of the Morea. The Catalan soldier and chronicler Ramon de Muntaner tells us that it was commonly said of the Morean chivalry that they spoke as good French as at Paris.[11] Quasi-French at least was still spoken half a century later by the numerous Christians settled at Aleppo, as John Marignolli testifies;[12] and if we may trust Sir John Maundevile the Soldan of Egypt himself and four of his chief Lords "_spak Frensche righte wel!_"[13] Ghazan Kaan, the accomplished Mongol Sovereign of Persia, to whom our Traveller conveyed a bride from Cambaluc, is said by the historian Rashiduddin to have known something of the Frank tongue, probably French.[14] Nay, if we may trust the author of the Romance of Richard Coeur-de-Lion, French was in his day the language of still higher spheres![15]

Nor was Polo's case an exceptional one even among writers on the East who were not Frenchmen. Maundevile himself tells us that he put his book first "out of Latyn into Frensche," and then out of French into English.[16] The History of the East which the Armenian Prince and Monk Hayton dictated to Nicolas Faulcon at Poictiers in 1307 was taken down in French. There are many other instances of the employment of French by foreign, and especially by Italian authors of that age. The Latin chronicle of the Benedictine Amato of Monte Ca.s.sino was translated into French early in the 13th century by another monk of the same abbey, at the particular desire of the Count of Militree (or Malta), "_Pour ce qu'il set lire et entendre fransoize et s'en delitte._"[17] Martino da Ca.n.a.le, a countryman and contemporary of Polo's, during the absence of the latter in the East wrote a Chronicle of Venice in the same language, as a reason for which he alleges its general popularity.[18] The like does the most notable example of all, Brunetto Latini, Dante's master, who wrote in French his encyclopaedic and once highly popular work _Li Tresor_.[19] Other examples might be given, but in fact such ill.u.s.tration is superfluous when we consider that Rusticiano himself was a compiler of French Romances.

But why the language of the Book as we see it in the Geographic Text should be so much more rude, inaccurate, and Italianized than that of Rusticiano's other writings, is a question to which I can suggest no reply quite satisfactory to myself. Is it possible that we have in it a literal representation of Polo's own language in dictating the story,--a rough draft which it was intended afterwards to reduce to better form, and which was so reduced (after a fashion) in French copies of another type, regarding which we shall have to speak presently?[20] And, if this be the true answer, why should Polo have used a French jargon in which to tell his story? Is it possible that his own mother Venetian, such as he had carried to the East with him and brought back again, was so little intelligible to Rusticiano that French of some kind was the handiest medium of communication between the two? I have known an Englishman and a Hollander driven to converse in Malay; Chinese Christians of different provinces are said sometimes to take to English as the readiest means of intercommunication; and the same is said even of Irish-speaking Irishmen from remote parts of the Island.

It is worthy of remark how many notable narratives of the Middle Ages have been dictated instead of being written by their authors, and that in cases where it is impossible to ascribe this to ignorance of writing. The Armenian Hayton, though evidently a well-read man, possibly could not write in Roman characters. But Joinville is an ill.u.s.trious example. And the narratives of four of the most famous Mediaeval Travellers[21] seem to have been drawn from them by a kind of pressure, and committed to paper by other hands. I have elsewhere remarked this as indicating how little diffused was literary ambition or vanity; but it would perhaps be more correct to ascribe it to that intense dislike which is still seen on the sh.o.r.es of the Mediterranean to the use of pen and ink. On certain of those sh.o.r.es at least there is scarcely any inconvenience that the majority of respectable and good-natured people will not tolerate--inconvenience to their neighbours be it understood--rather than put pen to paper for the purpose of preventing it.

[1] 232 chapters in the oldest French which we quote as the _Geographic Text_ (or G. T.), 200 in Pauthier's Text, 183 in the Crusca Italian.

[2] The MS. has been printed by Baldelli as above, and again by Bartoli in 1863.

[3] This is somewhat peculiar. I traced a few lines of it, which with Del Riccio's note were given in facsimile in the First Edition.

[4] The Crusca is cited from Bartoli's edition.

French idioms are frequent, as _l'uomo_ for the French _on_; _quattro-vinti_ instead of _ottanta_; etc.

We have at p. 35, "_Questo piano e molto_ cavo," which is nonsense, but is explained by reference to the French (G. T.) "_Voz di qu'il est celle plaingne mout_ chaue" (_chaude_).

The bread in Kerman is bitter, says the G. T. "_por ce que l'eive hi est_ amer," because the water there is bitter. The Crusca mistakes the last word and renders (p. 40) "_e questi e per lo_ mare _che vi viene_."

"_Sachies de voir qe_ endementiers," know for a truth that whilst----, by some misunderstanding of the last word becomes (p. 129) "_Sappiate di vero_ sanza mentire."

"_Mes de sel_ font-il monoie"--"They make money of salt," becomes (p.

168) "_ma fannole_ da loro," _sel_ being taken for a p.r.o.noun, whilst in another place _sel_ is transferred bodily without translation.

"_Chevoil_," "hair" of the old French, appears in the Tuscan (p. 20) as _cavagli_, "horses."--"_La Grant Provence_ Jereraus," the great general province, appears (p. 68) as a province whose proper name is _Ienaraus_. In describing Kublai's expedition against Mien or Burma, Polo has a story of his calling on the Jugglers at his court to undertake the job, promising them a Captain and other help, "_Cheveitain et aide_." This has fairly puzzled the Tuscan, who converts these (p. 186) into two Tartar tribes, "_quegli d'_ Aide _e quegli di_ Caveita."

So also we have _lievre_ for hare transferred without change; _lait_, milk, appearing as _laido_ instead of _latte_; _tres_, rendered as "three"; _bue_, "mud," Italianised as _buoi_, "oxen," and so forth.

Finally, in various places when Polo is explaining Oriental terms we find in the Tuscan MS. "_cioe a dire in_ Francesco."

The blunders mentioned are intelligible enough as in a version _from the French_; but in the description of the Indian pearl-fishery we have a startling one not so easy to account for. The French says, "the divers gather the sea-oysters (_hostrige de Mer_), and in these the pearls are found." This appears in the Tuscan in the extraordinary form that the divers catch those fishes called _Herrings_ (Aringhe), and in those Herrings are found the Pearls!