next to no silk at all grown in these districts. Is this the result of a change of climate, or only a commercial change? Baron Richthofen, to whom I have referred the question, believes it to be due to the former cause: "No tract in China would appear to have suffered so much by a change of climate as Shensi and southern Shansi."

NOTE 3. The asper or akché (both meaning "white") of the Mongols at Tana or Azov I have elsewhere calculated, from Pegolotti's data (Cathay, p. 298), to have contained about os. 2'8d. worth of silver, which is less than the grosso; but the name may have had a loose application to small silver coins in other countries of Asia. Possibly the money intended may have been the 50 tsien note (see note 1, ch. xxiv. supra).

CHAPTER XLI.

CONCERNING THE CITY OF KENJANFU.

AND when you leave the city of Cachanfu of which I have spoken, and travel eight days westward, you meet with cities and boroughs abounding in trade and industry, and quantities of beautiful trees, and gardens, and fine plains planted with mulberries, which are the trees on the leaves of which the silkworms do feed. The people are all Idolaters. There is also plenty of game of all sorts, both of beasts and birds.

And when you have travelled those eight days' journey, you come to that great city which I mentioned, called KENJANFU. A very great and fine city it is, and the capital of the kingdom of Kenjanfu, which in old times. was a noble, rich, and powerful realm, and had many great and wealthy and puissant kings. But now the king thereof

prince called MANGALAI, the son of the Great Kaan, who hath given him this realm, and crowned him king thereof. It is a city of great trade and industry. They have great abundance of silk, from which they weave cloths of silk and gold of divers kinds, and they also manufacture all sorts of equipments for an army. They have every

necessary of man's life very cheap. The city lies towards the west; the people are Idolaters; and outside the city is the palace of the Prince Mangalai, crowned king, and son of the Great Kaan, as I told you before.

This is a fine palace and a great, as I will tell you. It stands in a great plain abounding in lakes and streams and springs of water. Round about it is a massive and lofty wall, five miles in compass, well built, and all garnished with battlements. And within this wall is the king's palace, so great and fine that no one could imagine a finer. There are in it many great and splendid halls, and many chambers, all painted and embellished with work in beaten gold. This Mangalai rules his realm right well with justice and equity, and is much beloved by his people. The troops are quartered round about the palace, and enjoy the sport (that the royal demesne affords).

So now let us quit this kingdom, and I will tell you of a very mountainous province called Cuncun, which you reach by a road right wearisome to travel.

NOTE 1.-Having got to sure ground again at Kenjanfu, which is, as we shall explain presently, the city of SINGANFU, capital of Shensi, let us look back at the geography of the route from P'ingyanfu. Its difficulties are great.

The traveller carries us two days' journey from, P'ingyanfu to his castle of the Golden King. This is called in the G. Text and most other MSS. Caicui, Caytui, or the like, but in Ramusio alone Thaigin. He then carries us 20 miles further to the Caramoran; he crosses this river, travels two days further, and reaches the great city Cachanfu; eight days more (or as in Ramusio seven) bring him to Singanfu.

There seems scarcely room for doubt that CACHANFU is the HoCHANGFU of those days, now called P'UCHAUFU, close to the great elbow of the Hwang Ho (Klaproth). But this city, instead of being two days west of the great river, stands near its eastern bank.

Not maintaining the infallibility of our traveller's memory, we may conceive confusion here, between the recollections of his journey westward and those of his return; but this does not remove all the difficulties.

The most notable fortress of the Kin sovereigns was that of T'ungkwan, on the right bank of the river, 25 miles below P'uchaufu, and closing the passage between the river and the mountains, just where

the boundaries of Honan, Shansi, and Shensi meet. It was constantly the turning-point of the Mongol campaigns against that dynasty, and held a prominent place in the dying instructions of Chinghiz for the prosecution of the conquest of Cathay. This fortress must have continued famous to Polo's time, indeed it continues so still, the strategic position being one which nothing short of a geological catastrophe could impair,—but I see no way of reconciling its position with his narrative. The name in Ramusio's form might be merely that of the dynasty, viz., Tai-Kin Great Golden. But we have seen that Thaigin is not the only reading. That of the MSS. seems to point rather to some name like Kaichau. A hypothesis which has seemed to me to call for least correction in the text is that the castle was at the Kichau of the maps, nearly due west of P'ingyangfu, and just about 20 miles from the Hwang

=

Ho; that the river was crossed in that vicinity, and that the traveller then descended the valley to opposite P'uchaufu, or possibly embarked and descended the river itself to that point. This last hypothesis would mitigate the apparent disproportion in the times assigned to the different parts of the journey, and would, I think, clear the text of error. But it is only a hypothesis. There is near Kichau one of the easiest crossing places of the River, insomuch that since the Shensi troubles a large garrison has been kept up at Kichau to watch it. And this is the only direction in which 2 days' march, at Polo's rate, would bring him within 20 miles of the Yellow River. Whether there is any historic castle at Kichau I know not; the plan of that place in Duhalde, however, has the aspect of a strong position. Baron v. Richthofen is unable to accept this suggestion, and has favoured me with some valuable remarks on this difficult passage, which I slightly abridge :

"The difficulties are, (1) that for either reading, Thaigin or Caichu, a corresponding place can be found; (2) in the position of Cachanfu, setting both at naught.

66

Thaigin. There are two passages of the Yellow River near its great bend. One is at T'ungkwan, where I crossed it; the other, and

* 1 am indebted for this information to Baron Richthofen.

more convenient, is at the fortress of Taiching-kwan, locally pronounced Taigin-kwan.. This fortress, or rather fortified camp, is a very wellknown place, and to be found on native maps; it is very close to the River, on the left bank, about 6 m. S.W. of P'u-chau-fu. The road runs hence to Tungchau-fu and thence to Singan-fu. T'aiching-kwan could not possibly (at Polo's rate) be reached in 2 days from P'ingyang-fu.

"Caichu. If this reading be adopted Marsden may be right in supposing Kiai-chau, locally Khaidju, to be meant. This city dominates the important salt marsh, whence Shansi and Shensi are supplied with salt. It is 70 or 80 m. from P'ingyang-fu, but could be reached in 2 days. It commands a large and tolerably populous plain, and is quite fit to have been an imperial residence.

"May not the striking fact that there is a place corresponding to either name suggest that one of them was passed by Polo in going, the other in returning? and that, this being the only locality between Chingtufu and Chuchau where there was any deviation between the two journeys, his geographical ideas may have become somewhat confused, as might now happen to any one in like case and not provided with a map? Thus the traveller himself might have put into Ramusio's text the name of Thaigin instead of Caichu. From Kiaichau he would probably cross the River at T'ungkwan, whilst in returning by way of Taiching-kwan he would pass through P'uchau-fu (or vice versa). The question as to Caichu may still be settled, as it must be possible to ascertain where the Kin resided.” *

NOTE 2.-The 8 days' journey through richly cultivated plains run up the basin of the Wei River, the most important agricultural region of N.W. China, and the core of early Chinese History. The loss is here more than ever predominant, its yellow tinge affecting the whole landscape, and even the atmosphere. Here, according to Baron v. Richthofen, originated the use of the word hwang "yellow," as the symbol of the Earth, whence the primeval emperors were styled Hwang-ti, "Lord of the Earth," but properly "Lord of the Löss.”

Kenjanfu, or, as Ramusio gives it, Quenzanfu, is SI-NGAN-FU, or as it was called in the days of its greatest fame, Changgan, probably the most celebrated city in Chinese history, and the capital of several of the most potent dynasties. It was the metropolis of Shi Hwangti of the T'sin dynasty, properly the first emperor, and whose conquests almost intersected those of his contemporary Ptolemy Euergetes. It was, perhaps, the Thinae of Claudius Ptolemy, as it was certainly the Khumdán of the early Mahomedans, and the site of flourishing Christian Churches in the 7th century, as well as of the remarkable monument, the discovery of which a thousand years later disclosed their forgotten existence.† Kingchao-fu * See the small Map attached to "Marco Polo's Itinerary Map, No. IV.,” at end of Vol. I.

In the first edition I was able to present a reduced facsimile of a rubbing in my possession from this famous inscription, which I owed to the generosity of Dr. Lockhart.

was the name which the city bore when the Mongol invasions brought China into communication with the west, and Klaproth supposes that

To the Baron von Richthofen I am no less indebted for the more complete rubbing which has afforded the plate now published. A tolerably full account of this inscription is given in Cathay, pp. xcii. seqq., and pp. clxxxi. seqq., but the subject is so interesting that it seems well to introduce here the most important particulars :

The stone slab, about 7 feet high by 3 feet wide, and some ten inches in thickness, which bears this inscription, was accidentally found in 1625 by some workmen who were digging in the Changgan suburb of the city of Singanfu. The cross, which is engraved at page 24, is incised at the top of the slab, and beneath this are 9 large characters in 3 columns, constituting the heading, which runs: Monument commemorating the introduction and propagation of the noble Law of Ta-t'sin in the Middle Kingdom;" Ta-t'sin being the term applied in Chinese literature to the Roman Empire, of which the ancient Chinese had much such a shadowy conception as the Romans had, conversely, of the Chinese as Sinae and Seres. Then follows the body of the inscription, of great length and beautiful execution, consisting of 1780 characters. Its chief contents are as follows:-Ist. An abstract of Christian doctrine, of a vague and figurative kind; 2nd. An account of the arrival of the missionary OLOPĂN (probably a Chinese form of Rabban= Monk), from Tat'sin in the year equivalent to A.D. 635, bringing sacred books and images; of the translation of the said books; of the Imperial approval of the doctrine and permission to teach it publicly. There follows a decree of the Emperor (T'aitsung, a very famous prince), issued in 638, in favour of the new doctrine, and ordering a church to be built in the Square of Peace and Justice (I-ning Fang), at the capital. The Emperor's portrait was to be placed in the church. After this comes a description of Tat'sin (here apparently implying Syria); and then some account of the fortunes of the Church in China. Kaotsung (650-683, the devout patron also of the Buddhist traveller and Doctor Hwen T'sang) continued to favour it. In the end of the century, Buddhism gets the upper hand, but under HWAN-TSUNG (713-755) the Church recovers its prestige, and KIHO, a new missionary, arrives. Under TETSUNG (780-783) the monument was erected,

and this part ends with the eulogy of IssÉ, a statesman and benefactor of the Church. 3rd. There follows a recapitulation of the purport in octosyllabic verse.

The Chinese inscription concludes with the date of erection, viz., the 2nd year Kienchung of the Great T'ang dynasty, the 7th day of the month Tait'su, the feast of the great Yaosan. This corresponds, according to Gaubil, to 4th February, 781; and Yaosan is supposed to stand for Hosanna (i.e. Palm-Sunday; but this apparently does not fit). There are added the name of the chief of the law, NINGCHU (presumed to be the Chinese name of the Metropolitan), the name of the writer, and the official sanction.

The monument exhibits, in addition to the Chinese text, a series of short inscriptions in the Syriac language, and Estranghelo character, containing the date of erection, viz., 1092 of the Greeks (=A.D. 781), the name of the reigning Patriarch of the Nestorian church MAR HANAN ISHUA (dead in 778, but the fact apparently had not reached China), that of ADAM, Bishop and Pope of Tzinisthán (i. e. China); and those of the clerical staff of the capital, which here bears the name, given it by the early Arab Travellers, of Kúmdán. There follow sixty-seven names of persons in Syriac characters, most of whom are characterized as priests (Kashishá), and sixtyone names of persons in Chinese, all priests save one.

Kircher gives a good many more Syriac names than appear on the rubbing; probably because some of these are on the edge of the slab now built in. We have no room to speak of the controversies raised by this stone. The most able defence of its genuine character, as well as a transcript with translation and commentary, a work of great interest, was published by the late M. Pauthier. The monument exists intact, and has been visited by the Rev. Mr. Williamson, Baron Richthofen, and