Une Provence qe est
encore de le confin dou Mangi.
Crusca, 162-3 .. L' uomo truova una Provincia ch' e
chiamata ancora delle confine de' Mangi.
G.L. 396 .. Invenit unam Provinciam quae vocatur
Anchota de confinibus Mangi.
(6). G.T. 146 (II. 119.) Les dames portent as jambes et es
braces, braciaus d'or et d'arjent de
grandisme vailance.
Crusca, 189 .. Le donne portano alle braccia e alle
gambe bracciali d'oro e d'ariento
di gran valuta.
G.L. 411 .. Dominae eorum portant ad brachia et
ad gambas brazalia de auro et de
argento magni valoris.
B. Passages showing additionally the errors, or other peculiarities
of a translation from a French original, common to the Italian and the
Latin.
(7). G.T. 32 (I. 97.) Est celle plaingne mout chaue (chaude).
Crusca, 35 .. Questo piano e molto cavo.
G.L. 322 .. Ista planities est multum cava.
(8). G.T. 36 (I. 110). Avent por ce que l'eive hi est amer.
Crusca, 40 .. E questo e per lo mare che vi viene.
G.L. 324 .. Istud est propter mare quod est ibi.
(9). G.T. 8 (I. 50.) Un roi qi est apeles par tout tens
Davit Melic, que veut a dir en fransois
Davit Roi.
Crusca, 20 .. Uno re il quale si chiama sempre
David Melic, cio e a dire in francesco
David Re.
G.L. 312 .. Rex qui semper vocatur David Mellic,
quod sonat in gallico David Rex.
These passages, and many more that might be quoted, seem to me to
demonstrate (1) that the Latin and the Crusca have had a common
original, and (2) that this original was an Italian version from the
French.
[2] Thus the Pucci MS. at Florence, in the passage regarding the Golden
King (vol. ii. p. 17) which begins in G. T. "Lequel fist faire jadis
un rois qe fu apelles le Roi Dor," renders "Lo quale fa fare
Jaddis uno re," a mistake which is not in the Crusca nor in the
Latin, and seems to imply derivation from the French directly, or by
some other channel (Baldelli Boni).
[3] In the Prologue (vol. i. p. 34) this class of MSS. alone names the
King of England.
In the account of the Battle with Nayan (i. p. 337) this class alone
speaks of the two-stringed instruments which the Tartars played whilst
awaiting the signal for battle. But the circumstance appears elsewhere
in the G. T. (p. 250).
In the chapter on Malabar (vol. ii. p. 390), it is said that the
ships which go with cargoes towards Alexandria are not one-tenth of
those that go to the further East. This is not in the older French.
In the chapter on Coilun (ii. p. 375), we have a notice of the
Columbine ginger so celebrated in the Middle Ages, which is also
absent from the older text.
[4] See vol. ii. p. 439. It is, however, remarkable that a like mistake is
made about the Persian Gulf (see i. 63, 64). Perhaps Polo thought in
Persian, in which the word darya means either sea or a large
river.
