In M. Polo's Time (1292),
Khubilai Removed The Inhabitants Of Sha-Chow To The Interior Of China;
Fearing, Probably, The Aggression Of The Seditious Princes; And His
Successor, In 1303, Placed There A Garrison Of Ten Thousand Men."
(Palladius, L.C. P. 5.)
"Sha-chau is one of the best oases of Central Asia.
It is situated at the
foot of the Nan-shan range, at a height of 3700 feet above the sea, and
occupies an area of about 200 square miles, the whole of which is thickly
inhabited by Chinese. Sha-chau is interesting as the meeting-place of
three expeditions started independently from Russia, India, and China.
Just two months before Prjevalsky reached this town, it was visited by
Count Szechenyi [April, 1879], and eighteen months afterwards Pundit A-k,
whose report of it agrees fairly well with that of our traveller, also
stayed here. Both Prejevalsky and Szechenyi remark on some curious caves
in a valley near Sha-chau containing Buddhistic clay idols.[1] These caves
were in Marco Polo's time the resort of numerous worshippers, and are said
to date back to the Han Dynasty." (Prejevalsky's Journeys ... by E.
Delmar Morgan, Proc. R. G. S. IX. 1887, pp. 217-218.) - H. C.]
(Ritter, II. 205; Neumann, p. 616; Cathay, 269, 274; Erdmann, 155;
Erman, II. 267; Mag. Asiat. II. 213.)
NOTE 2. - By Idolaters, Polo here means Buddhists, as generally. We do
not know whether the Buddhism here was a recent introduction from Tibet,
or a relic of the old Buddhism of Khotan and other Central Asian kingdoms,
but most probably it was the former, and the "peculiar language" ascribed
to them may have been, as Neumann supposes, Tibetan. This language in
modern Mongolia answers to the Latin of the Mass Book, indeed with a
curious exactness, for in both cases the holy tongue is not that of the
original propagators of the respective religions, but that of the
hierarchy which has assumed their government. In the Lamaitic convents of
China and Manchuria also the Tibetan only is used in worship, except at
one privileged temple at Peking. (Koeppen, II. 288.) The language
intended by Polo may, however, have been a Chinese dialect. (See notes 1
and 4.) The Nestorians must have been tolerably numerous in Tangut, for it
formed a metropolitan province of their Church.
NOTE 3. - A practice resembling this is mentioned by Pallas as existing
among the Buddhist Kalmaks, a relic of their old Shaman superstitions,
which the Lamas profess to decry, but sometimes take part in. "Rich
Kalmaks select from their flock a ram for dedication, which gets the name
of Tengri Tockho, 'Heaven's Ram.' It must be a white one with a yellow
head. He must never be shorn or sold, but when he gets old, and the owner
chooses to dedicate a fresh one, then the old one must be sacrificed. This
is usually done in autumn, when the sheep are fattest, and the neighbours
are called together to eat the sacrifice. A fortunate day is selected, and
the ram is slaughtered amid the cries of the sorcerer directed towards the
sunrise, and the diligent sprinkling of milk for the benefit of the
Spirits of the Air. The flesh is eaten, but the skeleton with a part of
the fat is burnt on a turf altar erected on four pillars of an ell and a
half high, and the skin, with the head and feet, is then hung up in the
way practised by the Buraets." (Sammlungen, II. 346.)
NOTE 4. - Several of the customs of Tangut mentioned in this chapter are
essentially Chinese, and are perhaps introduced here because it was on
entering Tangut that the traveller first came in contact with Chinese
peculiarities. This is true of the manner of forming coffins, and keeping
them with the body in the house, serving food before the coffin whilst it
is so kept, the burning of paper and papier-mache figures of slaves,
horses, etc., at the tomb. Chinese settlers were very numerous at Shachau
and the neighbouring Kwachau, even in the 10th century. (Ritter, II.
213.) ["Keeping a body unburied for a considerable time is called khng
koan, 'to conceal or store away a coffin,' or thing koan, 'to detain a
coffin.' It is, of course, a matter of necessity in such cases to have the
cracks and fissures, and especially the seam where the case and the lid
join, hermetically caulked. This is done by means of a mixture of chunam
and oil. The seams, sometimes even the whole coffin, are pasted over with
linen, and finally everything is varnished black, or, in case of a
mandarin of rank, red. In process of time, the varnishing is repeated as
many times as the family think desirable or necessary. And in order to
protect the coffin still better against dust and moisture, it is generally
covered with sheets of oiled paper, over which comes a white pall." (De
Groot, I. 106.) - H. C.] Even as regards the South of China many of the
circumstances mentioned here are strictly applicable, as may be seen in
Doolittle's Social Life of the Chinese. (See, for example, p. 135; also
Astley, IV. 93-95, or Marsden's quotations from Duhalde.) The custom
of burning the dead has been for several centuries disused in China, but
we shall see hereafter that Polo represents it as general in his time. On
the custom of burning gilt paper in the form of gold coin, as well as of
paper clothing, paper houses, furniture, slaves, etc., see also
Medhurst, p. 213, and Kidd, 177-178. No one who has read Pere Huc will
forget his ludicrous account of the Lama's charitable distribution of
paper horses for the good of disabled travellers. The manufacture of mock
money is a large business in Chinese cities. In Fuchau there are more than
thirty large establishments where it is kept for sale. (Doolittle, 541.)
[The Chinese believe that sheets of paper, partly tinned over on one side,
are, "according to the prevailing conviction, turned by the process of
fire into real silver currency available in the world of darkness, and
sent there through the smoke to the soul; they are called gun-tsoa,
'silver paper.' Most families prefer to previously fold every sheet in the
shape of a hollow ingot, a 'silver ingot,' gun-kho as they call it.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 207 of 335
Words from 210067 to 211139
of 342071
