Wheresoever the Sovereign may die, he is carried to
his burial in that mountain with his predecessors; no matter an the place
of his death were 100 days' journey distant, thither must he be carried to
his burial.[NOTE 3]
Let me tell you a strange thing too. When they are carrying the body of
any Emperor to be buried with the others, the convoy that goes with the
body doth put to the sword all whom they fall in with on the road, saying:
"Go and wait upon your Lord in the other world!" For they do in sooth
believe that all such as they slay in this manner do go to serve their
Lord in the other world. They do the same too with horses; for when the
Emperor dies, they kill all his best horses, in order that he may have the
use of them in the other world, as they believe. And I tell you as a
certain truth, that when Mongou Kaan died, more than 20,000 persons, who
chanced to meet the body on its way, were slain in the manner I have
told.[NOTE 4]
NOTE 1. - Before parting with Chinghiz let me point out what has not to my
knowledge been suggested before, that the name of "Cambuscan bold" in
Chaucer's tale is only a corruption of the name of Chinghiz. The name of
the conqueror appears in Fr. Ricold as Camiuscan, from which the
transition to Cambuscan presents no difficulty. Camius was, I suppose, a
clerical corruption out of Canjus or Cianjus. In the chronicle of St.
Antonino, however, we have him called "Chinghiscan rectius Tamgius
Cam" (XIX. c. 8). If this is not merely the usual blunder of t for
c, it presents a curious analogy to the form Tankiz Khan always used
by Ibn Batuta. I do not know the origin of the latter, unless it was
suggested by tankis (Ar.) "Turning upside down." (See Pereg. Quat., p.
119; I. B. III. 22, etc.)
NOTE 2. - Polo's history here is inadmissible. He introduces into the list
of the supreme Kaans Batu, who was only Khan of Kipchak (the Golden
Horde), and Hulaku who was Khan of Persia, whilst he omits Okkodai,
the immediate successor of Chinghiz. It is also remarkable that he uses
the form Alacou here instead of Alaue as elsewhere; nor does he seem to
mean the same person, for he was quite well aware that Alaue was Lord of
the Levant, who sent ambassadors to the Great Khan Cublay, and could not
therefore be one of his predecessors. The real succession ran: 1.
Chinghiz; 2. Okkodai; 3. Kuyuk; 4. Mangku; 5. Kublai.
There are quite as great errors in the history of Haiton, who had probably
greater advantages in this respect than Marco. And I may note that in
Teixeira's abridgment of Mirkhond, Hulaku is made to succeed Mangku Kaan
on the throne of Chinghiz. (Relaciones, p. 338.)
NOTE 3. - The ALTAI here certainly does not mean the Great South Siberian
Range to which the name is now applied. Both Altai and Altun-Khan
appear sometimes to be applied by Sanang Setzen to the Khingan of the
Chinese, or range running immediately north of the Great Wall near Kalgan.
(See ch. lxi. note I.) But in reference to this matter of the burial of
Chinghiz, he describes the place as "the district of Yekeh Utek, between
the shady side of the Altai-Khan and the sunny side of the Kentei-Khan."
Now the Kentei-Khan (khan here meaning "mountain") is near the sources
of the Onon, immediately to the north-east of Urga; and Altai-Khan in this
connection cannot mean the hills near the Great Wall, 500 miles distant.
According to Rashiduddin, Chinghiz was buried at a place called Burkan
Kaldun ("God's Hill"), or Yekeh Kuruk ("The Great Sacred or Tabooed
Place"); in another passage he calls the spot Budah Undur (which means,
I fancy, the same as Burkan Kaldun), near the River Selenga. Burkan Kaldun
is often mentioned by Sanang Setzen, and Quatremere seems to demonstrate
the identity of this place with the mountain called by Pallas (and
Timkowski) Khanoolla. This is a lofty mountain near Urga, covered with
dense forest, and is indeed the first woody mountain reached in travelling
from Peking. It is still held sacred by the Mongols and guarded from
access, though the tradition of Chinghiz's grave seems to be extinct. Now,
as this Khanoolla ("Mount Royal," for khan here means "sovereign," and
oolla "mountain") stands immediately to the south of the Kentei
mentioned in the quotation from S. Setzen, this identification agrees with
his statement, on the supposition that the Khanoolla is the Altai of the
same quotation. The Khanoolla must also be the Han mountain which Mongol
chiefs claiming descent from Chinghiz named to Gaubil as the burial-place
of that conqueror. Note that the Khanoolla, which we suppose to be the
Altai of Polo, and here of Sanang Setzen, belongs to a range known as
Khingan, whilst we see that Setzen elsewhere applies Altai and
Altan-Khan to the other Khingan near the Great Wall.
Erdmann relates, apparently after Rashiduddin, that Chinghiz was buried at
the foot of a tree which had taken his fancy on a hunting expedition, and
which he had then pointed out as the place where he desired to be
interred. It was then conspicuous, but afterwards the adjoining trees shot
up so rapidly, that a dense wood covered the whole locality, and it became
impossible to identify the spot. (Q. R. 117 seqq.; Timk. I. 115 seqq.,
II. 475-476; San. Setz. 103, 114-115, 108-109; Gaubil, 54; Erd.
444.)
["There are no accurate indications," says Palladius (l.c. pp.
