They Have Also Immense Minsters And Abbeys, Some Of Them As Big As A Small
Town, With More Than Two Thousand Monks (I.E. After Their Fashion) In A
Single Abbey.[NOTE 13] These Monks Dress More Decently Than The Rest Of
The People, And Have The Head And Beard Shaven.
There are some among these
Bacsi who are allowed by their rule to take wives, and who have plenty
of children.[NOTE 14]
Then there is another kind of devotees called SENSIN, who are men of
extraordinary abstinence after their fashion, and lead a life of such
hardship as I will describe. All their life long they eat nothing but
bran,[NOTE 15] which they take mixt with hot water. That is their food:
bran, and nothing but bran; and water for their drink. 'Tis a lifelong
fast! so that I may well say their life is one of extraordinary
asceticism. They have great idols, and plenty of them; but they sometimes
also worship fire. The other Idolaters who are not of this sect call these
people heretics - Patarins as we should say[NOTE 16] - because they do not
worship their idols in their own fashion. Those of whom I am speaking
would not take a wife on any consideration.[NOTE 17] They wear dresses of
hempen stuff, black and blue,[NOTE 18] and sleep upon mats; in fact their
asceticism is something astonishing. Their idols are all feminine, that is
to say, they have women's names.[NOTE 19]
Now let us have done with this subject, and let me tell you of the great
state and wonderful magnificence of the Great Lord of Lords; I mean that
great Prince who is the Sovereign of the Tartars, CUBLAY by name, that
most noble and puissant Lord.
NOTE 1. - [There were two roads to go from Peking to Shangtu: the eastern
road through Tu-shi-k'ow, and the western (used for the return journey)
road by Ye-hu ling. Polo took this last road, which ran from Peking to
Siuen-te chau through the same places as now; but from the latter town it
led, not to Kalgan as it does now, but more to the west, to a place called
now Shan-fang pu where the pass across the Ye-hu ling range begins. "On
both these roads nabo, or temporary palaces, were built, as
resting-places for the Khans; eighteen on the eastern road, and twenty-four
on the western." (Palladius, p. 25.) The same author makes (p. 26) the
following remarks: "M. Polo's statement that he travelled three days from
Siuen-te chau to Chagannor, and three days also from the latter place to
Shang-tu, agrees with the information contained in the 'Researches on the
Routes to Shangtu.' The Chinese authors have not given the precise position
of Lake Chagannor; there are several lakes in the desert on the road to
Shangtu, and their names have changed with time. The palace in Chagannor
was built in 1280" (according to the Siu t'ung kien). - H. C.]
NOTE 2. - Chandu, called more correctly in Ramusio Xandu, i.e. SHANDU,
and by Fr. Odorico Sandu, viz. SHANG-TU or "Upper Court," the Chinese
title of Kublai's summer residence at Kaipingfu, Mongolice Keibung (see
ch. xiii. of Prologue) [is called also Loan king, i.e. "the capital on
the Loan River," according to Palladius, p. 26. - H. C.]. The ruins still
exist, in about lat. 40 deg. 22', and a little west of the longitude of
Peking. The site is 118 miles in direct line from Chaghan-nor, making
Polo's three marches into rides of unusual length.[1] The ruins bear the
Mongol name of Chao Naiman Sume Khotan, meaning "city of the 108
temples," and are about 26 miles to the north-west of Dolon-nor, a
bustling, dirty town of modern origin, famous for the manufactory of
idols, bells, and other ecclesiastical paraphernalia of Buddhism. The site
was visited (though not described) by Pere Gerbillon in 1691, and since
then by no European traveller till 1872, when Dr. Bushell of the British
Legation at Peking, and the Hon. T. G. Grosvenor, made a journey thither
from the capital, by way of the Nan-kau Pass (supra p. 26), Kalgan, and
the vicinity of Chaghan-nor, the route that would seem to have been
habitually followed, in their annual migration, by Kublai and his
successors.
The deserted site, overgrown with rank weeds and grass, stands but little
above the marshy bed of the river, which here preserves the name of Shang-
tu, and about a mile from its north or left bank. The walls, of earth
faced with brick and unhewn stone, still stand, forming, as in the Tartar
city of Peking, a double enceinte, of which the inner line no doubt
represents the area of the "Marble Palace" of which Polo speaks. This
forms a square of about 2 li (2/3 of a mile) to the side, and has three
gates - south, east, and west, of which the southern one still stands
intact, a perfect arch, 20 ft. high and 12 ft. wide. The outer wall forms
a square of 4 li (1-1/3 mile) to the side, and has six gates. The
foundations of temples and palace-buildings can be traced, and both
enclosures are abundantly strewn with blocks of marble and fragments of
lions, dragons, and other sculptures, testifying to the former existence
of a flourishing city, but exhibiting now scarcely one stone upon another.
A broken memorial tablet was found, half buried in the ground, within the
north-east angle of the outer rampart, bearing an inscription in an
antique form of the Chinese character, which proves it to have been
erected by Kublai, in honour of a Buddhist ecclesiastic called Yun-Hien.
Yun-Hien was the abbot of one of those great minsters and abbeys of
Bacsis, of which Marco speaks, and the exact date (no longer visible) of
the monument was equivalent to A.D. 1288.[2]
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