[22] Vulgar Errors, Bk. I. ch. viii.; Astley's Voyages, IV. 583.
[23] A few years before Marsden's publication, the Historical branch of
the R. S. of Science at Goettingen appears to have put forth as the
subject of a prize Essay the Geography of the Travels of Carpini,
Rubruquis, and especially of Marco Polo. (See L. of M. Polo, by
Zurla, in Collezione di Vite e Ritratti d'Illustri Italiani. Pad.
1816.)
[24] See Staedtewesen des Mittelalters, by K. D. Huellmann, Bonn, 1829,
vol. iv.
After speaking of the Missions of Pope Innocent IV. and St. Lewis,
this author sketches the Travels of the Polos, and then proceeds: -
"Such are the clumsily compiled contents of this ecclesiastical
fiction (Kirchengeschichtlichen Dichtung) disguised as a Book of
Travels, a thing devised generally in the spirit of the age, but
specially in the interests of the Clergy and of Trade.... This
compiler's aim was analogous to that of the inventor of the Song of
Roland, to kindle enthusiasm for the conversion of the Mongols, and so
to facilitate commerce through their dominions.... Assuredly the Poli
never got further than Great Bucharia, which was then reached by many
Italian Travellers. What they have related of the regions of the
Mongol Empire lying further east consists merely of recollections of
the bazaar and travel-talk of traders from those countries; whilst the
notices of India, Persia, Arabia, and Ethiopia, are borrowed from
Arabic Works. The compiler no doubt carries his audacity in fiction a
long way, when he makes his hero Marcus assert that he had been
seventeen years in Kublai's service," etc. etc. (pp. 360-362).
In the French edition of Malcolm's History of Persia (II. 141),
Marco is styled "pretre Venetien"! I do not know whether this is due
to Sir John or to the translator.
[Polo is also called "a Venetian Priest," in a note, vol. i., p. 409,
of the original edition of London, 1815, 2 vols., 4to. - H. C.]
XII. CONTEMPORARY RECOGNITION OF POLO AND HIS BOOK.
[Sidenote: How far was there diffusion of his Book in his own day?]
75. But we must return for a little to Polo's own times. Ramusio states,
as we have seen, that immediately after the first commission of Polo's
narrative to writing (in Latin as he imagined), many copies of it were
made, it was translated into the vulgar tongue, and in a few months all
Italy was full of it.
The few facts that we can collect do not justify this view of the rapid
and diffused renown of the Traveller and his Book. The number of MSS. of
the latter dating from the 14th century is no doubt considerable, but a
large proportion of these are of Pipino's condensed Latin Translation,
which was not put forth, if we can trust Ramusio, till 1320, and certainly
not much earlier. The whole number of MSS. in various languages that we
have been able to register, amounts to about eighty. I find it difficult
to obtain statistical data as to the comparative number of copies of
different works existing in manuscript. With Dante's great Poem, of which
there are reckoned close upon 500 MSS.,[1] comparison would be
inappropriate. But of the Travels of Friar Odoric, a poor work indeed
beside Marco Polo's, I reckoned thirty-nine MSS., and could now add at
least three more to the list. [I described seventy-three in my edition of
Odoric. - H. C.] Also I find that of the nearly contemporary work of
Brunetto Latini, the Tresor, a sort of condensed Encyclopaedia of
knowledge, but a work which one would scarcely have expected to approach
the popularity of Polo's Book, the Editor enumerates some fifty MSS. And
from the great frequency with which one encounters in Catalogues both MSS.
and early printed editions of Sir John Maundevile, I should suppose that
the lying wonders of our English Knight had a far greater popularity and
more extensive diffusion than the veracious and more sober marvels of
Polo.[2] To Southern Italy Polo's popularity certainly does not seem at
any time to have extended. I cannot learn that any MS. of his Book exists
in any Library of the late Kingdom of Naples or in Sicily.[3]
Dante, who lived for twenty-three years after Marco's work was written,
and who touches so many things in the seen and unseen Worlds, never
alludes to Polo, nor I think to anything that can be connected with his
Book. I believe that no mention of Cathay occurs in the Divina
Commedia. That distant region is indeed mentioned more than once in the
poems of a humbler contemporary, Francesco da Barberino, but there is
nothing in his allusions besides this name to suggest any knowledge of
Polo's work.[4]
Neither can I discover any trace of Polo or his work in that of his
contemporary and countryman, Marino Sanudo the Elder, though this worthy
is well acquainted with the somewhat later work of Hayton, and many of the
subjects which he touches in his own book would seem to challenge a
reference to Marco's labours.
[Sidenote: Contemporary references to Polo.]
76. Of contemporary or nearly contemporary references to our Traveller by
name, the following are all that I can produce, and none of them are new.
First there is the notice regarding his presentation of his book to
Thibault de Cepoy, of which we need say no more (supra, p. 68).
Next there is the Preface to Friar Pipino's Translation, which we give at
length in the Appendix (E) to these notices. The phraseology of this
appears to imply that Marco was still alive, and this agrees with the date
assigned to the work by Ramusio. Pipino was also the author of a
Chronicle, of which a part was printed by Muratori, and this contains
chapters on the Tartar wars, the destruction of the Old Man of the
Mountain, etc., derived from Polo.
