"In Addition To These Somewhat Conclusive Observations, Marco Polo Says
That Jade Is Found In The River Of Pimo, Which Is True Of The Keriya, But
Not Of The Chira, Or The Other Rivers Near Kenan." (Ellsworth HUNTINGTON,
The Pulse Of Asia, Pp.
387-8.)
XXVIII., p. 194. "The whole of the Province [of Charchan] is sandy, and so
is the road all the way from Pein, and much of the water that you find is
bitter and bad. However, at some places you do find fresh and sweet
water."
Sir Aurel Stein remarks (Ancient Khotan, I., p. 436): "Marco Polo's
description, too, 'of the Province of Charchan' would agree with the
assumption that the route west of Charchan was not altogether devoid of
settlements even as late as the thirteenth century.... [His] account of
the route agrees accurately with the conditions now met with between Niya
and Charchan. Yet in the passage immediately following, the Venetian tells
us how 'when an army passes through the land, the people escape with their
wives, children, and cattle a distance of two or three days' journey into
the sandy waste; and, knowing the spots where water is to be had, they are
able to live there, and to keep their cattle alive, while it is impossible
to discover them.' It seems to me clear that Marco Polo alludes here to
the several river courses which, after flowing north of the Niya-Charchan
route, lose themselves in the desert. The jungle belt of their terminal
areas, no doubt, offered then, as it would offer now, safe places of
refuge to any small settlements established along the route southwards."
XXXIX., P. 197.
OF THE CITY OF LOP.
Stein remarks, Ruins of Desert Cathay, I., p. 343: "Broad
geographical facts left no doubt for any one acquainted with local
conditions that Marco Polo's Lop, 'a large town at the edge of the Desert'
where 'travellers repose before entering on the Desert' en route
for Sha chou and China proper, must have occupied the position of the
present Charklik. Nor could I see any reason for placing elsewhere the
capital of that 'ancient kingdom of Na-fo-po, the same as the territory of
Lou-lan,' which Hiuan Tsang reached after ten marches to the north-east of
Chue-mo or Charchan, and which was the pilgrim's last stage before his
return to Chinese soil."
In his third journey (1913-1916), Stein left Charchan on New Year's Eve,
1914, and arrived at Charkhlik on January 8, saying: "It was from this
modest little oasis, the only settlement of any importance in the Lop
region, representing Marco Polo's 'City of Lop,' that I had to raise the
whole of the supplies, labour, and extra camels needed by the several
parties for the explorations I had carefully planned during the next three
months in the desert between Lop-nor and Tunhuang."
"The name of LOB appears under the form Lo pou in the Yuan-shi, s.a.
1282 and 1286. In 1286, it is mentioned as a postal station near those of
K'ie-t'ai, Che-ch'an and Wo-tuan. Wo-tuan is Khotan. Che-ch'an, the name
of which reappears in other paragraphs, is Charchan. As to K'ie-t'ai, a
postal station between those of Lob and Charchan, it seems probable that
it is the Kaetaek of the Tarikh-i-Rashidi." (PELLIOT.)
See in the Journ. Asiatique, Jan.-Feb., 1916, pp. 117-119, Pelliot's
remarks on Lob, Navapa, etc.
XXXIX., pp. 196-7.
THE GREAT DESERT.
After reproducing the description of the Great Desert in Sir Henry Yule's
version, Stein adds, Ruins of Desert Cathay, I., p. 518:
"It did not need my journey to convince me that what Marco here tells us
about the risks of the desert was but a faithful reflex of old folklore
beliefs he must have heard on the spot. Sir Henry Yule has shown long ago
that the dread of being led astray by evil spirits haunted the imagination
of all early travellers who crossed the desert wastes between China and
the oases westwards. Fa-hsien's above-quoted passage clearly alludes to
this belief, and so does Hiuan Tsang, as we have seen, where he points in
graphic words the impressions left by his journey through the sandy desert
between Niya and Charchan.
"Thus, too, the description we receive through the Chinese
historiographer, Ma Tuan-lin, of the shortest route from China towards
Kara-shahr, undoubtedly corresponding to the present track to Lop-nor,
reads almost like a version from Marco's book, though its compiler, a
contemporary of the Venetian traveller, must have extracted it from some
earlier source. 'You see nothing in any direction but the sky and the
sands, without the slightest trace of a road; and travellers find nothing
to guide them but the bones of men and beasts and the droppings of camels.
During the passage of this wilderness you hear sounds, sometimes of
singing, sometimes of wailing; and it has often happened that travellers
going aside to see what these sounds might be have strayed from their
course and been entirely lost; for they were voices of spirits and
goblins.'...
"As Yule rightly observes, 'these Goblins are not peculiar to the Gobi.'
Yet I felt more than ever assured that Marco's stories about them were of
genuine local growth, when I had travelled over the whole route and seen
how closely its topographical features agree with the matter-of-fact
details which the first part of his chapter records. Anticipating my
subsequent observations, I may state here at once that Marco's estimate of
the distance and the number of marches on this desert crossing proved
perfectly correct. For the route from Charklik, his 'town of Lop,' to the
'City of Sachiu,' i.e. Sha-chou or Tun-huang, our plane-table survey,
checked by cyclometer readings, showed an aggregate marching distance of
close on 380 miles."
XXXIX., p. 196.
OF THE CITY OF LOP AND THE GREAT DESERT.
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