Judging From Certain Indications We Conceive It Probable That The Three
Venetians, Whose Second Start From Acre Took Place About
November 1271,
proceeded by Ayas and Sivas, and then by Mardin, Mosul, and Baghdad, to
Hormuz at the mouth of
The Persian Gulf, with the view of going on by sea,
but that some obstacle arose which compelled them to abandon this project
and turn north again from Hormuz.[13] They then traversed successively
Kerman and Khorasan, Balkh and Badakhshan, whence they ascended the Panja
or upper Oxus to the Plateau of Pamir, a route not known to have been
since followed by any European traveller except Benedict Goes, till the
spirited expedition of Lieutenant John Wood of the Indian Navy in
1838.[14] Crossing the Pamir highlands the travellers descended upon
Kashgar, whence they proceeded by Yarkand and Khotan, and the vicinity of
Lake Lob, and eventually across the Great Gobi Desert to Tangut, the name
then applied by Mongols and Persians to territory at the extreme
North-west of China, both within and without the Wall. Skirting the
northern frontier of China they at last reached the presence of the Kaan,
who was at his usual summer retreat at Kai-ping fu, near the base of the
Khingan Mountains, and nearly 100 miles north of the Great Wall at Kalgan.
If there be no mistake in the time (three years and a half) ascribed to
this journey in all the existing texts, the travellers did not reach the
Court till about May of 1275.[15]
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