The people only a little better." (J. R. G.
S. X. 292.) The ill report of the people of this region did not begin
with the Turkmans, for the Emperor Constantine Porphyrog.
Quotes a Greek
proverb to the disparagement of the three kappas, Cappadocia, Crete, and
Cilicia. (In Bandurit I. 6.)
NOTE 2. - In Turcomania Marco perhaps embraces a great part of Asia Minor,
but he especially means the territory of the decaying Seljukian monarchy,
usually then called by Asiatics Rum, as the Ottoman Empire is now, and
the capital of which was Iconium, KUNIYAH, the Conia of the text, and
Coyne of Joinville. Ibn Batuta calls the whole country Turkey
(Al-Turkiyah), and the people Turkman; exactly likewise does Ricold
(Thurchia and Thurchimanni). Hayton's account of the various classes
of inhabitants is quite the same in substance as Polo's. [The Turkmans
emigrated from Turkestan to Asia Minor before the arrival of the Seljukid
Turks. "Their villages," says Cuinet, Turquie d'Asie, II. p. 767, "are
distinguished by the peculiarity of the houses being built of sun-baked
bricks, whereas it is the general habit in the country to build them of
earth or a kind of plaster, called djes" - H. C.] The migratory and
pastoral Turkmans still exist in this region, but the Kurds of like habits
have taken their place to a large extent. The fine carpets and silk
fabrics appear to be no longer produced here, any more than the excellent
horses of which Polo speaks, which must have been the remains of the
famous old breed of Cappadocia. [It appears, however (Vital Cuinet's
Turquie d'Asie, I. p. 224), that fine carpets are still manufactured at
Koniah, also a kind of striped cotton cloth, called Aladja. - H. C.]
A grant of privileges to the Genoese by Leon II., King of Lesser Armenia,
dated 23rd December, 1288, alludes to the export of horses and mules,
etc., from Ayas, and specifies the duties upon them. The horses now of
repute in Asia as Turkman come from the east of the Caspian. And Asia
Minor generally, once the mother of so many breeds of high repute, is now
poorer in horses than any province of the Ottoman empire.
(Pereg. Quat. p. 114; I.B. II. 255 seqq.; Hayton, ch. xiii.; Liber
Jurium Reip. Januensis, II. 184; Tchihatcheff, As. Min., 2'de partie,
631.)
[The Seljukian Sultanate of Iconium or Rum, was founded at the expense of
the Byzantines by Suleiman (1074-1081); the last three sovereigns of the
dynasty contemporaneous with Marco Polo are Ghiath ed-din Kaikhosru III.
(1267-1283), Ghiath ed-din Mas'ud II. (1283-1294), Ala ed-din Kaikobad
III. (1294-1308), when this kingdom was destroyed by the Mongols of
Persia. Privileges had been granted to Venice by Ghiath ed-din Kaikhosru
I. (+ 1211), and his sons Izz ed-din Kaikaua (1211-1220), and Ala ed-din
Kaikobad I. (1220-1237); the diploma of 1220 is unfortunately the only one
of the three known to be preserved.
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