Case, with different titles, in Java.
And yet it is curious that John Marignolli, Ibn Batuta's contemporary in
the middle of the 14th century, and Barbosa in the 16th century, are alike
at pains to describe the umbrella as some strange object. And in our own
country it is commonly stated that the umbrella was first used in the last
century, and that Jonas Hanway (died 1786) was one of the first persons
who made a practice of carrying one. The word umbrello is, however, in
Minsheu's dictionary. [See Hobson-Jobson, s.v. Umbrella. - H. C.]
(Murat. Dissert. II. 229; Archiv. Storic. Ital. VIII. 274, 560;
Klapr. Mem. III.; Carp. 759; N. and Q., C. and J. II. 180; Arrian,
Indica, XVI.; Smith's Dict., G. and R. Ant., s. v. umbraculum; J. R.
A. S. v. 351; Ras Mala, I. 221; I. B. II. 440; Cathay, 381;
Ramus. I. f. 301.)
Alexander, according to Athenaeus, feasted his captains to the number of
6000, and made them all sit upon silver chairs. The same author relates
that the King of Persia, among other rich presents, bestowed upon Entimus
the Gortynian, who went up to the king in imitation of Themistocles,
a silver chair and a gilt umbrella. (Bk. I. Epit. ch. 31, and II. 31.)
The silver chair has come down to our own day in India, and is much
affected by native princes.
NOTE 4. - I have not been able to find any allusion, except in our author,
to tablets, with gerfalcons (shonkar). The shonkar appears, however,
according to Erdmann, on certain coins of the Golden Horde, struck at
Sarai.
There is a passage from Wassaf used by Hammer, in whose words it runs that
the Sayad Imamuddin, appointed (A.D. 683) governor of Shiraz by Arghun
Khan, "was invested with both the Mongol symbols of delegated
sovereignty, the Golden Lion's Head, and the golden Cat's Head." It
would certainly have been more satisfactory to find "Gerfalcon's Head" in
lieu of the latter; but it is probable that the same object is meant. The
cut below exhibits the conventional effigy of a gerfalcon as sculptured
over one of the gates of Iconium, Polo's Conia. The head might easily pass
for a conventional representation of a cat's head, and is indeed
strikingly like the grotesque representation that bears that name in
mediaeval architecture. (Erdmann, Numi Asiatici, I. 339; Ilch. I.
370.)
[Illustration: Sculptured Gerfalcon. (From the Gate of Iconium.)]
[1] "In anno Simiae, octava luna, die quarto exeunte, juxta fluvium Cobam
(the Kuban), apud Ripam Rubeam existentes scripsimus." The original
was in lingua Persayca.
[2] See Golden Horde, p. 218.
CHAPTER VIII.
CONCERNING THE PERSON OF THE GREAT KAAN.
The personal appearance of the Great Kaan, Lord of Lords, whose name is
Cublay, is such as I shall now tell you.
