[5] If Mr. Phillips had given particulars about his map and quotations, as
to date, author, etc., it would have given them more value. He leaves
this vague.
CHAPTER XI.
OF THE KINGDOMS OF LAMBRI AND FANSUR.
When you leave that kingdom you come to another which is called LAMBRI.
[NOTE 1] The people are Idolaters, and call themselves the subjects of the
Great Kaan. They have plenty of Camphor and of all sorts of other spices.
They also have brazil in great quantities. This they sow, and when it is
grown to the size of a small shoot they take it up and transplant it; then
they let it grow for three years, after which they tear it up by the root.
You must know that Messer Marco Polo aforesaid brought some seed of the
brazil, such as they sow, to Venice with him, and had it sown there; but
never a thing came up. And I fancy it was because the climate was too
cold.
Now you must know that in this kingdom of Lambri there are men with tails;
these tails are of a palm in length, and have no hair on them. These
people live in the mountains and are a kind of wild men. Their tails are
about the thickness of a dog's.[NOTE 2] There are also plenty of unicorns
in that country, and abundance of game in birds and beasts.
Now then I have told you about the kingdom of Lambri.
You then come to another kingdom which is called FANSUR. The people are
Idolaters, and also call themselves subjects of the Great Kaan; and
understand, they are still on the same Island that I have been telling you
of. In this kingdom of Fansur grows the best Camphor in the world called
Canfora Fansuri. It is so fine that it sells for its weight in fine
gold.[NOTE 3]
The people have no wheat, but have rice which they eat with milk and
flesh. They also have wine from trees such as I told you of. And I will
tell you another great marvel. They have a kind of trees that produce
flour, and excellent flour it is for food. These trees are very tall and
thick, but have a very thin bark, and inside the bark they are crammed
with flour. And I tell you that Messer Marco Polo, who witnessed all this,
related how he and his party did sundry times partake of this flour made
into bread, and found it excellent.[NOTE 4]
There is now no more to relate. For out of those eight kingdoms we have
told you about six that lie at this side of the Island. I shall tell you
nothing about the other two kingdoms that are at the other side of the
Island, for the said Messer Marco Polo never was there. Howbeit we have
told you about the greater part of this Island of the Lesser Java: so now
we will quit it, and I will tell you of a very small Island that is called
GAUENISPOLA.[NOTE 5]
NOTE 1. - The name of Lambri is not now traceable on our maps, nor on any
list of the ports of Sumatra that I have met with; but in old times the
name occurs frequently under one form or another, and its position can be
assigned generally to the north part of the west coast, commencing from
the neighbourhood of Achin Head.
De Barros, detailing the twenty-nine kingdoms which divided the coast of
Sumatra, at the beginning of the Portuguese conquests, begins with Daya,
and then passes round by the north. He names as next in order LAMBRIJ, and
then Achem. This would make Lambri lie between Daya and Achin, for which
there is but little room. And there is an apparent inconsistency; for in
coming round again from the south, his 28th kingdom is Quinchel
(Singkel of our modern maps), the 29th Mancopa, "which falls upon
Lambrij, which adjoins Daya, the first that we named." Most of the data
about Lambri render it very difficult to distinguish it from Achin.
The name of Lambri occurs in the Malay Chronicle, in the account of the
first Mahomedan mission to convert the Island. We shall quote the passage
in a following note.
The position of Lambri would render it one of the first points of Sumatra
made by navigators from Arabia and India; and this seems at one time to
have caused the name to be applied to the whole Island. Thus Rashiduddin
speaks of the very large Island LAMURI lying beyond Ceylon, and adjoining
the country of Sumatra; Odoric also goes from India across the Ocean to
a certain country called LAMORI, where he began to lose sight of the North
Star. He also speaks of the camphor, gold, and lign-aloes which it
produced, and proceeds thence to Sumoltra in the same Island.[1] It is
probable that the verzino or brazil-wood of Ameri (L'Ameri, i.e.
Lambri?) which appears in the mercantile details of Pegolotti was from
this part of Sumatra. It is probable also that the country called
Nanwuli, which the Chinese Annals report, with Sumuntula and others,
to have sent tribute to the Great Kaan in 1286, was this same Lambri which
Polo tells us called itself subject to the Kaan.
In the time of the Sung Dynasty ships from T'swan-chau (or Zayton) bound
for Tashi, or Arabia, used to sail in forty days to a place called
Lanli-poi (probably this is also Lambri, Lambri-puri?). There they
passed the winter, i.e. the south-west monsoon, just as Marco Polo's
party did at Sumatra, and sailing again when the wind became fair, they
reached Arabia in sixty days. (Bretschneider, p. 16.)
[The theory of Sir H. Yule is confirmed by Chinese authors quoted by Mr.
Groeneveldt (Notes on the Malay Archipelago, pp.
