63, 65. "In Baudas they weave many different kinds of silk stuffs
and gold brocades, such as nasich, and nac, and cramoisy, and many
other beautiful tissue richly wrought with figures of beasts and birds."
In the French text we have nassit and nac.
"S'il faut en croire M. Defremery, au lieu de nassit, il faut evidemment
lire nassij (necidj), ce qui signifie un tissu, en general, et designe
particulierement une etoffe de soie de la meme espece que le nekh. Quant
aux etoffes sur lesquelles etaient figures des animaux et des oiseaux, le
meme orientaliste croit qu'il faut y reconnaitre le thardwehch, sorte
d'etoffe de soie qui, comme son nom l'indique, representait des scenes de
chasse. On sait que l'usage de ces representations est tres ancien en
Orient, comme on le voit dans des passages de Philostrate et de
Quinte-Curce rapportes par Mongez." (FRANCISQUE-MICHEL, Recherches sur le
Commerce, I., p. 262.)
VI., p. 67.
DEATH OF MOSTAS'IM.
According to Al-Fakhri, translated by E. Amar (Archives marocaines XVI.,
p. 579), Mostas'im was put to death with his two eldest sons on the 4th of
safar, 656 (3rd February, 1258).
XI., p. 75. "The [the men of Tauris] weave many kinds of beautiful and
valuable stuffs of silk and gold."
Francisque-Michel (I., p. 316) remarks: "De ce que Marco Polo se borne a
nommer Tauris comme la ville de Perse ou il se fabriquait maints draps
d'or et de soie, il ne faudrait pas en conclure que cette industrie
n'existat pas sur d'autres points du meme royaume. Pour n'en citer qu'un
seul, la ville d'Arsacie, ancienne capitale des Parthes, connue
aujourd'hui sous le nom de Caswin, possedait vraisemblablement deja cette
industrie des beaux draps d'or et de soie qui existait encore au temps de
Huet, c'est-a-dire au XVII'e siecle."
XIII., p. 78. "Messer Marco Polo found a village there which goes by the
name of CALA ATAPERISTAN, which is as much as to say, 'The Castle of the
Fire-worshippers.'"
With regard to Kal'ah-i Atashparastan, Prof. A.V.W. Jackson writes
(Persia, 1906, p. 413): "And the name is rightly applied, for the people
there do worship fire. In an article entitled The Magi in Marco Polo
(Journ. Am. Or. Soc., 26, 79-83) I have given various reasons for
identifying the so-called 'Castle of the Fire-Worshippers' with Kashan,
which Odoric mentions or a village in its vicinity, the only rival to the
claim being the town of Nain, whose Gabar Castle has already been
mentioned above."
XIV., p. 78.
PERSIA.
Speaking of Saba and of Cala Ataperistan, Prof. E.H. Parker (Asiatic
Quart. Rev., Jan., 1904, p. 134) has the following remarks: "It is not
impossible that certain unexplained statements in the Chinese records may
shed light upon this obscure subject. In describing the Arab Conquest of
Persia, the Old and New T'ang Histories mention the city of Hia-lah as
being amongst those captured; another name for it was Sam (according to
the Chinese initial and final system of spelling words). A later Chinese
poet has left the following curious line on record: 'All the priests
venerate Hia-lah.' The allusion is vague and undated, but it is difficult
to imagine to what else it can refer. The term seng, or 'bonze,' here
translated 'priests,' was frequently applied to Nestorian and Persian
priests, as in this case."
XIV., p. 80. "Three Kings."
Regarding the legend of the stone cast into a well, cf. F.W.K. MUELLER,
Uigurica, pp. 5-10 (Pelliot).
XVII., p. 90. "There are also plenty of veins of steel and Ondanique."
"The ondanique which Marco Polo mentions in his 42nd chapter is almost
certainly the pin t'ieh or 'pin iron' of the Chinese, who frequently
mention it as coming from Arabia, Persia, Cophene, Hami, Ouigour-land and
other High Asia States." (E.H. PARKER, Journ. North China Br. Roy.
Asiatic Soc., XXXVIII., 1907, p. 225.)
XVIII., pp. 97, 100. "The province that we now enter is called
REOBARLES.... The beasts also are peculiar.... Then there are sheep here
as big as asses; and their tails are so large and fat, that one tail shall
weight some 30 lbs. They are fine fat beasts, and afford capital mutton."
Prof. E.H. PARKER writes in the Journ. of the North China Branch of the
Royal Asiatic Soc., XXXVII., 1906, p. 196: "Touching the fat-tailed sheep
of Persia, the Shan-hai-king says the Yueh-chi or Indo-Scythy had a
'big-tailed sheep' the correct name for which is hien-yang. The Sung
History mentions sheep at Hami with tails so heavy that they could not
walk. In the year 1010 some were sent as tribute to China by the King of
Kuche."
"Among the native products [at Mu lan p'i, Murabit, Southern Coast of
Spain] are foreign sheep, which are several feet high and have tails as
big as a fan. In the spring-time they slit open their bellies and take out
some tens of catties of fat, after which they sew them up again, and the
sheep live on; if the fat were not removed, (the animal) would swell up
and die." (CHAU JU-KWA, pp. 142-3.)
"The Chinese of the T'ang period had heard also of the trucks put under
these sheep's tails. 'The Ta-shi have a foreign breed of sheep (hu-yang)
whose tails, covered with fine wool, weigh from ten to twenty catties; the
people have to put carts under them to hold them up. Fan-kuo-chi as quoted
in Tung-si-yang-k'au." (HIRTH and ROCKHILL, p. 143.)
Leo Africanus, Historie of Africa, III., 945 (Hakluyt Soc. ed.), says he
saw in Egypt a ram with a tail weighing eighty pounds!:
OF THE AFRICAN RAMME.
"There is no difference betweene these rammes of Africa and others, saue
onely in their tailes, which are of a great thicknes, being by so much the
grosser, but how much they are more fatte, so that some of their tailes
waigh tenne, and other twentie pounds a peece, and they become fatte of
their owne naturall inclination:
