The Travels Of Marco Polo - Volume 2 Of 2 By Marco Polo And Rustichello Of Pisa











































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XIV., p. 313. The people [of Ceylon] are Idolaters, and go quite naked
except that they cover the middle.... The - Page 345
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XIV., P. 313.

"The people [of Ceylon] are Idolaters, and go quite naked except that they cover the middle....

The King of this Island possesses a ruby which is the finest and biggest in the world; I will tell you what it is like. It is about a palm in length, and as thick as a man's arm; to look at, it is the most resplendent object upon earth; it is quite free from flaw and as red as fire. Its value is so great that a price for it in money could hardly be named at all."

Chau Ju-kwa, p. 73, has: "The King holds in his hand a jewel five inches in diameter, which cannot be burnt by fire, and which shines in (the darkness of) night like a torch. The King rubs his face with it daily, and though he were passed ninety he would retain his youthful looks.

"The people of the country are very dark-skinned, they wrap a sarong round their bodies, go bare-headed and bare-footed."

XIV., p. 314 n.

THE ISLAND OF CEYLON.

The native kings of this period were Pandita Prakama Bahu II., who reigned from 1267 to 1301 at Dambadenia, about 40 miles north-north-east of Columbo (Marco Polo's time); Vijaya Bahu IV. (1301-1303); Bhuwaneka Bahu I. (1303-1314); Prakama Bahu III. (1314-1319); Bhuwaneka Bahu II. (1319).

SAGAMONI BORCAN.

= Sakya Muni Burkhan.

XV., p. 319. Seilan-History of Sagamoni Borcan. "And they maintain ... that the teeth, and the hair, and the dish that are there were those of the same king's son, whose name was Sagamoni Borcan, or Sagamoni the Saint."

See J.F. FLEET, The Tradition about the corporeal Relics of Buddha. (Jour. R. As. Soc., 1906, and April, 1907, pp. 341-363.)

XV., p. 320.

In a paper on Burkhan printed in the Journal of the American Oriental Society, XXXVI., 1917, pp. 390-395, Dr. Berthold Laufer has come to the following conclusion: "Burkhan in Mongol by no means conveys exclusively the limited notion of Buddha, but, first of all, signifies 'deity, god, gods,' and secondly 'representation or image of a god.' This general significance neither inheres in the term Buddha nor in Chinese Fo; neither do the latter signify 'image of Buddha'; only Mongol burkhan has this force, because originally it conveyed the meaning of a shamanistic image. From what has been observed on the use of the word burkhan in the shamanistic or pre-Buddhistic religions of the Tungusians, Mongols and Turks, it is manifest that the word well existed there before the arrival of Buddhism, fixed in its form and meaning, and was but subsequently transferred to the name of Buddha."

XV., pp. 323 seq.

BARLAAM AND JOSAPHAT.

The German traveller von Le Coq has found at Turfan fragments of this legend in Turki which he published in 1912 in his Tuerkische Manichaica, which agree with the legend given by the Persian Ibn Babawaih of Qum, who died in 991. (S. d'OLDENBOURG, Bul. Ac. I. des Sc., Pet., 1912, pp. 779-781; W. RADLOFF, Alttuerk. Stud., VI., zu Barlaam und Joasaph). M.P. Alfaric (La Vie chretienne du Bouddha, J. Asiatique, Sept.-Oct., 1917, pp. 269 seq.; Rev. de l'Hist. des Religions, Nov.-Dec., 1918, pp. 233 seq.) has studied this legend from a Manichaean point of view.

XV., p. 327.

See La "Vie des Saints Barlaam et Josaphat" et la legende du Bouddha, in Vol. I., pp. xxxxvii-lvi, of Contes populaires de Lorraine par Emmanuel COSQUIN, Paris, Vieweg, n.d. [1886].

XVI., p. 335 n.

TANJORE.

Speaking of Chu-lien (Chola Dominion, Coromandel Coast), Chau Ju-kwa, pp. 93-4, says: -

"The kingdom of Chu-lien is the Southern Yin-tu of the west. To the east (its capital) is five li distant from the sea; to the west one comes to Western India (after) 1500 li; to the south one comes to Lo-lan (after) 2500 li; to the north one comes to Tun-t'ien (after) 3000 li."

Hirth and Rockhill remark, p. 98: "Ma Tuan-lin and the Sung-shi reproduce textually this paragraph (the former writer giving erroneously the distance between the capital and the sea as 5000 li). Yule, Marco Polo, II, p. 335, places the principal port of the Chola kingdom at Kaveripattanam, the 'Pattanam' par excellence of the Coromandel Coast, and at one of the mouths of the Kaveri. He says that there seems to be some evidence that the Tanjore ports were, before 1300, visited by Chinese trade. The only Lo-lan known to mediaeval Chinese is mentioned in the T'ang-shu, 221'8, and is identified with the capital of Bamian, in Afghanistan. I think our text is corrupt here and that the character lo should be changed to si, and that we should read Si-lan, our Ceylon. Both Ma and the Sung-shi say that 2500 li south-east of Chu-lien was 'Si-lan-ch'i-kuo with which it was at war. Of course the distance mentioned is absurd, but all figures connected with Chu-lien in Chinese accounts are inexplicably exaggerated."

XVI., pp. 336-337.

CHINESE PAGODA AT NEGAPATAM.

Sir Walter ELLIOT, K.C.S.I., to whom Yule refers for the information given about this pagoda, has since published in the Indian Antiquary, VII., 1878, pp. 224-227, an interesting article with the title: The Edifice formerly known as the Chinese or Jaina Pagoda at Negapatam, from which we gather the following particulars regarding its destruction: -

"It went by various names, as the Puduveli-gopuram, the old pagoda, Chinese pagoda, black pagoda, and in the map of the Trigonometrical Survey (Sheet 79) it stands as the Jeyna (Jaina) pagoda. But save in name it has nothing in common with Hindu or Muhammadan architecture, either in form or ornament."

"In 1859, the Jesuit Fathers presented a petition to the Madras Government representing the tower to be in a dangerous condition, and requesting permission to pull it down and appropriate the materials to their own use...." In 1867 "the Fathers renewed their application for leave to remove it, on the following grounds:

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