In 1326 He Writes A Letter Home, In Which He
Speaks Of The Place As "A Great City On The
Shores of the Ocean Sea, which
is called in the Persian tongue Cayton (Cayton); and in this city a rich
Armenian lady did build a large and fine enough church, which was erected
into a cathedral by the Archbishop," and so on. He speaks incidentally of
the Genoese merchants frequenting it. John Marignolli, who was there about
1347, calls it "a wondrous fine sea-port, and a city of incredible size,
where our Minor Friars have three very fine churches; ... and they have a
bath also, and a fondaco which serves as a depot for all the merchants."
Ibn Batuta about the same time says: "The first city that I reached after
crossing the sea was ZAITUN.... It is a great city, superb indeed; and in
it they make damasks of velvet as well as those of satin (Kimkha and
Atlas), which are called from the name of the city Zatuniah; they are
superior to the stuffs of Khansa and Kharbalik. The harbour of Zaitun is
one of the greatest in the world - I am wrong; it is the greatest! I
have seen there about an hundred first-class junks together; as for small
ones, they were past counting. The harbour is formed by an estuary which
runs inland from the sea until it joins the Great River."
[Mr. Geo. Phillips finds a strong argument in favour of Changchau being
Zayton in this passage of Ibn Batuta.
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