Travels of Marco Polo by Marco Polo

Author:Marco Polo
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-10-27T16:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 48

Of the Great Province of Karajan and of Yachi, Its Principal City

HAVING passed the river above mentioned, you enter the province of Karajan, which is so large as to include seven kingdoms. It is situated toward the west; and the inhabitants are idolaters. It is subject to the dominion of the Great Khan, who has appointed as its king his son [actually grandson] Essen-Temur, a rich, magnificent, and powerful prince, who is endowed with much wisdom and virtue and rules with great justice. In traveling from this river five days’ journey in a westerly direction, you pass through a country fully inhabited and see many castles. The inhabitants live upon flesh meat and upon the fruits of the earth. Their language is peculiar to them, and is difficult to master. The best horses are bred in this province.

At the end of these five days you arrive at its capital city, which is named Yachi [Kunming, on the Burma Road] and is large and noble. In it are found merchants and artisans, with a mixed population consisting of idolaters, Nestorian Christians, and Saracens or Mahometans; but the first is the most numerous class. The land is fertile in rice and wheat. The people, however, do not use wheaten bread, which they think unwholesome, but eat rice. Of other grain, with the addition of spices, they make wine, which is clear, light-colored, and most pleasant to the taste. For money they employ the white porcelain shells [cowrie shells] found in the sea, and these they also wear as ornaments about their necks. Eighty of the shells are equal in value to a saggio of silver or two Venetian groats, and eight saggi of good silver to one of pure gold. In this country also there are salt springs, from which all the salt used by the inhabitants is derived. The duty levied on this salt produces a large revenue for the Emperor.

The natives do not consider it as an injury when others have relations with their wives, provided the woman be willing. Here there is a lake nearly a hundred miles in circuit, in which great quantities of various kinds of fish are caught, some of them quite large.

The people are accustomed to eat the undressed flesh of fowl, sheep, oxen, and buffaloes, but cured in the following manner: They cut the meat into very small particles and then put it into pickling salt, along with several of their spices. It is prepared thus for persons of the upper class, but the poorer sort only steep it, after mincing, in a sauce of garlic, and then eat it as if it were dressed.

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