To his delight, Marco discovered that this remote but strategically located outpost supported thriving tuna and whaling industries, which appealed to his mercantile instincts. The whale was well known, if poorly understood, in Europe. For centuries, the giant mammal had furnished meat, blubber, and teeth to northern Europeans. Whalebone was especially prized for fashioning weaving tools, gaming pieces, and chopping blocks. In the eleventh century, an Arab traveler wandering far from home discovered that people living on the islands off the coast of England used whale bones, not wood, for construction. Whaling was a popular pursuit in Scandinavia as well as Ireland.
Marco explains how Arabs caught their whales, and how merchants turned a handsome profit from the creature’s by-products. He begins with the procedure for preparing tuna, used as bait. “The tuna is very fat, and they cut it into pieces and place it in large vases or jars and put in salt and make much brine,” he says. “This done, there will be perhaps twelve who will take a small ship and, putting on board this fish with all the brine or salt broth of the fish, will go out to sea. And then they will have some remnants of torn pieces or of other cast-off things, and they will soak these leavings tied in a bundle in the brine that will be very fat, and afterward they will throw them into the water; and they will be tied to the little ship with a rope. They will then hoist sail and will go all day wandering through the high seas hither and thither; and wherever they pass the fat that is in the brine leaves as it were a path on the water.”
Marco was astonished by the whale’s endurance—“If it happens that they pass by a place where a whale is, or by some means the whale perceives the scent of the fat of the tuna, [the whale] follows that track…for a hundred miles”—and its vulnerability. When the hunters reached their elusive prey and threw it “two or three pieces of tuna,” the whale, on devouring the bait, was “immediately made drunk as a man is made drunken with wine.”
The bravest whale hunters clambered out of their craft onto the back of the slippery wet beast and attempted to balance themselves. One held a “stake of iron barbed at the end so that if it is fixed in, it cannot be pulled out because of the barb.” At the first opportunity, one of the hunters “will put the stake on the head of the whale and another will strike the stake with a wooden mallet and will immediately fix it all in the head of the whale. For the whale through drunkenness hardly feels the men who stand on it, so that they can do whatever they wish.”
By “stake,” Marco meant a harpoon; once it was fixed, the stage was set for the wildest of rides. “When the whale plunges and flees, it drags the boat to which the rope is tied after it. If it seems to succeed in drawing the boat downward too much, then another barrel with another flag is thrown out, because it cannot draw the barrels under water, and so it is so tired by dragging them after it that in the end it is weakened by the wound and dies.”
At the moment of the whale’s death, the small vessel following the beast approached; the men tied the whale securely to their craft and towed it to “their island or to one that is near them, where they sold it. They took the ambergris”—a waxy excretion of the whale’s intestines—“out of the belly,” and “many butts of oil from the head.” Marco estimated that one whale produced a thousand pounds of oil.
Whale by-products were just one feature of Socotra’s abundant marketplace. In the course of his strolls along the waterfront, Marco noted that “many ships come to this island with many merchants and with many wares that they sell in this island, and carry away again with them of the things that are in the island, of which they make great gain and profit.” Amid the abundance, piracy flourished openly: “Corsairs come to this island with their ships when they have made their cruise, and make camp there and sell all the things that they have stolen at sea.” Most everyone on the scene knew about the pirates, and most everyone looked the other way, including Christians who were aware that “all those things are robbed from idolaters and from Saracens.” At the same time, Marco says, the Christians “hold that they can lawfully buy them all gladly,” and so they financed the pirates whom they condemned.
In these lawless waters, magicians, charmers, and necromancers all practiced their versions of extortion, meeting with much criticism but little interference. The archbishop himself “does not wish them to do those enchantments and forbids as much as he can and chastises and admonishes them for it, and says it is a sin.” But, Marco adds with a sigh of resignation, “it avails nothing because they say that their ancestors did them of old.” And so the archbishop “bears with it so far.” Even the threat of excommunication had no effect on the necromancers’ practice of black arts.
According to popular belief, which Marco uncritically repeats, the magicians dared to defy the pirates: “If any of the pirates were to cause any loss to the island, they detain them with their enchantments so their ships can never freely leave this island till that which was taken has been wholly replaced. I tell you that if a ship may be going with sails set and have a good wind and fair enough on her way, they will make another contrary wind come to her and will make her turn back to the island.” These enchanters could just as easily quiet the sea, or, if it suited their fancy, summon a devastating storm.
TO ADVANCE HIS ACCOUNT, Marco Polo increasingly drew on information gathered from reasonably reliable sources such as merchants, traders, and local officials during his coastal travels, rather than on personal experience. Although he did not set foot in them, the regions with elaborate mating and marital customs, and varieties of worship, seem designed to appeal to his lurid taste and overheated imagination, especially the pair of islands known as Male and Female.
Male, he informs his readers with as much confidence as he can muster, was a Christian land populated mostly by men. “When [an inhabitant’s] wife is pregnant, he does not touch her afterward until she has given birth, and from the time when she has given birth he leaves her again without touching her for forty days. But from forty days onward he touches her at his pleasure…. I tell you,” Marco asserts, “that their wives do not live in this island, nor any other ladies, but they all live in the other island that is called Female. And you may know that the women never come to the island of the men, but when it comes to the month of March the men of this island go off to this island of Women and remain there for three months, these are March, April, and May.” During that time, the men “take great enjoyment and pleasure” with their wives, then afterward they return to their bachelor quarters on Male Island, to “plant, harvest, and sell their produce.”
The islands were about thirty miles apart, and couples learned to incorporate child rearing into their domestic arrangements. “Their children which are born to their mothers nourish in their island, and if it is a girl, then the mother keeps her there till she is of the age to be married, and then at the season marries her to one of the men of the island. Yet it is true that as soon as they are weaned and the male child has fourteen years, his mother sends him to his father on their island.” To Marco, the plan made for careful, considered child rearing and respectful, cooperative relations between the sexes. “Their wives do nothing else but nourish their children,” he observes, “for the men supply them with what they need. When the men come to the women’s island, they sow grain, and then the women cultivate and reap it; and the women also gather any fruit, which they have of many kinds in that island.” In light of the excesses of sensuality and asceticism he had witnessed, the inhabitants of Male and Female islands had, in his view, evolved a satisfying, if strenuous, design for living.
ALTHOUGH BRIEF in comparison with the long years Marco spent in China, his sojourn in India prompted a spiritual transformation. Marco had begun his travels wanting only to reach Kublai Khan’s court in one piece; later, he sought to travel and comprehend all of China, and then India. En route, he evolved from apprentice merchant and traveler (and bumbling student of history) to pilgrim and explorer of the spirit. By this late point, his inner lens had opened wide enough to take in all huma
nity, or so he believed. Yet nothing had prepared him for the spectacle of the river of the plains, the Ganges, the holiest river to the Hindus—perhaps the holiest river on earth.
Photo Insert 3
Marco Polo’s vivid and occasionally misinterpreted descriptions of his travels inspired this medieval artist to depict dragons in China.
(Granger)
A rendering of the city of Pagan, whose gold and silver towers so impressed Marco Polo
(Imageworks)
Kublai Khan attacks his rival, Nayan.
(AKG)
Kublai Khan’s mighty fleet tried to extend the Mongol Empire with repeated attempts to conquer Korea and Japan, but came to grief.
(Corbis)
Saint Thomas, whose exile fascinated Marco Polo, in a dramatic portrait by Caravaggio (1601–1602)
(Bridgeman)
A European depiction of a Mongolian ship foundering at sea. Marco barely escaped with his life from a shipwreck during his journey home.
(Bibliothèque Nationale de France)
Mongol forces attempt to take Japan in this illustration from the Book of Marvels. Until Marco Polo wrote of the epochal struggle at sea, Europe knew nothing of it.
(Bridgeman)
Marco Polo’s last will. In his careful allocation of resources, he proved to be a diligent merchant until his final hour.
(Bridgeman)
Frontispiece of an early published edition of Marco Polo’s Travels
(Granger)
Frontispiece of an early published edition of Marco Polo’s Travels, Nuremberg, Germany, 1477
(Granger)
Fra Mauro’s renowned map of the world (1459) drew on Marco Polo’s account
(Corbis)
Venice in the eighteenth century, by the prolific artist Canaletto (Giovanni Antonio Canal)
(Art Resource)
The Ganges was not the longest river in Asia—at fifteen hundred miles, it was surpassed by many others—but from its origins in the Himalayas to its final destination in the Bay of Bengal, it was the most revered, as Marco acknowledged. He probably visited the river during January or February, when the celebrated bathing festival known as the mela took place; during the ceremony of purification, pilgrims from afar immersed themselves in its waters. “Both men and women wash themselves twice a day in the water,” he says, “their whole bodies, that is, morning and evening.” Refusing to wash was tantamount to heresy. He observes with fascination: “Naked they go to the river and take water and throw it over their head, and then they rub one another.”
The obsession with cleanliness took many other forms. “In eating they use only the right hand, nor with the left hand do they touch anything of food. And all clean and beautiful things they do and touch with the right hand, for the office of the left is only about unpleasant and unclean necessities like cleansing the nostrils, anus, and things like these. Again, they drink with cups only, and each with his own; nor would anyone drink with the cup of another. When they drink they do not put the cup to the mouth, nor with those cups would they give to drink to any strangers.”
THE LOCAL SYSTEM of justice struck Marco as equally stringent, but far from illogical. He says that if a debt goes unpaid, and the debtor makes empty promises to fulfill his obligation, “the creditor is able to catch the debtor in such a way that he is able to mark a circle round him, [and] the debtor will not leave that circle unless he shall first have satisfied the creditor or shall make him a proper pledge and bond that he shall be wholly satisfied the same day.” If the debtor attempted to flee without paying, “he would be punished…with death as a transgressor of right and of the justice established by the lord.”
In Marco’s hands, the following tale becomes an intriguing study in commercial conflict: “And this Master Marco saw in the king, being in the kingdom on the way home. For when the king himself was bound to satisfy a certain foreign merchant for certain things had from him, and though many times asked by the merchant had often on account of inconvenience fixed a later date for payment, the merchant, because the delay was hurtful to him on account of his business, being ready one day while the king was riding about the place immediately surrounded the king himself with all his horse with a circle on the ground. And when the king saw this, he let his horse go no farther, nor did he move himself from the place before the merchant had been wholly satisfied.” The sight surprised onlookers, who exclaimed, “See how the king was obedient to justice.” And the king replied to them, “I who established this just law, shall I break it because it was against me? No, I am bound before others to observe it.”
THE MINGLING of religious observance and fertility rites drew Marco’s curiosity. He became aware of multitudes of young girls who visited monasteries where they sang and danced to entertain the idols, that is, the images of various divinities, and to feed the monks and priests dwelling within; the custom continued, he says, until the girls took husbands. He found the girls slim and surpassingly lovely: “These maidens…are so firm in flesh that none can by any means take hold of them or pinch them in any part,” except that “for a small coin they will allow a man to pinch them as much as he can.” On the basis of hints he drops, one can imagine the Venetian merchant staring, considering, and finally parting with a coin, or several, to satisfy his curiosity and his libido.
The maidens’ behavior raised an urgent question: “Why do they make these entertainments for the idols? Because the priests of the idols often say that the god is vexed with the goddess, nor is one united with the other, nor do they talk together. And since they are angry and vexed, unless they are reconciled and make peace together all our affairs will be contrary and will go from bad to worse because they will not bestow their blessing and grace.”
In the service of this goal, “the damsels go…naked except that they are covered in the natural parts, and sing before the god and goddess. For the god stays by himself on one altar under one canopy and the goddess stays on another altar by herself under another canopy, and those people say that the god often takes his pleasure with her and they are united, and that when they are vexed they do not join together. Then these damsels come there to pacify him, and…begin to sing, dance, leap, tumble, and make different entertainments to move the god and goddess to joy and to reconcile them, and thus they say as they make entertainment, ‘O Master, why are you vexed with this goddess and do not care for her? Is she not beautiful, is she not pleasing?” This plea was accompanied by some astonishing gyrations. “She who has said so will lift her leg above her neck and will spin round for the pleasure of the god and goddess. And when they have solaced enough they go home. And in the morning, the priest of the idols will announce as a great joy that he has seen the god and goddess together and that peace has been made between them, and then all rejoice and are thankful.”
NO MATTER HOW diligently Marco tried to come to terms with the people and practices he witnessed, India remained surpassingly strange and constantly challenging to the Venetian traveler. He observes that “certain animals by the name of tarantula” infested homes; these hideous carnivorous arachnids were everywhere, even overhead, startling him. They resembled “lizards that climb up by the walls,” and they had “a poisonous bite and hurt a man very much.” They even screamed, or so Marco claims.
To make matters worse, he considered tarantulas bad omens for merchants. “When some people were trading together in a house where these tarantulas are, and a tarantula may cry to the merchants there above them, they will see from what side of the merchant, whether of the buyer or of the seller, namely whether it cries from the left side or from the right, from the front or back, or over the head,…they know whether it means good or ill; and if good, they finish the dealing, and if it mean ill, that dealing is never begun. Sometimes it means good for the seller and bad for the buyer, sometimes bad for the seller and good for the buyer, sometimes good for both or bad for both; and they guide themselves by that.”
To sleep safely amid such peril, he relied
on the inhabitants’ clever apparatus. “The men have their very light bed of canes so contrived that while they are inside, when they wish to sleep they draw themselves up with cords near to the ceiling and tie themselves there. They do this indeed for the sake of escaping the tarantulas that bite much and fleas and other insects, and also for the sake of catching the air to do away with the heat that reigns in those parts.”
Travelers such as Marco also employed their suspended beds to safeguard their valuables. “When men are traveling in the night and may wish to sleep (for on account of the lower heat they make their journey by night rather than by day), if they have a bag of pearls or other treasure they will put the bag of pearls under the head and sleep there, nor does anyone ever lose anything by theft or otherwise. And if he does lose [it], it is made good to him immediately provided that he has slept on the street.” If he has not slept on the street, “evil is presumed against him, for the government says, ‘Why didst thou sleep off the street unless because thou hadst proposed to rob others?’ Then he is punished, and the loss is not returned to him.”
AFRICA
Zanzibar.
“A very exceedingly great and noble island,” Marco declares. “It is two thousand miles around.”
For once, he had strayed into a territory with an abbreviated history. The island’s first inhabitants apparently had emigrated from the African mainland and reassembled in small villages reminiscent of those in Africa. Soon they were confronted with Arab traders, who may have been aware of the island even before it was settled. Skillful and courageous sailors, the traders caught the monsoon winds to speed them across the Indian Ocean, and they found a makeshift harbor where the town of Zanzibar now stands. Eventually they settled there, as well, and interbred with the African emigrants. Not long before Marco’s arrival, the emerging Zanzibar community established a ruler, the Jumbe. Although he was neither a great warrior nor bold leader, he helped to give the island a semblance of political unity.
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