did marco polo go to china?

Thus it is a typical example of an argument from silence. remains a persuasive and drily witty read, 25 years on. Marco Polo really did go to China, new study finds It has been said that Marco Polo did not really go to China; that he merely cobbled together his information about it from journeys to the Black Sea, Constantinople and Persia and from talking to merchants and reading now-lost Persian books. At the age of... See full answer below. Polo spent four years marching along the silk road to the capital of Beijing. The expedition then proceeded to Khorāsān, handing over the princess not to Arghun, who had died, but to his son Maḥmūd Ghāzān. (first published by Secker & Warburg, London, in 1995), Dr Frances Wood claims that Marco did not go to China and that he 'probably never travelled much further than the family's trading post on the Black Sea and in … However, as Dr. Wood knows, scholars of the Mongol era as well as specialists on Polo's text have, for … piques the issue and raises some considerable debatable questions on whether one of history's greatests myths is indeed fact and to what level cultural diffusion took place between the east and west during that specific time period. A famous story relates how Polo was asked on his deathbed to retract the “fables” he had invented in his book; his answer was that he told barely half of what he actually saw. Did Marco Polo Go to China? According to some versions of Il milione, he governed the city of Yangzhou for three years sometime between 1282 and 1287; but this assertion seems hardly credible and hinges entirely on the interpretation of one word. is a 1995 book, by Frances Wood, arguing that Italian explorer Marco Polo never visited China but travelled no further than Persia and that he based his description of China on accounts from Persian travelers. tries to solve these and other inconsistencies by carefully examining the Polo family history, Marco Polo's activities as a merchant, the preparation of his book, and the imperial Chinese records. (first published by Secker & Warburg, London, in 1995), Dr Frances Wood claims that Marco did not go to China and that he probably never traveled much further than the family's trading post on the Black Sea and in Constantinople. Sceptics have long wondered whether Marco Polo wrote his book based on hearsay, with some pointing to omissions about noteworthy practices and structures of China as well as the lack of details on some places in his book. Ring in the new year with a Britannica Membership. "Did Marco Polo Go to China?" The wealth of new geographic information recorded by Polo was widely used by European navigators. Frontispiece depicting Marco Polo, from an early printed edition (in German) of his travels. [7], Reviewing Haw's book, Peter Jackson (author of The Mongols and the West) has said that Haw "must surely now have settled the controversy surrounding the historicity of Polo's visit to China". Polo also seems to have made emendations himself on various copies of the work during the last 20 years or so of his life. “Like so … [2] The book has been criticized by figures including Igor de Rachewiltz (translator and annotator of The Secret History of the Mongols) and Morris Rossabi (author of Kublai Khan: his life and times). The trip to China for Marco Polo and his uncle would have been very long and arduous, requiring traveling thousands of miles through unknown cultures and lands. [4], The historian David Morgan also points out basic errors made such as confusing the Liao dynasty with the Jin dynasty, and he found no compelling evidence in the book that would convince him that Marco Polo did not go to China. 3 and half years after leaving Venice, the trio finally arrived to the original capital of Kublai Khan at Shangdou — his summer residence. The Polos eventually departed for Europe, but their movements at this point are unclear; possibly they stayed for a few months in Tabrīz. Polo traveled … Marco wrote that Kublai had been unwilling to let them go but finally granted permission. "[9], Igor de Rachewiltz, "Marco Polo Went to China,", Explorer Marco Polo 'never actually went to China', A counter-argument from Dr Igor de Rachewiltz at The Australian National University, Jackson, Peter (2007) Review of Stephen G. Haw, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Did_Marco_Polo_Go_to_China%3F&oldid=892145059, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License, This page was last edited on 12 April 2019, at 14:15. Textbooks often include a section on how the Venetian Marco Polo went to China, served Kublai Khan for many years, and returned to Italy with the recipes for pasta and ice cream. The elder Polos were probably employed in some technical capacity. In her book did Marco Polo Go to China? Moreover, Frances Wood "Did Marco Polo go to China?" In Il milione Polo often branches off into descriptions of places probably visited not by himself but by his relatives or people he knew. His account of those travels, known in English as the Travels of Marco Polo, is a classic. If Marco Polo had not stayed in China between 1274 to 1295, the world would not know much about Kublai Khan and his court. The work is marked by uncertainty and controversy, however. While in Asia, Marco Polo, his father and his uncle encountered a number of strange sights, and they even achieved some political success. After passing through the Pamirs, Marco Polo entered western China near Tazkoragan, near where China, Afghanistan and Tajikistan meet, and traveled to Kashgar. Marco was about age 20 when he reached Cathay. By signing up for this email, you are agreeing to news, offers, and information from Encyclopaedia Britannica. If he did, why there are no record or names in the archive? Nonetheless, details concerning travel, distances covered, and seasons are rarely stated; the panorama is observed from an impersonal distance with a powerful wide-angle lens. But Frances Wood, head of the Chinese Department at the British Library, argues that Marco Polo not only never went to China, he probably never even made it past the Black Sea, where his family conducted business as merchants.Marco Polo's travels from Venice to the exotic and distant East, and his epic book describing his extraordinary adventures, A Description of the World, ranks among the … de Rachewiltz, Igor. [5] Haw also argues in his book Marco Polo's China that Marco's account is much more correct and accurate than has often been supposed and that it is extremely unlikely that he could have obtained all the information in his book from second-hand sources. Marco Polo was probably born in Venice, although there is no proof of his place of birth, around 1254 CE. His will set free a “Tatar slave” who may possibly have followed him from East Asia. He has become a cultural icon bridging East and West, his name known by adults and children alike. He seems to have led a quiet existence, managing a not too conspicuous fortune and dying at age 70. The Yuan (Mongol) Empire (c. 1300), showing the extent reached under Kublai Khan. These were given as laissez-passer by Khubilai to the Polos to facilitate their journeys. The origin of the popular title, Il milione, for example, is not quite clear. Naturally, they also longed to see their native Venice and their families again. According to some experts, they believed that he never reached to China. While Polo describes paper money and the burning of coal, he fails to mention the Great Wall of China, tea, Chinese characters, chopsticks, or footbinding. He was then imprisoned in Genoa, where he had a felicitous encounter with a prisoner from Pisa, Rustichello (or Rusticiano), a fairly well-known writer of romances and a specialist in chivalry and its lore, then a fashionable subject. is a 1995 book, by Frances Wood, arguing that Italian explorer Marco Polo never visited China but travelled no further than Persia and that he based his description of China on accounts from Persian travelers. Furthermore, since all this happened long before the invention of printing, professional scribes or amateurs made dozens of copies of the book, as well as free translations and adaptations—often adding to or subtracting from the text with little or no respect for authenticity. His failure to note the presence of the Great Wall of China was first raised in the middle of the seventeenth century, and in the middle of the ei… Unfortunately, because Marco’s book Il milione is only incidentally a biography and autobiography, it is exceedingly difficult to ascertain where the Polos went and what they did during these years. After further delays, they reached Constantinople and finally Venice (1295). The extent of their success and the specific roles they filled, however, remains an open question. Marco Polo decided to travel to China after his father and uncle told him about the treasures and wealth they had encountered there. And why, given China's extensive and even obsessive record-keeping, is there no mention of Marco Polo anywhere in the archives?Sure to spark controversy, Did Marco Polo Go to China? Sometime around 1292 (1290 according to Otagi), a Mongol princess was to be sent to Persia to become the consort of Arghun Khan, and the Polos offered to accompany her. There is, however, ample evidence to show that Polo considered himself an adoptive son of his new country. Unfortunately, as soon as they left the Mongol dominions and set foot in a Christian country, at Trebizond in what is now Turkey, they were robbed of most of their hard-won earnings. Once and very abruptly, a glimpse in Il milione is obtained of them acting as military advisers during the siege of “Saianfu” (formerly Xiangyang, now Xiangfan), a city that was finally taken, according to Marco, thanks to some “great mangonels” (missile-throwing engines) built according to the Polos’ specifications. And why, given China's extensive and even obsessive record-keeping, is there no mention of Marco Polo anywhere in the archives?Sure to spark controversy, Did Marco Polo Go to China? The son of the merchant Niccolo Polo, Marco joined his father and uncle at the young age of seventeen on a journey that would take him across the vast continent. For the next 16 or 17 years the Polos lived in the emperor’s dominions, which included, among other places, Cathay (now North China) and Mangi, or “Manzi” (now South China). AbeBooks.com: Did Marco Polo Go To China? “It is a terrific story; the only trouble is that there is no evidence to support it,” she says. The history of the text itself is characterized by similar uncertainty. Typical digressions are those on Mesopotamia, the Assassins and their castles, Samarkand, Siberia, Japan, India, Ethiopia, and Madagascar. According to his book, "The Travels of Marco Polo," Marco Polo even became an official in Kublai Khan's government, serving as an envoy, governor and member of the Privy Council. [6] Haw also criticizes Wood's approach to finding mention of Marco Polo in Chinese texts by contending that contemporaneous Europeans had little regard for using surnames and that a direct Chinese transliteration of the name "Marco" ignores the possibility of him taking on a Chinese or even Mongol name with no bearing or similarity with his Latin name. His conclusion in answer to F.W. Marco Polo, Venetian merchant and adventurer who traveled from Europe to Asia in 1271–95, remaining in China for 17 of those years. Did Marco Polo Go to China? Marco Polo was a Venetian explorer known for the book The Travels of Marco Polo, which describes his voyage to and experiences in Asia. The language employed was Franco-Italian—a strange composite tongue fashionable during the 13th and 14th centuries. 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