Bao Hu Lie Bi Wen Ku · Giant Hundred Bi Series -- Marco Polo

Author: Chang Ningwen (Compiler)
Publisher:
Publish Date: 1998-10-01
Features: We are delighted to recommend the "Giant Biographies Series" to young friends. At the turn of the century, having such a premium series accompany you is a joy in wisdom. We believe that from the footsteps of these giants and masters, one can learn how to properly handle success and failure, comfort and hardship, joy and pain, smoothness and tribulation, and understand how to approach life, how to learn to be a person, how to pursue knowledge, and how to shape oneself and the future.
Principal of Peking University High School, Zhao Yulin; Secretary of the Party Committee, Dong Lingsheng
Every great figure with global influence has a deeply moving story behind them. Their rich experiences and life journeys, their spirit of struggle and elements of success, their pursuit of excellence and ability to seize opportunities, undoubtedly have a great inspirational and educational role for today's youth.
Principal of Tsinghua University High School, Zhao Qinggang
Giants are the elite of humanity, who have made outstanding contributions to the progress and civilization of human society. Their spirit of struggle and extraordinary achievements are deeply admired by people, becoming models for others to learn from. Giants are human, not gods; they come from ordinary people but surpass them. Their lofty ideals and the belief that they wish to benefit their motherland and humanity are the driving forces behind their relentless efforts and fearlessness of difficulties.
Principal of Tianjin Nankai High School, Kang Xiuyan
To carefully read this series of books is like seeing their appearance and demeanor, hearing their words and actions, and feeling their ideals, beliefs, ambitions, and moral character. This will help you learn to be a person, to study knowledge, and to pursue a career.
Principal of Fudan University Affiliated High School, Cao Tianren
In ancient and early medieval Western historical records, although there are occasional mentions of China and other Eastern countries, they are often fragmented and vague. However, in the many records left by Arab historians and travelers, there is quite a bit about China, which later reached Europe and became the main way Europeans understood China. Despite this, Europeans were still very unfamiliar with China and the East at the time. By the late Middle Ages, with the rise of cities, the establishment of universities, the launch of the Crusades, the emergence of the new urban class, and the formation of nation-states, new opportunities arose for the development of historiography. The general public began to enter the field of history, and secular chronicles, urban chronicles, biographies of secular figures, and travelogues emerged accordingly. Some of these works were about Eastern countries, and Marco Polo's "The Travels of Marco Polo" (also translated as "The Description of the World") is a typical example.
Marco Polo (1254–1324) was born into a merchant family in Venice, Italy. His father, Marco Polo, and his uncle, Niccolò Polo, were both wealthy merchants in Venice, and they had all visited China before bringing Marco Polo there. In 1271, Marco Polo set off for China with his father and uncle and arrived in the capital of the Yuan Dynasty, Dadu (modern-day Beijing), in 1275. From 1275 to 1292, for 17 years, the three of them served as foreign advisors in the Yuan Dynasty, gaining the favor of Kublai Khan and others. Marco Polo quickly learned Mongolian and Chinese. In addition to serving in the capital, he was often sent to inspect provinces or on missions abroad. It is said that he was appointed as the governor of Yangzhou and stayed in the southeastern regions for three years. In 1292, Marco Polo and his father and uncle were ordered to escort the Yuan princess K?k?zhen to marry the Persian king (the Ilkhan, the successor of Hulagu Khan) by sea, and they eventually returned to Venice via the West in 1295. Due to the vast amount of gold, silver, and rare treasures they brought back from China, they became extremely wealthy in Venice. In 1298, Marco Polo was captured in a naval battle during Venice's war against its commercial rival, Genoa, and imprisoned in Genoa. As a widely traveled explorer, Marco Polo was already quite famous in Italy by then. Therefore, he was well-treated in prison and was often asked to share his experiences and observations from the East. Perhaps tired of answering one by one, he dictated his observations and experiences in China and other Eastern countries to a fellow inmate named Rusticiano, a skilled writer, who recorded them in the widely used French of the time, thus creating the classic work "The Travels of Marco Polo."
"The Travels of Marco Polo" is known as "one of the greatest marvels of the world." The book is divided into four parts:
Part 1: Describes the countries and regions Marco Polo passed through on his journey to the East, including Armenia, Mesopotamia, Persia, Central Asia, the Pamir Plateau, the northern and southern foothills of the Tian Shan, and the customs and cultures of these places.
Part 2: Records the political affairs of the early Yuan Dynasty and the series of wars launched by Kublai Khan, describing the grandeur of the Khan's court and the prosperity of cities such as Beijing, Xi'an, Nanjing, Luoyang, Kaifeng, Zhenjiang, Yangzhou, Suzhou, Hangzhou, Fuzhou, Quanzhou, and others.
Part 3: Introduces some neighboring countries and regions of China, including Japan, Korea, Myanmar, Vietnam, Laos, Siam, Java, Sumatra, India, and Sri Lanka. It also mentions countries in the eastern part of Africa, such as Ethiopia, Zanzibar, and Madagascar.
Part 4: Tells the story of the wars between the Mongol khans after Genghis Khan's death and the situation in Russia.
"The Travels of Marco Polo" extensively introduces the countries of the East, especially China, opening up a new world for European intellectuals. For example: it depicts the prosperity of China's large cities with millions of inhabitants at the time, records China's well-developed system of post stations and granaries, and mentions the paper money (jiaozi) already in use in China and the "black stones" used for burning. All of these were incredibly novel to Europeans at the time, greatly broadening their horizons. As a result, it spread rapidly after its publication, reaching all of Italy within a few months and was soon translated into various languages. Because it was initially spread through handwritten manuscripts, there were inevitable losses and gains during translation and copying, leading to over 50 different versions. Thus, interpreting "The Travels of Marco Polo" became a specialized field of study.
"The Travels of Marco Polo" is a key work in the history of Sino-Western relations and world cultural history, and its influence was immense. European geographers in the 14th and 15th centuries relied heavily on the geographical knowledge provided by "The Travels of Marco Polo" when drawing the earliest world maps. European merchants learned about the wealth of China and the East through it, while explorers were further inspired to travel to the East, with Christopher Columbus being the most typical example. Columbus had carefully read "The Travels of Marco Polo" in his youth and made many annotations in the book. On his voyage in 1492, Columbus originally carried a letter from the King of Spain to the Emperor of China, planning to reach China and India, but accidentally arrived in the Americas instead. However, Columbus himself, until the very end of his life, still insisted that the continent he had reached was India and the island he had landed on (Cuba) was Japan. In this sense, Columbus discovered the Americas under the influence of Marco Polo. However, Marco Polo rarely mentioned the rituals and cultural relics of China in "The Travels of Marco Polo," and did not even mention the Great Wall or the Grand Canal, nor did he mention the printing technology already widely used in China at the time, which is indeed a pity.
Regardless, Marco Polo was the first European to extensively travel through the Eastern world and leave important records about it. From the perspective of discovering a new world and its influence on Columbus's discovery of the New World, Marco Polo's journey to the East in 1271 can be seen as an act of stepping out of the Middle Ages and discovering a new world.