The Travels of Marco Polo — Volume 1 by Marco Polo and da Pisa Rusticiano
5. Two long marches over a plain, part of which is
1775 words | Chapter 273
described as “continuous cultivation for some 16
miles,” and the rest as a “most uninteresting plain” 2
——
Total as before . . . 17
In the previous edition of this work I was inclined to identify
Marco’s route _absolutely_ with this Itinerary. But a communication
from Major St. John, who surveyed the section from Kermán towards
Deh Bakri in 1872, shows that this first section does not answer
well to the description. The road is not all plain, for it crosses
a mountain pass, though not a formidable one. Neither is it through
a thriving, populous tract, for, with the exception of two large
villages, Major St. John found the whole road to Deh Bakri from
Kermán as desert and dreary as any in Persia. On the other hand,
the more direct route to the south, which is that always used
except in seasons of extraordinary severity (such as that of Major
Smith’s journey, when this route was impassable from snow), answers
better, as described to Major St. John by muleteers, to Polo’s
account. The first _six days_ are occupied by a gentle ascent
through the districts of Bardesir and Kairat-ul-Arab, which are the
best-watered and most fertile uplands of Kermán. From the crest
of the pass reached in those six marches (which is probably more
than 10,000 feet above the sea, for it was closed by snow on 1st
May, 1872), an easy descent of _two days_ leads to the Garmsir.
This is traversed in four days, and then a very difficult pass is
crossed to reach the plains bordering on the sea. The cold of this
route is much greater than that of the Deh Bakri route. Hence the
correspondence with Polo’s description, as far as the descent to
the Garmsir, or Reobarles, seems decidedly better by this route.
It is admitted to be quite possible that on reaching this plain
the two routes coalesced. We shall assume this provisionally, till
some traveller gives us a detailed account of the Bardesir route.
Meantime all the remaining particulars answer well.
[General Houtum-Schindler (_l.c._ pp. 493–495), speaking of the
Itinerary from Kermán to Hormúz and back, says: “Only two of the
many routes between Kermán and Bender ’Abbás coincide more or less
with Marco Polo’s description. These two routes are the one over
the Deh Bekrí Pass [see above, Colonel Smith], and the one _viâ_
Sárdú. The latter is the one, I think, taken by Marco Polo. The
more direct roads to the west are for the greater part through
mountainous country, and have not twelve stages in plains which we
find enumerated in Marco Polo’s Itinerary. The road _viâ_ Báft,
Urzú, and the Zendán Pass, for instance, has only four stages in
plains; the road, _viâ_ Ráhbur, Rúdbár and the Nevergún Pass only
six; and the road _viâ_ Sírján also only six.”
Marches.
The Sárdú route, which seems to me to be the one
followed by Marco Polo, has five stages through fertile
and populous plains to Sarvízan . . . . . 5
One day’s march ascends to the top of the Sarvízan Pass . 1
Two days’ descent to Ráhjird, a village close to the
ruins of old Jíruft, now called Shehr-i-Daqíánús . . 2
Six days’ march over the “vast plain” of Jírúft and Rúdbár
to Faríáb, joining the Deh Bekrí route at Kerímábád, one
stage south of the Shehr-i-Daqíánús . . . . 6
One day’s march through the Nevergún Pass to Shamíl,
descending . . . . . . . . . 1
Two days’ march through the plain to Bender ’Abbás or
Hormúz . . . . . . . . . . 2
——
In all . . . . . . 17
The Sárdú road enters the Jíruft plain at the ruins of the old
city, the Deh Bekrí route does so at some distance to the eastward.
The first six stages performed by Marco Polo in seven days go
through fertile plains and past numerous villages. Regarding the
cold, “which you can scarcely abide,” Marco Polo does not speak of
it as existing on the mountains only; he says, “From the city of
Kermán to this descent the cold in winter is very great,” that is,
from Kermán to near Jíruft. The winter at Kermán itself is fairly
severe; from the town the ground gradually but steadily rises,
the absolute altitudes of the passes crossing the mountains to
the south varying from 8000 to 11,000 feet. These passes are up
to the month of March always very cold; in one it froze slightly
in the beginning of June. The Sárdú Pass lies lower than the
others. The name is Sárdú, not Sardú from sard, “cold.” Major
Sykes (_Persia_, ch. xxiii.) comes to the same conclusion: “In
1895, and again in 1900, I made a tour partly with the object of
solving this problem, and of giving a geographical existence to
Sárdu, which appropriately means the ‘Cold Country.’ I found that
there was a route which exactly fitted Marco’s conditions, as
at Sarbizan the Sárdu plateau terminates in a high pass of 9200
feet, from which there is a most abrupt descent to the plain of
Jíruft, Komádin being about 35 miles, or two days’ journey from
the top of the pass. Starting from Kermán, the stages would be as
follows:—I. Jupár (small town); 2. Bahrámjird (large village); 3.
Gudar (village); 4. Ráin (small town).... Thence to the Sarbizan
pass is a distance of 45 miles, or three desert stages, thus
constituting a total of 110 miles for the seven days. This is the
camel route to the present day, and absolutely fits in with the
description given.... The question to be decided by this section of
the journey may then, I think, be considered to be finally and most
satisfactorily settled, the route proving to lie between the two
selected by Colonel Yule, as being the most suitable, although he
wisely left the question open.”—H. C.]
In the abstract of Major Smith’s Itinerary as we have given it,
we do not find Polo’s city of _Camadi_. Major Smith writes to
me, however, that this is probably to be sought in “the ruined
city, the traces of which I observed in the plain of Jíruft
near Kerimabad. The name of the city is now apparently lost.”
It is, however, known to the natives as the _City of Dakiánús_,
as Mr. Abbott, who visited the site, informs us. This is a name
analogous only to the Arthur’s ovens or Merlin’s caves of our own
country, for all over Mahomedan Asia there are old sites to which
legend attaches the name of _Dakianus_ or the Emperor Decius, the
persecuting tyrant of the Seven Sleepers. “The spot,” says Abbott,
“is an elevated part of the plain on the right bank of the Hali
Rúd, and is thickly strewn with kiln-baked bricks, and shreds of
pottery and glass.... After heavy rain the peasantry search amongst
the ruins for ornaments of stone, and rings and coins of gold,
silver, and copper. The popular tradition concerning the city is
that it was destroyed by a flood long before the birth of Mahomed.”
[General Houtum-Schindler, in a paper in the _Jour. R. As. Soc._,
Jan. 1898, p. 43, gives an abstract of Dr. Houtsma’s (of Utrecht)
memoir, _Zur Geschichte der Saljuqen von Kerman_, and comes to the
conclusion that “from these statements we can safely identify Marco
Polo’s Camadi with the suburb Qumādīn, or, as I would read it,
Qamādīn, of the city of Jíruft.”—(Cf. _Major Sykes’ Persia_, chap.
xxiii.: “Camadi was sacked for the first time, after the death of
Toghrul Shah of Kermán, when his four sons reduced the province to
a condition of anarchy.”)
Major P. Molesworth Sykes, _Recent Journeys in Persia_ (_Geog.
Journal_, X. 1897, p. 589), says: “Upon arrival in Rudbar, we
turned northwards and left the Farman Farma, in order to explore
the site of Marco Polo’s ‘Camadi.’... We came upon a huge area
littered with yellow bricks eight inches square, while not even a
broken wall is left to mark the site of what was formerly a great
city, under the name of the Sher-i-Jiruft.”—H. C.] The actual
distance from Bamm to the City of Dakianus is, by Abbott’s Journal,
about 66 miles.
The name of REOBARLES, which Marco applies to the plain
intermediate between the two descents, has given rise to many
conjectures. Marsden pointed to _Rúdbár_, a name frequently
applied in Persia to a district on a river, or intersected by
streams—a suggestion all the happier that he was not aware of
the fact that there is a district of RUDBAR exactly in the
required position. The last syllable still requires explanation.
I ventured formerly to suggest that it was the Arabic _Laṣṣ_,
or, as Marco would certainly have written it, _Les_, a robber.
Reobarles would then be RUDBAR-I-LAṢṢ, “Robber’s River District.”
The appropriateness of the name Marco has amply illustrated; and
it appeared to me to survive in that of one of the rivers of the
plain, which is mentioned by both Abbott and Smith under the title
of _Rúdkhánah-i-Duzdi_, or Robbery River, a name also applied to
a village and old fort on the banks of the stream. This etymology
was, however, condemned as an inadmissible combination of Persian
and Arabic by two very high authorities both as travellers and
scholars—Sir H. Rawlinson and Mr. Khanikoff. The _Les_, therefore,
has still to be explained.[1]
[Major Sykes (_Geog. Journal_, 1902, p. 130) heard of robbers, some
five miles from Mináb, and he adds: “However, nothing happened, and
after crossing the Gardan-i-Pichal, we camped at Birinti, which is
situated just above the junction of Rudkhána Duzdi, or ‘River of
Theft,’ and forms part of the district of Rudán, in Fars.”
“The Jíruft and Rúdbár plains belong to the germsír (hot region),
dates, pistachios, and konars (apples of Paradise) abound in them.
Reobarles is Rúdbár or Rüdbáris.” (_Houtum-Schindler_, _l.c._ 1881,
p. 495.)—H. C.]
We have referred to Marco’s expressions regarding the great cold
experienced on the pass which formed the first descent; and it is
worthy of note that the title of “The Cold Mountains” is applied
by Edrisi to these very mountains. Mr. Abbott’s MS. Report also
mentions in this direction, _Sardu_, said to be a cold country (as
its name seems to express [see above,—H. C.]), which its population
(Iliyáts) abandon in winter for the lower plains. It is but
recently that the importance of this range of mountains has become
known to us. Indeed the _existence_ of the chain, as extending
continuously from near Kashán, was first indicated by Khanikoff in
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