The Travels of Marco Polo — Volume 1 by Marco Polo and da Pisa Rusticiano
CHAPTER LVIII.
1661 words | Chapter 320
OF THE KINGDOM OF EGRIGAIA.
Starting again from Erguiul you ride eastward for eight days, and
then come to a province called EGRIGAIA, containing numerous cities
and villages, and belonging to Tangut.{1} The capital city is called
CALACHAN.{2} The people are chiefly Idolaters, but there are fine
churches belonging to the Nestorian Christians. They are all subjects
of the Great Kaan. They make in this city great quantities of camlets
of camel’s wool, the finest in the world; and some of the camlets that
they make are white, for they have white camels, and these are the best
of all. Merchants purchase these stuffs here, and carry them over the
world for sale.{3}
We shall now proceed eastward from this place and enter the territory
that was formerly Prester John’s.
NOTE 1.—Chinghiz invaded Tangut in all five times, viz. in 1205,
1207, 1209 (or according to Erdmann, 1210–1211), 1218, and
1226–1227, on which last expedition he died.
_A_. In the third invasion, according to D’Ohsson’s Chinese guide
(Father Hyacinth), he took the town of _Uiraca_, and the fortress
of Imen, and laid siege to the capital, then called Chung-sing or
Chung-hing, now Ning-hsia.
Rashid, in a short notice of this campaign, calls the first city
_Erica_, _Erlaca_, or, as Erdmann has it, _Artacki_. In De Mailla
it is _Ulahai_.
_B_. On the last invasion (1226), D’Ohsson’s Chinese authority says
that Chinghiz took Kanchau and Suhchau, Cholo and Khola in the
province of Liangcheu, and then proceeded to the Yellow River, and
invested Lingchau, south of Ning-hsia.
Erdmann, following his reading of Rashiduddin, says Chinghiz
took the cities of Tangut, called _Arucki_, _Kachu_, _Sichu_,
and _Kamichu_, and besieged Deresgai (D’Ohsson, _Derssekai_),
whilst Shidergu, the King of Tangut, betook himself to his capital
_Artackin_.
D’Ohsson, also professing to follow Rashid, calls this “his capital
_Irghai_, which the Mongols call _Ircaya_.” Klaproth, illustrating
Polo, reads “Eyircai, which the Mongols call _Eyircayá_.”
Pétis de la Croix, relating the same campaign and professing to
follow Fadlallah, _i.e._ Rashiduddin, says the king “retired to his
fortress of _Arbaca_.”
_C_. Sanang Setzen several times mentions a city called _Irghai_,
_apparently_ in Tangut; but all we can gather as to his position is
that it seems to have lain east of Kanchau.
We perceive that the _Arbaca_ of P. de la Croix, the _Eyircai_ of
Klaproth, the _Uiraca_ of D’Ohsson, the _Artacki_ or _Artackin_ of
Erdmann, are all various readings or forms of the same name, and
are the same with the Chinese form _Ulahai_ of De Mailla, and most
probably the place is the _Egrigaia_ of Polo.
We see also that Erdmann mentions another place _Aruki_ (ارقى?)
in connection with Kanchau and Suhchau. This is, I suspect, the
_Erguiul_ of Polo, and perhaps the Irghai of Sanang Setzen.
Rashiduddin seems wrong in calling Ircayá the capital of the king,
a circumstance which leads Klaproth to identify it with Ning-hsia.
Pauthier, identifying Ulahai with Egrigaya, shows that the former
was one of the circles of Tangut, but _not_ that of Ning-hsia. Its
position, he says, is uncertain. Klaproth, however, inserts it in
his map of Asia, in the era of Kúblái (_Tabl. Hist._ pl. 22), as
_Ulakhai_ to the north of Ning-hsia, near the great bend eastward
of the Hwang-Ho. Though it may have extended in this direction, it
is probable, from the name referred to in next note, that Egrigaia
or Ulahai is represented by the modern principality of ALASHAN,
visited by Prjevalsky in 1871 and 1872.
[New travels and researches enable me to say that there can be
no doubt that _Egrigaia = Ning-hsia_. Palladius (_l.c._ 18) says:
“_Egrigaia_ is Erigaia of the Mongol text. Klaproth was correct
in his supposition that it is modern Ning-h’ia. Even now the
Eleuths of Alashan call Ning-h’ia, _Yargai_. In M. Polo’s time
this department was famous for the cultivation of the Safflower
(_carthamus tinctorius_). [_Siu t’ung kien_, A.D. 1292.]” Mr.
Rockhill (cf. his _Diary of a Journey_) writes to me that Ning-hsia
is still called _Irge Khotun_ by Mongols at the present day. M.
Bonin (_J. As._, 1900. I. 585) mentions the same fact.
Palladius (19) adds: “_Erigaia_ is not to be confounded with
_Urahai_, often mentioned in the history of Chingis Khan’s wars
with the Tangut kingdom. Urahai was a fortress in a pass of the
same name in the Alashan Mountains. Chingis Khan spent five months
there (an. 1208), during which he invaded and plundered the country
in the neighbourhood. [_Si hia shu shi._] The Alashan Mountains
form a semicircle 500 _li_ in extent, and have over forty narrow
passes leading to the department of Ning-hia; the broadest and most
practicable of these is now called Ch’i-mu-K’ow; it is not more
than 80 feet broad. [_Ning hia fu chi._] It may be that the Urahai
fortress existed near this pass.”
“From Liang-chow fu, M. Polo follows a special route, leaving the
modern postal route on his right; the road he took has, since the
time of the Emperor K’ang-hi, been called the courier’s route.”
(_Palladius_, 18.)—H. C.]
NOTE 2.—_Calachan_, the chief town of Egrigaia, is mentioned,
according to Klaproth, by Rashiduddin, among the cities of Tangut,
as KALAJÁN. The name and approximate position suggest, as just
noticed, identity with Alashan, the modern capital of which, called
by Prjevalsky Dyn-yuan-yin, stands some distance west of the
Hwang-Ho, in about lat. 39°. Polo gives no data for the interval
between this and his next stage.
[The _Dyn-yuan-yin_ of Prjevalsky is the camp of _Ting-yuan-yng_
or Fu-ma-fu of M. Bonin, the residence of the Si-wang (western
prince), of Alashan, an abbreviation of Alade-shan (_shan_,
mountain in Chinese), Alade = Eleuth or Œlöt; the sister of this
prince married a son of Prince Tuan, the chief of the _Boxers_.
(_La Géographie_, 1901. I. 118.) Palladius (_l.c._ 19) says: “Under
the name of Calachan, Polo probably means the summer residence of
the Tangut kings, which was 60 _li_ from Ning-hia, at the foot
of the Alashan Mountains. It was built by the famous Tangut king
Yuen-hao, on a large scale, in the shape of a castle, in which
were high terraces and magnificent buildings. Traces of these
buildings are visible to this day. There are often found coloured
tiles and iron nails 1 foot, and even 2 feet long. The last Tangut
kings made this place their permanent residence, and led there
an indolent and sensual life. The Chinese name of this residence
was Ho-lan shan _Li-Kung_. There is sufficient reason to suppose
that this very residence is named (under the year 1226) in the
Mongol text _Alashai nuntuh_; and in the chronicles of the Tangut
Kingdom, _Halahachar_, otherwise _Halachar_, apparently in the
Tangut language. Thus M. Polo’s Calachan can be identified with the
Halachar of the _Si hia shu shi_, and can be taken to designate the
Alashan residence of the Tangut kings.”—H. C.]
NOTE 3.—Among the Buraets and Chinese at Kiakhta snow-white camels,
without albino character, are often seen, and probably in other
parts of Mongolia. (See _Erdmann_, II. 261.) Philostratus tells us
that the King of Taxila furnished white camels to Apollonius. I
doubt if the present King of Taxila, whom Anglo-Indians call the
Commissioner of Ráwal Pindi, could do the like.
_Cammellotti_ appear to have been fine woollen textures, by no
means what are now called camlets, nor were they necessarily of
camel’s wool, for those of Angora goat’s wool were much valued.
M. Douet d’Arcq calls it “a fine stuff of wool approaching to our
Cashmere, and sometimes of silk.” Indeed, as Mr. Marsh points
out, the word is Arabic, and has nothing to do with _Camel_ in
its origin; though it evidently came to be associated therewith.
_Khamlat_ is defined in F. Johnson’s Dict.: “Camelot, silk and
camel’s hair; also all silk or velvet, especially pily and plushy,”
and _Khaml_ is “pile or plush.” _Camelin_ was a different and
inferior material. There was till recently a considerable import
of different kinds of woollen goods from this part of China into
Ladakh, Kashmir, and the northern Panjáb. [Leaving Ning-hsia, Mr.
Rockhill writes (_Diary_, 1892, 44): “We passed on the road a cart
with Jardine and Matheson’s flag, coming probably from Chung-Wei
Hsien, where camel’s wool is sold in considerable quantities to
foreigners. This trade has fallen off very much in the last three
or four years on account of the Chinese middlemen rolling the
wool in the dirt so as to add to its weight, and practising other
tricks on buyers.”—H. C.] Among the names of these were _Sling_,
_Shirum_, _Gurun_, and _Khoza_, said to be the names of the towns
in China where the goods were made. We have supposed _Sling_ to be
Sining (note 2, ch. lvii.), but I can make nothing of the others.
Cunningham also mentions “camlets of camel’s hair,” under the name
of _Suḳlát_, among imports from the same quarter. The term _Suḳlát_
is, however, applied in the _Panjáb_ trade returns to _broadcloth_.
Does not this point to the real nature of the _siclatoun_ of the
Middle Ages? It is, indeed, often spoken of as used for banners,
which implies that it was not a _heavy_ woollen:
“There was mony gonfanoun
Of gold, sendel, and siclatoun.”
(_King Alisaundre_, in Weber, I. 85.)
But it was also a material for ladies’ robes, for quilts,
leggings, housings, pavilions. Franc. Michel does not decide what
it was, only that it was generally _red_ and wrought with gold.
Dozy renders it “silk stuff brocaded with gold”; but this seems
conjectural. Dr. Rock says it was a thin glossy silken stuff, often
with a woof of gold thread, and seems to derive it from the Arabic
ṣaḳl, “polishing” (a sword), which is improbable. Perhaps the name
is connected with _Ṣiḳiliyat_, “Sicily.”
(_Marsh on Wedgwood_, and _on Webster_ in _N. Y. Nation_, 1867;
_Douet D’Arcq_, p. 355; _Punjab Trade Rep._, App. ccxix.–xx.;
_Ladak_, 242; _Fr.-Michel Rech._ I. 221 _seqq._; _Dozy_, _Dict. des
Vêtements_, etc.; _Dr. Rock’s Kens. Catal._ xxxix.–xl.)
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