SOURCE: "The 'Lost' Toledo Manuscript of Marco Polo," in Speculum, Vol. XII, No. 4, October, 1937, pp. 458-63.

In the following essay, Herriott discusses the superiority of a fifteenth-century Polian manuscript believed to have been lost.

In 1559 the first attempt at a critical edition of Marco Polo appeared in Venice in a volume entitled Secondo volume delle Navigation et Viaggi nel quale si contengono l'Historia delle cose de Tartari, et diuersi fatti de loro Imperatori, descritta da M. Marco Polo Gentilhuomo Venetiano, et da Haiton Armeno. The first volume of this collection of travels had been published in 1550, and the third volume in 1556. The editor of the series, Giouan Battista Ramusio, delayed publication of the second volume, since he was in search of additional materials to be incorporated in the work. Death overtook him in 1557, and, owing to a fire in the Giuntine presses, the volume was not issued until...