The Travels of Marco Polo — Volume 1 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 1,230 pages of information about The Travels of Marco Polo — Volume 1.

The Travels of Marco Polo — Volume 1 eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 1,230 pages of information about The Travels of Marco Polo — Volume 1.
in this region, but the Kurds of like habits have taken their place to a large extent.  The fine carpets and silk fabrics appear to be no longer produced here, any more than the excellent horses of which Polo speaks, which must have been the remains of the famous old breed of Cappadocia. [It appears, however (Vital Cuinet’s Turquie d’Asie, I. p. 224), that fine carpets are still manufactured at Koniah, also a kind of striped cotton cloth, called Aladja.—­H.  C.]

A grant of privileges to the Genoese by Leon II., King of Lesser Armenia, dated 23rd December, 1288, alludes to the export of horses and mules, etc., from Ayas, and specifies the duties upon them.  The horses now of repute in Asia as Turkman come from the east of the Caspian.  And Asia Minor generally, once the mother of so many breeds of high repute, is now poorer in horses than any province of the Ottoman empire.

(Pereg.  Quat. p. 114; I.B. II. 255 seqq.; Hayton, ch. xiii.; Liber Jurium Reip.  Januensis, II. 184; Tchihatcheff, As.  Min., 2’de partie, 631.)

[The Seljukian Sultanate of Iconium or Rum, was founded at the expense of the Byzantines by Suleiman (1074-1081); the last three sovereigns of the dynasty contemporaneous with Marco Polo are Ghiath ed-din Kaikhosru III. (1267-1283), Ghiath ed-din Mas’ud II. (1283-1294), Ala ed-din Kaikobad III. (1294-1308), when this kingdom was destroyed by the Mongols of Persia.  Privileges had been granted to Venice by Ghiath ed-din Kaikhosru I. (+ 1211), and his sons Izz ed-din Kaikaua (1211-1220), and Ala ed-din Kaikobad I. (1220-1237); the diploma of 1220 is unfortunately the only one of the three known to be preserved. (Cf.  Heyd, I. p. 302.)—­H.  C.]

Though the authors quoted above seem to make no distinction between Turks and Turkmans, that which we still understand does appear to have been made in the 12th century:  “That there may be some distinction, at least in name, between those who made themselves a king, and thus achieved such glory, and those who still abide in their primitive barbarism and adhere to their old way of life, the former are nowadays termed Turks, the latter by their old name of Turkomans.” (William of Tyre, i. 7.)

Casaria is KAISARIYA, the ancient Caesareia of Cappadocia, close to the foot of the great Mount Argaeus. Savast is the Armenian form (Sevasd) of Sebaste, the modern SIVAS.  The three cities, Iconium, Caesareia, and Sebaste, were metropolitan sees under the Catholicos of Sis.

[The ruins of Sebaste are situated at about 6 miles to the east of modern Sivas, near the village of Gavraz, on the Kizil Irmak.  In the 11th century, the King of Armenia, Senecherim, made his capital of Sebaste.  It belonged after to the Seljukid Turks, and was conquered in 1397 by Bayezid Ilderim with Tokat, Castambol and Sinope. (Cf. Vital Cuinet.)

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The Travels of Marco Polo — Volume 1 from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.