Note {2} — Chapter LXXVI

Note 2.—✛The Ramusian version says: “Messer Marco Polo was frequently at this city, and took great pains to learn everything about it, writing down the whole in his notes.” The information being originally derived from a Chinese document, there might be some ground for supposing that 100 miles of circuit stood for 100 li. Yet the circuit of the modern city is stated in the official book called Hang-chau Fu-Chi, or topographical history of Hang-chau, at only 35 li. And the earliest record of the wall, as built under the Sui by Yang-su (before A.D. 606), makes its extent little more (36 li and 90 paces.)[1] But the wall was reconstructed by Ts’ien Kiao, feudal prince of the region, during the reign of Chao Tsung, one of the last emperors of the T’ang Dynasty (892), so as to embrace the Luh-ho-ta Pagoda, on a high bluff over the Tsien-tang River,[2] 15 li distant from the present south gate, and had then a circuit of 70 li. Moreover, in 1159, after the city became the capital of the Sung emperors, some further extension was given to it, so that, even exclusive of the suburbs, the circuit of the city may have been not far short of 100 li. When the city was in its glory under the Sung, the Luh-ho-ta Pagoda may be taken as marking the extreme S.W. Another known point marks approximately the chief north gate of that period, at a mile and a half or two miles beyond the present north wall. The S.E. angle was apparently near the river bank. But, on the other hand, the waist of the city seems to have been a good deal narrower than it now is. Old descriptions compare its form to that of a slender-waisted drum (dice-box or hour-glass shape).