Volume 2 / Part 2 — CHAPTER XXXVI.
Henry Yule translation
Account of the City of Juju.
When you leave the Bridge, and ride towards the west, finding all the way excellent hostelries for travellers, with fine vineyards, fields, and gardens, and springs of water, you come after 30 miles to a fine large city called Juju, where there are many abbeys of idolaters, and the people live by trade and manufactures. They weave cloths of silk and gold, and very fine taffetas.{1} Here too there are many hostelries for travellers.{2}
After riding a mile beyond this city you find two roads, one of which goes west and the other south-east. The westerly road is that through Cathay, and the south-easterly one goes towards the province of Manzi.{3}
Taking the westerly one through Cathay, and travelling by it for ten days, you find a constant succession of cities and boroughs, with numerous thriving villages, all abounding with trade and manufactures, besides the fine fields and vineyards and dwellings of civilized people; but nothing occurs worthy of special mention; and so I will only speak of a kingdom called Taianfu.
“Many a pencel of sykelatoun And of sendel of grene and broun,”
and also pavilions of sendel; and in the Anglo-French ballad of the death of William Earl of Salisbury in St. Lewis’s battle on the Nile—
“Le Meister du Temple brace les chivaux Et le Count Long-Espée depli les sandaux.”
The oriflamme of France was made of cendal. Chaucer couples taffetas and sendal. His “Doctor of Physic”
“In sanguin and in persë clad was allë, Linëd with taffata and with sendallë.”
[La Curne, Dict., s.v. Sendaus has: Silk stuff: “Somme de la delivrance des sendaus.” (Nouv. Compt. de l’Arg. p. 19).—Godefroy, Dict., gives: “Sendain, adj., made with the stuff called cendal: Drap d’or sendains (1392, Test. de Blanche, duch d’Orl., Ste-Croix, Arch. Loiret).” He says s.v. Cendal, “cendau, cendral, cendel, ... sendail, ... étoffe légère de soie unie qui paraît avoir été analogue au taffetas.” “‘On faisait des cendaux forts ou faibles, et on leur donnait toute sorte de couleurs. On s’en servait surtout pour vêtements et corsets, pour doublures de draps, de fourrures et d’autres étoffes de soie plus précieuses, enfin pour tenture d’appartements.’ (Bourquelot, Foir. de Champ. I. 261).”
“J’ay de toilles de mainte guise, De sidonnes et de cendaulx. Soyes, satins blancs et vermaulx.” —Greban, Mist. de la Pass., 26826, G. Paris.—H. C.]
The origin of the word seems also somewhat doubtful. The word Σενδἑς occurs in Constant. Porphyrog. de Ceremoniis (Bonn, ed. I. 468), and this looks like a transfer of the Arabic Săndăs or Sundus, which is applied by Bakui to the silk fabrics of Yezd. (Not. et Ext. II. 469.) Reiske thinks this is the origin of the Frank word, and connects its etymology with Sind. Others think that sendal and the other forms are modifications of the ancient Sindon, and this is Mr. Marsh’s view. (See also Fr.-Michel, Recherches, etc. I. 212; Dict. des Tissus, II. 171 seqq.)
[The Rev. W. S. Ament (Marco Polo, 119–120) writes, “the historian of the city of Cho-chau sounds the praises of the people for their religious spirit. He says:—‘It was the custom of the ancients to worship those who were before them. Thus students worshipped their instructors, farmers worshipped the first husbandman, workers in silk, the original silk-worker. Thus when calamities come upon the land, the virtuous among the people make offerings to the spirits of earth and heaven, the mountains, rivers, streams, etc. All these things are profitable. These customs should never be forgotten.’ After such instruction, we are prepared to find fifty-eight temples of every variety in this little city of about 20,000 inhabitants. There is a temple to the spirits of Wind, Clouds, Thunder, and Rain, to the god of silk-workers, to the Horse-god, to the god of locusts, and the eight destructive insects, to the Five Dragons, to the King who quiets the waves. Besides these, there are all the orthodox temples to the ancient worthies, and some modern heroes. Liu Pei and Chang Fei, two of the three great heroes of the San Kuo Chih, being natives of Cho Chou, are each honoured with two temples, one in the native village, and one in the city. It is not often that one locality can give to a great empire two of its three most popular heroes: Liu Pei, Chang Fei, Kuan Yu.”
“Judging from the condition of the country,” writes the Rev. W. S. Ament (p. 120), “one could hardly believe that this general region was the original home of the silk-worm, and doubtless the people who once lived here are the only people who ever saw the silk-worm in his wild state. The historian of Cho-Chou honestly remarks that he knows of no reason why the production of silk should have ceased there, except the fact that the worms refused to live there.... The palmy days of the silk industry were in the T’ang dynasty.”—H. C.]
Of a part of the road of which Polo speaks in the latter part of the chapter Williamson says: “The drive was a very beautiful one. Not only were the many villages almost hidden by foliage, but the road itself hereabouts is lined with trees.... The effect was to make the journey like a ramble through the avenues of some English park.” Beyond Tingchau however the country becomes more barren. (I. 268.)