Michael Yamashita: 700 years ago, a young Venetian embarked
on a 24 year odyssey, taking him to the furthest reaches of the globe.
His book, "Description of the World," altered the course
of history and made him a legend. Some believe it also
made him a liar.
I'm Mike Yamashita, a National Geographic photographer.
For centuries, Marco Polo has been a figure of inspiration and
suspicion. Did the world's greatest overland explorer
really see what he described in his fantastical book? Did he
ever make it to China?
Marco Polo's book: Great princes, emperors and kings,
dukes and marquesses, counts, knights and burgesses. And
people of all degrees who desire to get knowledge of the various
races of mankind, take this book and cause it to be read to you,
for let me tell you that never have there been any man who in
his own person have had so much knowledge and experience of the
diverse parts of the world and its wonders as have had this
Messr. Marco.
Michael Yamashita: Those are the opening lines to Marco's
modestly titled book, "Description of the World." Now
when I first read it, I got what's called Marco Polo fever
and the symptoms of this disease or that I became obsessed,
totally obsessed with everything Marco wrote or talked about, and
that's why I'm here and in Venice.
Okay, this is Corte del Milion, Marco Polo's believed to
be his, his house. Why millon? Well, he was called milion by
his contemporaries and nobody knows really why, whether it was
about the fact that he made a million dollars or told a
million lies who knows?
You know, Giuseppe, I've heard a lot of different stories about
Corte del Milion, but tell me what you know about this
building? Is this Marco Polo's house? Yeah, not only this one,
all was the house of Marco Polo because the house was very, very
large. You know anything about Marco Polo? Marco Polo? Yeah. He
lives there. What about this house? No, no.
Does he live here? No, Veneziano dock. La isla de la Giudecca.
Oh, he lives on Giudecca. Nobody seems to know the answer. I
think it's this one. Well, there is one clue that possibly says
something about Marco Polo living here. And that is these
two birds up there, which are, I'm told the Polo crest, the
Marco Polo family crest.
What we do know is that Marco was only 17 when his father and
uncle took him on one of the most influential journeys ever
made. They were merchants and Venice in the 13th century was
the bustling commercial center of the Mediterranean. Yet very
few Europeans dared venture beyond their borders. Back then,
many people still thought the world was flat. No European,
barring a handful of missionaries would have gone as
far as he did.
Here we are at the Piazza San Marco with its two columns on
the Quay. This would have been the exact same view Marco saw
when he left Venice for China at the age of 17. You see the size
of that thing?
Oh, man!
I wanted to find a new way to shoot this historical place. And
I discovered that one of the world's largest cruise ships,
the Grand Princess, was about to enter Venice.
Unbelievable!
As a Japanese American, I grew up interested in the Far East
and I studied Asian history in college. And now I'm going to
get a chance to see a lot of that history come alive. I've
always been interested in Marco Polo. But what really got me and
deep in my intrigue was reading an article questioning whether
he actually made it to China or not. And I thought, wouldn't
this be the opportunity to prove once and for all that he made it
or didn't make the trip? That was the, that that is the
question.
I then read a book by Dr. Frances Wood, curator of the
Chinese collection at the British Library, who argues that
Marco fabricated the stories in his book.
Dr. Frances Wood: For centuries, people have doubted whether he
actually travelled all the way across Asia to China. Whether he
actually came back and wrote a book about it, some people even
doubt whether he even existed at all.
Michael Yamashita: I'm going to retrace his steps using his book
like a guide, and make up my own mind. So whether you become a
believer or not, what you're about to see is one of the most
amazing overland journeys ever made.
Marco Polo left Venice in 1271. Traveling through Iraq, Iran,
and Afghanistan before he finally arrived here about three
years later, the Pamir mountains between China and Afghanistan.
I'm sure that this would have been one of the more arduous
legs and Marco's journey. He probably traveled here in
winter, because in his book, he had written that in the
mountains, flying birds, there are none. In that case, Marco
would have had to deal with blizzards and avalanches. And as
if that weren't bad enough, he claimed that up here, there was
neither habitation nor shelter.
Marco Polo's book: Tis said to be the highest place in the
world. And when you have got to this height, you find a great
lake between two mountains, and out of it, a fine river, running
through a plain, clothed with the finest pasture in the world.
Michael Yamashita: Cool breeze, soft sunlight, and unbelievable
scenery. It just doesn't get any better than this. As Marco made
his way through China, he encountered on more than a few
occasions, a rather unusual custom. And I imagined it would
have made his eyes pop, especially since he was still
only a teenager. Now I don't know if this is the village or
not, but one thing I've been noticing is how good looking
these women really are.
Now these are Kyrgheze people, right? Yes, there is so
beautiful here and there's only this this these two families.
That's true. Yeah. And I imagine that this work they're doing
here is making these same carpets that they're sitting on
over here. It's their job. Okay. At least half a dozen places
throughout the book, he talks about meeting some tribe, where
when the visitor arrives, the husband allows the visitor to do
what he may with the wife as well as the daughter. How old is
she?
She's 16. What's her name? Tell her she looks, she's very
pretty. (foreign language translator)
Marco Polo's book: If a foreigner comes to the house of
one of these people to lodge, the host is delighted and
desires his wife to put herself entirely at the guests'
disposal. Obviously, the country is a fine one to visit for a lad
from 16 to 24.
Michael Yamashita: Now Chinese scholars have actually confirmed
that the practice of sharing wives and daughters with foreign
visitors was indeed an ancient tradition in remote areas, the
theory being that it helped widen the gene pool, avoiding
the threat of marriages between blood relations. Well, these
women were really nice, but they weren't nearly as hospitable,
shall I say, as the ones I'm looking for? So I guess we'll
move on and try to find another curiosity Marco says he found in
these parts.
So Abdul, what I'm really looking for here is a
traditional family, and I need you to ask them if they've ever
seen the fabled Ovis polii. You know the huge Marco Polo sheep
with curly horns.
Marco Polo's book: there are great quantities of wild sheep
of huge size. Their horns are as much as six palms in length
Michael Yamashita: Can you ask about one thing, Marco Polo was
here, he talked about the big sheep. Big horn sheep that that
were in the Pamir mountains. Has he ever seen one?
(foreign language translator) Yes, he saw. How big is that sheep?
Like looks just like a donkey. Okay, well, I never saw one live
but I did find this set of horns on the other side of the Pamirs
in Afghanistan. Just like a donkey. Marco certainly didn't
exaggerate on this one. Thank you very much.
Thank you, really enjoyed it
Well, it's still another 250 miles to the great medieval town
of Kashgar. It takes about nine hours by bus. But in Marco's
day, he said crossing these mountains and gorges took about
two and a half months.
Dr. Frances Wood: Now Marco Polo is supposed to have traveled
from Venice all the way to Peking and then throughout the
rest of China. We assume and I think most readers assume that
it's it's a travel book where you can follow his route from
place to place. But if you read it closely, you can't possibly
do that. He suddenly shoots up to the north to Siberia, then
cuts back down again. He reprises, goes back on his
footsteps. So whatever it is, it's not an itinerary that you
can follow directly.
Michael Yamashita: Some of the distances that he described,
sometimes he's right on, incredibly accurate and other
times he's way off. But the miracle for me is to think what
he wrote about was 20 years after he actually made the trip.
Marco Polo's book: There are a good number of towns and
villages, but the greatest and finest is Kashgar itself.
Michael Yamashita: Well, Kashgar is arguably the biggest market in
Asia. And it was a big market obviously in Marco Polo's day.
As he puts it, there's a wealth of goods here and merchants
travel, from Kashgar all over the world. The feel of this
place is definitely for me, 13th century.
What hasn't changed are the people and the faces and the
bargaining and all this human interaction and that's what
turns me on. And those are the pictures that I'm going for.
This, the donkey section, it seems to be, contained the most
characters. I think it's because donkeys are like a very basic
form of transportation. And therefore you get very basic
people here. Great faces, seemingly much more than any
other part of the market. And the great thing about shooting
here is nobody seems to pay any attention to you while you're
shooting because they're all so intent on on the the work at
hand which is buying and selling their donkeys. I'm able to walk
around here and shoot without anybody really caring that this
cameras in their face.
I did a picture like this in Afghanistan, same thing throwing
the weed up. And I always choose an angle where I'm right in the
middle of the action. So I almost want to be right in the
scene so you can feel the wind and feel that dust in your face.
It hides and reveals at the same time Marco talks about wheat.
Perfect illustration. Plus, as you know my job is to make
whatever picture of an ordinary situation look look a lot more
than ordinary. I love that. I just love that dust.
What I love about old Kashgar is this feeling that things haven't
changed much here in the last 1000 years or so. I like sitting
on a corner and watching the world go by the women with their
veils over their head. These donkey carts coming by. I feel
privileged being a photographer and being able to see scenes
like this and record them because I feel like I'm seeing
history and putting it on film seeing something that won't be
here in another three or four years.
As we traveled east a few hours across this desert, we're gonna
come across Yangasar, a town famous for its knives.
Well, Marco talks about steelmaking on the Silk Road,
usually in reference to making weapons of war. But anyway, we
thought we should come here because this is the first and
only steelmaking we found. Of course it's also the best knives
supposedly on the Silk Road. And surely, Marco pass this way and
everybody, as you can see, all these Uighurs carry one. And I'm
sure he was carrying one too
I understand the Yangisar knife is the best knife on the Silk
Road. Is that true? Yeah. How long have they been making them?
For a long time. Like how long?
The history? For about 1000 years. How long does it take to
make one of these knives? One knife. It takes three days to
put up one knife.
How long have these guys been working here?
How long does it take for them to be a master knife maker?
For my master, maybe over 30 years? Yeah, how long has this
guy been working? Maybe, about 40 years or 45 years. This guy's
been here for forty five years? He's one of the oldest knife
masters in this factory. Thanks a lot for the tour.
Let's get out of this noise. Show me some of those knives I'd
like to buy. Hey check out my Yangisar blade with the yak horn
handle. So from Yangisar, Marco continues along the famous Silk
Road. And one of the most important commodities around
here of course is silk, which gave the road its name. Now most
silk exported from China today is made in factories but of
course we wanted to find silk being made the traditional way,
the way it would have been produced during Marco's time. We
found what we were looking for in the villages around Hotan.
Guli, what's going on here?
Translator: This is called a silk boiling. So they boil the
cocoon in this pot, about 15 minutes and then it becomes very
soft. So the lady find the head of the thread, the silk reeling.
From one cocoon, they can get about 800 meters.
Michael Yamashita: 800 meters? Of raw silk. Wow! What happens
to the worms? Are people still eating those worms?
Translator: Yes, people still eat the worms, also make the soy
sauce.
Michael Yamashita: Do you like to taste? No. I'm not fond of
it myself.
I've never seen that before my life. Are you are you watching
this? Guli? Can you explain to me what's going on here?
(Translator)
Michael Yamashita: Can you explain to me what she's doing
with this?
Translator: This is corn starch. Make the silk stiff.
Michael Yamashita: It makes it stiff
Wow! I've never seen that.
That was great.
I guess what I find incredible is first of all, the fruit here
is so good. Marco Polo talks about it, he raves about the
fruit. And we just have traveled through nothing but desert. And
here we are in an oasis town. He just happened to put some water
on the ground and turns into clay so that these guys can
build this wall. And it's the same soil that grows this
amazing fruit. It's almost like if you look at that it looks
like just plain sand but put some water on it and it becomes
just the most fertile soil that you can imagine.
I'm now going in search of what Marco Polo called the cloth that
doesn't burn. And it comes from these remarkable rocks which can
produce fiber as soft as cotton. Not only that, this material is
fireproof.
Here it is, just like the book says. it's sort of a fibrous,
feels feels like cotton. Chinese call it cotton rock. And this is
where it comes from. These veins right here. This white stuff is
stuck in these white and these veins here, sort of a greenish
color in this rock. And that's where asbestos comes from. But
in Marco's time, many believed that asbestos actually came from
the shedding skin of a salamander, a lizard like
creature that was said to live in the fire. It was Marco who
first revealed to the west the secret of its origins.
Marco Polo's book: Beauty is not true that those cloths are of
the hair of an animal which lives in fire. It is a thing of
the earth.
Michael Yamashita: Today asbestos is big business here in
China. It's used to make all sorts of insulating material.
China has some of the biggest asbestos mines in the world
today. And they're still obviously, finding a lot of uses
for this stuff. I guess everybody's wearing a mask as
they do realize there's a danger here. But just as Marco
describes it, so it is here he passed through here. It has to
be firsthand observation, he can't have described it any more
better, unless he had seen it, just the way I'm looking at it
right now.
With each triumphant find, I am more and more convinced that
Marco had to be writing from firsthand experience. Not only
are the sights exactly as he described, but we are finding
each precisely where he tells us to look. No matter if you're a
believer in Marco Polo or not, the mystery of whether he made
it to China has brought us here. He's crossed the Pamirs, the so
called roof of the world, suffering from incredible cold
and high altitude. He's descended into Kashgar, where he
visits the great market and reports about all the merchants
who from here go all over the world. He's seen the silk being
made on the Silk Road. And he's discovered the amazing cloth
that doesn't burn. And here we are, now on the edge of the
Taklimakan, heading to the fabled land of Xanadu, and the
magnificent palace of the Mongol ruler, Kublai Khan. And perhaps
his biggest challenge lies ahead of him: crossing this unending,
unbearable desert, which in its native language means "go in,
and you won't come out."
Marco Polo's book: When travelers are on the move by
night, and one of them chances to lag behind, he will hear
spirits talking, and will suppose them to be his comrades,
and thus shall a traveler be led astray, so that he never finds
his party, and in this way, many have perished.
Michael Yamashita: Well, here I am in the Taklimakan, the
hottest and driest desert in all of China. It gives you a real
appreciation for what Marco Polo must have gone through, spending
two months crossing over this same waste land of sand, 100
degree heat. You're always feeling dry. You're never quite
comfortable, it's the sand that's itching or the sweat
that's dripping down your brow. It must have been the hardest
part of his journey.
Dr. Frances Wood: From very early on, people cast doubt on
Marco Polo. First of all, people didn't believe what was written
how vast and enormous China was. Then you get, more in the 19th
century, people start questioning whether it was
possible to get from X to Y in the sort of time he states. And
gradually I think if you build up, if you were to build up the
doubts that have been expressed over the centuries, you start to
see that there are very real questions about Marco Polo, but
they never quite defeat those who want him to have been there.
Michael Yamashita: So here we are now an Aksai on the edge of
the desert and we've run into these nomadic people or former
nomads. They're Kazhaks and would you believe it? It's a
wedding. As I often say, photographers are paid to be
lucky.
Okay, so this is the, this is the bride being brought to the
groom's neighborhood and she just got off the car. She
doesn't have her full get up on but boy, does she look great
wearing red, I can't believe it.
The groom's coming in to meet the family. Everybody's
welcoming them.
Look at all the guests, look at these babes, look at these women
wearing these incredibly colorful dresses.
Unknown: This must be the bride's mother.
Michael Yamashita: They don't even need music to dance here.
Alright I don't know what rhythm these ladies are dancing to but
I don't hear any music. (Foreign language)
Marco Polo's book: Those who have reared the sheep, bring it
with their children and perform a solemn act of devotion. They
will have the sheep slaughtered and cooked, they have the head,
feet, entrails and fleece.
Whoa whoa (singing).
In rereading my copy of Marco Polo last night, regarding his time spent in
Dunhuang, I was struck by the similarity, or not even
similarity, how exactly he described a sheep sacrifice, in
this case for the protection of the children, and how that just
exactly fit what we saw here at the wedding last night. Of
course, his critics say it's not what Marco described that raises
doubts. It's what he failed to mention.
Dr. Frances Wood: There are some very serious omissions which do
really seriously make one question whether this is an
eyewitness account. He doesn't, for example, in China, mention
chopsticks once. He doesn't mention drinking tea, although
his defenders would say, "well, that's because he didn't like
tea, perhaps he preferred wine because he was Italian." He
doesn't mention the bound feet that he might have seen on
certain Chinese women. So these omissions are a slight problem.
Michael Yamashita: I think it's important to show not only what
Marco described, but what he didn't describe and try to come
to some answers to why he didn't describe it. I'm looking for the
famous village with the women with the bound feet. Now bound
feet women don't exist everywhere in China because it
was banned about 100 years ago. But in these far off provinces
and faraway villages, there still exist quite a few of these
women who are now in their 80s and 90s. This particular village
is famous because they formed a troupe called the little feet
dancing troupe, so I know they're here. Now one of the
biggest arguments by those non believers in Marco Polo is this
bound foot issue. However, I think he did talk about it. He
describes the women's gait as being very dainty, and that
they, each step is only a hair's breadth in front of the next
step. That, to me, is describing the way a bound foot woman
walks. The other thing is, he would not have seen them since
they all wore long dresses in those days. And therefore, in my
opinion, for sure, he talks about the bound feet without
ever having seen them. These women have the smallest feet
I've ever seen.
So May, I understand these women are have this smallest feet in
the village? Yeah. Can you ask how old was she when they bound
her feet? (Chinese translator with elderly women).
Four to five years old. 4 to 5?
Translator: So at that time, the women they have to have a very
smaller, very small feet so that they can marry a very good
person, rich person.
Michael Yamashita: Could I, could I take a look at that
shoe? (Chinese translator) And who makes these shoes.
Translator: she wear eyeglasses and made this. Oh, yeah, you
might have the people to do for her.
Michael Yamashita: Do you mind if I, I see the size comparison.
Unbelievable. But what really is amazing to me is they've been
able to have a pretty darn normal life. And obviously,
there's no shame to this, they seem to be very proud of their
feet. It's just an amazing practice. Now, I'm not a
scholar. So I decided to talk to Professor Liu, a historian and
specialist in Marco Polo. Professor Liu, we're in a tea
house, drinking some very good Chinese tea and I'm going to ask
you therefore, what about the omissions of Marco Polo, the
fact that he never mentioned tea, or chopsticks, for example.
Michael Yamashita: So they wouldn't have he wouldn't have
met many Chinese. As Marco rarely interacted with the lowly
Chinese, no wonder he didn't pick up many of their customs.
But still, how do you explain Marco's most glaring omission:
his failure to mention China's greatest landmark, the Great
Wall.
The Great Wall of China. Over 2000 years old, over 4000 miles
long. It's been built and rebuilt by countless ruling
dynasties. How come Marco Polo never mentioned it in his book.
It's here in Jiayuguan that the mystery of Marco Polo starts to
fall apart.
As any Chinese scholar can tell you, it was this wall, this 10
foot high maybe, mud wall that Marco Polo saw when he traveled
through here in 1275. Now this wall is the Han Wall, built
somewhere around AD 200, just pretty much a lump wandering
through the desert. And if I was Marco Polo, I wouldn't have paid
it a second glance, especially after the walls that he saw and
commented in places like Bam in Iran, the world's biggest
citadel, the Great Wall, in his day was just not great.
It's the Ming wall that all the tourists go to in Beijing that
gives the great to the Great Wall. And that was built 300
years after Marco came this way.
This is it. End of the Great Wall? No way to go this way. No
way to go that way either with a mountains. Marco Polo had to
have passed through here as all, everybody did coming into China
from the west.
By now, the Polos have traveled perhaps 1300 miles in China,
about halfway to Shangdu. And I was getting a little hungry.
So the real question for me is, did Marco Polo bring spaghetti
and ravioli from Italy to China? Or did he bring noodles and
jiaozi from China to Italy? And the real answer is the Arabs
brought noodles both to China and Italy well before Marco Polo
ever arrived here. But for me, I don't care either way. I just
like to taste the noodles: pasta or Chinese noodles, either way,
one of my favorite foods.
As we approach Inner Mongolia, I'm hoping to see the famous
Mongolian horses that so impressed Marco and helped the
Mongols create the biggest empire the world has ever known.
Must have been an amazing sight to see: hundreds of 1000s of
these horses, and men going over these hills. They went off to
battle, they didn't have to carry oats or grain to feed the
horses because the horses just lived off the land. They, of
course, lived off the horses
You know I need to be a little closer. Let's go this way
They'd be on a horse march and going hungry for a couple of
days they actually slit the horse's vein and drink the blood
as it splurted out and then sew it up and on they went. And you
can imagine how an army of that toughness and mobility on horses
could really cover ground over this flat land. We're getting
close to Xanadu and Marco Polo must have been in great
anticipation. Kublai Khan was, and I quote, "the most powerful
man in people and in lands and in treasure that was ever in the
world." This is where the Great Khan reined three months of the
year. All that is left now is rubble.
Hey, we finally made it. Here we are. Shangdu, or Xanadu, as
Coleridge called it. Marco Polo's destination. This is what
he came to see. This is where it where he came to meet the Khan.
And boy, he must have been impressed. Figure this guy's
been traveling for three and a half years; it only took us
what, a little over three weeks. He gets here after crossing
hundreds of miles of desert and he sees this green, and these
walls. You can imagine what it must have been like. I'm
standing on the gate here, on the outside wall. It's the
southern gate, as you can see, the sun is down this way,
directly west. This city has been laid down in a grid. You
can see the outer wall coming down this way, going down that
way to the east and coming around pretty well defined all
the way out there.
Yeah, Marco talks about these, what I think is a roof tile and
the shine it gives off 700 years ago and you can still find them
sitting on the ground here in the middle of the of Xanadu.
When I read Marco Polos description of the palace, I'm
seeing the Forbidden City, in my mind's eye. The checkerboard
pattern, the north south axis, the way it's laid out, the
doubled walls, the huge halls that could seat 6000 banqueters
at one sitting. What he describes is what I feel here
and what I'm seeing is, is indeed this Forbidden City, but
the actual Palace was destroyed, as were most remnants of the
Yuan Dynasty. Wow! Can you believe this? I've been here at
least a half a dozen times. And every time I come here, I'm just
totally blown away by the scale and grandeur. I feel like I'm on
a movie set. And just think what Marco Polo must have felt: a
small town guy, and he comes to this amazing city, with over a
million population. He must have been totally blown away. This
must have absolutely floored him to see something like this.
From Xanadu, Marco travelled to Daidu, the New City being built
by the Khan. Today, it's called Beijing. And you can still find
Marco's legacy and China's bustling capitol.
Marco Polo's book: There is not a bridge in the world to compare
with it. It has 24 arches, and is built entirely of gray
marble. At the foot of the column is a marble lion. And on
top of the column, another of great beauty and size and fine
workmanship.
Michael Yamashita: You know, Marco Polo was totally impressed
by this bridge, and described it in a lot of detail. And
therefore, to this day, his name's on it. This is the Marco
Polo Bridge. But, you know, I've been here photographing this
thing for half a day now. And I still can't, couldn't have told
you how many arches are here, unless I specifically focused on
that and counted them. So those who doubt Marco Polo are saying
that he didn't get the arches right. And I'm saying, who's
counting? He also talked about the the lions up there on the
columns, and he got the lion on top right. But he also mentioned
there was a lion on the bottom. So again, the doubters say,
well, look, he mentioned two lions and there's only one. But
for a guy who supposedly wrote the book without taking notes, I
say it's an amazing feat that he got as much right as he did on
some detail, like a column and how many lions were carved
either top or bottom. It was here that Marco became a
trusted, confidant to the Khan, working as an emissary and
traveling to the furthest reaches of the Mongol Empire.
Marco could not have imagined what the next 17 years would
bring: the vast cities and strange customs he's going to
see; people who dined on raw flesh; Chinese cities far more
advanced than those of the West. Could any of this be true? We
have to make sure that what we are photographing is accurate.
Who, what, when, where, why are the main questions when I'm
writing up my notes. And at the end of every morning or every
session of pictures, I like to sit down logging my film and
write as much detail as I can about the subject that is
photographed.
Somehow I think Marco Polo in many of the sections in the book
has had to have written from notes. The reason is, it's just
too detailed and too accurate. There are other sections that
you can tell he's just sort of his writing from memory because
there's no detail there.
I don't know about you, but for me, it's very hard to remember
what I shot yesterday or did yesterday, let alone three weeks
or three years ago. In Marco's case, some of the stuff he's
writing down is 30 years old before he gets around writing
about it. So, either he has had an amazing memory or he took
notes. Perhaps that was when he was working as a envoy for the
Khan. Traveling on his behalf, he took notes in order to better
explain what he was seeing in some of these far flung
provinces.
This is the Grand Canal of Yangzhou: a manmade waterway
Marco described as stretching nearly 1100 miles from Beijing.
Marco Polo's book: So that this Yangzhou, is you see, a city of
great importance and Msr. Marco Polo himself, of whom this book
speaks, did govern this city for full years, by the order of the
Great Khan.
Michael Yamashita: We're in Yangzhou, where Marco supposedly
lived for three years and supposedly he was the governor
here. Now, most experts figure that he couldn't have been
governor, otherwise there would have been some mention of him in
Chinese texts about the period.
Dr. Frances Wood: I think one of the most serious problems about
Marco Polo is the fact that he doesn't appear in any of the
Chinese or indeed the Mongol records of the periods. The
Chinese were the biggest bureaucrats in the world. They
wrote everything down. They recorded everything. Every
governor of every city, every small official. Marco Polo and
his family do not appear anywhere. There are records of
other Europeans listed in the Chinese annals, but nothing
about the Polos, and believe me, Chinese historians, European
historians have been searching for the last couple of 100
years, and we found nothing. That's a very serious problem.
Michael Yamashita: The belief is that he was actually a lower
ranking public servant, perhaps a salt administrator. And the
reason why they think that is because he's knows a lot about
salt and Yangzhou was where all the salt in China was coming
from at the time. It was very close to the sea. And anyway
where we are now is actually in a salt administrator's house,
which is a pretty nice place. It is a little strange that if he
indeed did live here for three years, he certainly had very
little to say about it. It was almost as if he was saving all
his praise for the next town we're going to which is
Hangzhou, which he described as the greatest city in the world.
Marco Polo's book: The city is beyond dispute the finest and
noblest in the world.
Michael Yamashita: To me, Hangzhou is a no brainer. It was
the greatest city in the world. He called it the city of heaven.
And it was the London, the Paris, the Rome, the Beijing of
its day. So of course, a young guy is going to be interested in
hanging out here and in describing it in in great
detail. You know if you substitute the word market for
great shopping. If you talk about, he talks about food, well
think: restaurants. He talks about the elegant ladies and the
wine, substitute that for like, nightlife, and realizing the guy
is in his, like 20s. He was just having a great time here.
When Marco described this, it was pretty much the first first
time anybody ever described aquaculture - and that was 700
years ago. They, they raise the fish here in the lake and then
take them on a regular basis. And he was, he thought it was
amazing that people had a full time living as fishermen. So I
guess fishermen in Venice would only go out on occasion or
something. And for him, it was a big deal that these guys made a
living, just fishing. It's not hard to understand why Venetians
couldn't believe what Marco Polo was telling them. The numbers
alone: 1.6 million houses here. 12,000 bridges. Partiers - 1000s
going to weddings on the island. Pleasure seekers. In medieval
Venice, a city of maybe 100,000 people, there was no time for
leisure. And here on the other side of the world, was this
incredible city, so far superior to anything in the West. People
here had just so much better a life.
While working on behalf of the Great Khan, Marco Polo travelled
to the remotest parts of the empire, encountering many
strange people, but none that he relished more than those of the
land they call Tibet.
Marco Polo's book: Men of extraordinary abstinence: all
their life long, they eat nothing but bran, which they
take mixed with hot water. That is their food, bran, and nothing
but bran.
Michael Yamashita: I'm in a Tibetan village above Labrang
monastery. And I'm sitting down with a bunch of young lamas
about to have breakfast. What we're looking at here is some
yak butter tea. That's the yak butter. A big chunk of it into
my smoky tea. And this is the staple of the Tibetan diet.
Not bad. Kinda like rancid milk on top of smokey tea. Okay, and so
he's putting in some tsampa, which is bran. Marco Polo
describes this. He describes the lamas as eating nothing but this
bran. Okay, well, why don't you guys make me one. I don't think
I've got quite the skill. Marco also talks about how dirty the
Tibetans are and the fact that they only wash maybe once a
year. However, they definitely have to use their hands to make
this tsampa. I think that's enough of that.
Marco Polo's book: They have immense minsters and abbeys,
some of them as big as a small town, with more than 2000 monks
in a single abbey. These monks have their head and beard
shaven.
Michael Yamashita: 2000 monks, heads shaven, beards shaven,
eating tsampa and worshipping their gods. It's as like nothing
has changed here in 700 years. I come here. I feel like I'm
seeing exactly what Marco saw. Well, this is why Marco, was
called or so called Milione. People couldn't believe his
figures because there were always 10s of 1000s: the
cities, the populations, the number of boats, the number of
bridges. They were always so much bigger than any numbers
that existed in Europe at the time. Who ever heard of a church
in Europe with 2000 monks praying at one time?
Sometimes these, Marco is describing things, obviously
from firsthand. This is one of them. He had to have known these
people and been here to so enthusiastically describe them.
There are other places along the route where he's talking about
cities that he passes by, with two or three sentences, but a
place like this, he obviously has been here because you can
just read the enthusiasm in his words, as he talks about the
place.
Dr. Frances Wood: I think there's no question that he
could have written the book without going to China. Only 100
years later, there was a famous merchant called Pegalotte, who
worked in Antwerp and never went further than the Holy land. And
he wrote quite a famous book on how to trade with China. He even
advised things like taking a woman with you because it wasn't
safe to consort with Chinese ladies. My feeling is that we're
not dealing with an eyewitness account here. I don't think that
Marco Polo went, saw and described.
Michael Yamashita: Certainly some of the things Marco
described does confound the imagination. He claimed he saw
people who dined on raw flesh. This, I had to see for myself.
On behalf of the great Mongol leader, Kublai Khan, Marco Polo
traveled to Yunnan in southern China, encountering many
minority tribes. One thing that astounded him was the fact that
the people here ate their meat raw and obviously they still do.
But I was surprised to find that the the animal they love eating
raw happens to be pork, which is such a no no. I've learned from
childhood that pork always has to be well cooked. And here
these people for 700 years have been eating raw pork. And as you
can see by the healthy faces around here, they don't look
much the worst for it.
As you can see, the kids are used to it, a common scene out
here.
If you want to eat your pig raw, you gotta get it fresh.
I love the way everybody participates. You got all the
kids in here as well looking forward to the feast afterwards.
So now, now they need to burn this pig just to synge the hair
and to sort of sterilize the skin.
Okay, now we got all the women involved in this part.
See the roles: obviously the men control the fire.
These guys look like regular surgeons.
Marco Polo's book: People of that country eat their meat raw
and put in a sauce of garlic and spices and so eat it just as we
eat meat that is dressed.
Michael Yamashita: Not bad. How come you guys aren't eating? Try
some.
These women are kind of beefy, you know. I think, I shouldn't
say beefy, wrong word. They look like they're well fed. And I
assume they must eat quite a big diet of pork here. I always say
that I can pretty much eat whatever anybody else is eating
anywhere in the world. And I trust that those healthy faces
tell me that that meat is perfectly safe. So I'm not
worried about it. Anyway, it was an experience. I don't think I'd
make it a regular part of my menu but in the interests of
Marco Polo, I knew that I had to eat it.
But there are some whoppers in the book, which are
pretty unbelievable.
Dr. Frances Wood: There's all sorts of medieval rubbish,
fable, mixed in with what is generally now treated as a
rather serious geographic text and it makes it quite difficult
to take the serious bit seriously.
Marco Polo's book: And I assure you, all the men of this island
have heads like dogs and teeth and eyes, likewise. In fact in
the face, they are all just like big mastif dogs.
Michael Yamashita: But in China, there are some pretty unusual
practices that do really exist.
Alright, well, we're out here cormorant fishing, mainly
because Marco Polo never talked about cormorants. So we think
that's a good enough reason to be out here photographing this
unusual way of fishing and wonder why Marco didn't talk
about it considering it must not surprise anybody, it certainly
has me surprised. But this is one thing that's hard to
explain. They were fishing back 700 years ago like this. He
probably did see it if he was here but neglected to mention
it, then again, you can't mention everything. Maybe he
just forgot.
And, then again at the end of, on his deathbed, he did say,
I've only told told you half of what I've seen. So this must be
one of the things that he hasn't told us. Maybe was thinking
there would be another chapter sometime.
Oh yeah! Oh gosh, you see the size of that fish! Wow!
After so many years in China, the Polo's must have been
feeling homesick. Marco, only 17 when he set out from Venice, was
now 37. He knew that Kublai Khan's health was failing, and
his regime was losing its grip on power. We're in Zhouzhuang:
Venice of the east. My favorite time of the day: sunrise. The
colors are warm; the light is soft; and everybody's waking up
and doing what they do in the morning. We like to call it
magic hour because good things happen with the light. And this
particular town really fits Marco' description of Suzhou. He
talked about the 2000 bridges and canals all over the city of
Suzhou. And here we have at least 100 still left. So this is
my image of the way Suzhou looked back 700 years ago. And
you could see how he must have felt right at home and maybe
that's the reason why he spent so much time in this area. It just felt like home.
Finally in 1291, the Khan allowed the Polos
to leave. They traveled by sea from southern China via India to
the Persian Gulf and back overland to Venice. Perhaps
there were epidemics, typhoons or shipwrecks for only 18 of the
600 passengers of their Expedition survived. But Marco
arrived in Venice, a rich man, or so they say. A lot of stories
about how Marco came back into Venice. The one I liked the best
is he comes in looking like a beggar. And he is wearing this
ratty old coat. He whips off the coat and pulls out the lining
and inside, the lining is lined with all kinds of gems and
precious, precious stones. And everybody then knows it's Marco
Polo, and he's about to tell the his stories to the world.
Dr. Frances Wood: The great problem with Marco Polo and his
travels or his discovery of the world is that we don't have the
original manuscript. This has disappeared completely. What we
have are a number of manuscripts, which were copied
from copies from copies from copies. There are maybe 150
early manuscripts of the text of Marco Polo, and every single one
of them is different. Now, if you don't have the original
manuscript, it's very difficult to track back to the source.
Where did the stories come from?
Michael Yamashita: Well, there's one thing that a lot of people
don't know. For years, Venice had been fighting a sea war with
its rival Genoa. And shortly after his return, Marco was put
under house arrest. The world's greatest traveler actually wrote
the book from the four walls of a prison cell. It was under
these circumstances that this legendary book was written,
dictated to his cellmate Rustacello, a famous writer
known for his romantic embellishments. So perhaps it
was this ghostwriter, Rustacello, who was responsible
for some of the exaggerations?
Dr. Frances Wood: I think in the end, we've got to try and make a
balance between the theories, the problems, the omissions, the
doubts, and the question of whether he went to China or not.
And for me, it's fairly clear he didn't. But many other people
feel very strongly that he did. I think in the end, we can't
prove anything with fingerprints or DNA by now. 700 years have
passed. And in the end, it's really just a question of faith.
Michael Yamashita: You know, for every argument the naysayers
have about Marco, I've got an answer. And I'm the only one
that's done this trip. It's one thing, reading about it and
figuring out where he went, from a library seat back in London.
But when you're out on the road, you can't help believe, be a big
believer in Marco Polo. He's too right on.
Marco Polo's book: I believe it was God's will that we should
get back in order that people might learn about the things
that the world contains. Never was there a man who ever
traveled over so much of the world, as did that noble and
illustrious citizen of the city of Venice: Msr. Marco Polo.
Thanks be to God. Amen. Amen.