Asia -- Description and travel -- Early works to 1800; Mongols -- History; Polo, Marco, 1254-1323?; Voyages and travels
The genealogy recorded by Marco Barbaro, as drawn up from documents
by Ramusio, makes the Castellano of Verona a grandson of our Marco by
a son Maffeo, whom we may safely pronounce not to have existed, and
makes Maria the daughter of Maffeo, Marco’s brother—that is to say,
makes a lady marry in 1414 and have children, whose father was born
in 1271 at the very latest! The genealogy is given in several other
ways, but as I have satisfied myself that they all (except perhaps
this of Barbaro’s, which we see to be otherwise erroneous) confound
together the two distinct families of Polo of S. Geremia and Polo of
S. Giov. Grisostomo, I reserve my faith, and abstain from presenting
them. Assuming that the Marco or Marcolino Polo, spoken of in the
preceding page, was a near relation (as is probable, though perhaps
an illegitimate one), he is the only male descendant of old Andrea of
San Felice whom we can indicate as having survived Marco himself; and
from a study of the links in the professed genealogies I think it not
unlikely that both Marco the Castellano of Verona and Maria Trevisan
belonged to the branch of S. Geremia.[37] [See vol. ii., _App. C_, p.
510.]
[Illustration: The Pseudo Marco Polo at Canton.]
[49. _bis._—It is interesting to note some of the _reliques_ left by
our traveller.
I. The unfortunate Doge of Venice, Marino Faliero, seems to have
possessed many souvenirs of Marco Polo, and among them two manuscripts,
one in the handwriting of his celebrated fellow-citizen(?), and one
adorned with miniatures. M. Julius von Schlosser has reprinted (_Die
ältesten Medaillen und die Antike_, Bd. XVIII., _Jahrb. d. Kunsthist.
Samml. d. Allerhöchsten Kaiserhauses_, Vienna, 1897, pp. 42–43) from
the _Bulletino di arti, industrie e curiosità veneziane_, III.,
1880–81, p. 101,[38] the inventory of the curiosities kept in the “Red
Chamber” of Marino Faliero’s palace in the Parish of the SS. Apostles;
we give the following abstract of it:—
Anno ab incarnacione domini nostri Jesu Christi 1351° indictione
sexta mensis aprilis. Inuentarium rerum qui sunt in camera rubea
domi habitationis clarissimi domini MARINI FALETRO de confinio SS.
Apostolorum, scriptum per me Johannem, presbiterum, dicte ecclesie.
• • • • •
_Item_ alia capsaleta cum ogiis auri et argenti, inter quos unum
anulum con inscriptione que dicit: _Ciuble Can Marco Polo_, et unum
torques cum multis animalibus Tartarorum sculptis, que res donum
dedit predictus MARCUS cuidam Faletrorum.
• • • • •
_Item_ 2 capsalete de corio albo cum variis rebus auri et argenti,
quas habuit praedictus MARCUS a Barbarorum rege.
• • • • •
_Item_ 1 ensem mirabilem, qui habet 3 enses simul, quem habuit in
suis itineribus praedictus MARCUS.
• • • • •
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