Volume I Part 33 (1/2)
[Sidenote: Language of the original Work.]
51. As regards the language in which Marco's Book was first committed to writing, we have seen that Ramusio a.s.sumed, somewhat arbitrarily, that it was _Latin_; Marsden supposed it to have been the _Venetian_ dialect; Baldelli Boni first showed, in his elaborate edition (Florence, 1827), by arguments that have been ill.u.s.trated and corroborated by learned men since, that it was _French_.
That the work was originally written in _some_ Italian dialect was a natural presumption, and slight contemporary evidence can be alleged in its favour; for Fra Pipino, in the Latin version of the work, executed whilst Marco still lived, describes his task as a translation _de vulgari_. And in one MS. copy of the same Friar Pipino's Chronicle, existing in the library at Modena, he refers to the said version as made ”_ex vulgari idiomate_ Lombardico.” But though it may seem improbable that at so early a date a Latin version should have been made at second hand, I believe this to have been the case, and that some internal evidence also is traceable that Pipino translated _not_ from the original but from an Italian _version_ of the original.
The oldest MS. (it is supposed) in any Italian dialect is one in the Magliabecchian Library at Florence, which is known in Italy as _L'Ottima_, on account of the purity of its Tuscan, and as _Della Crusca_ from its being one of the authorities cited by that body in their Vocabulary.[2]
It bears on its face the following note in Italian:--
”This Book called the Navigation of Messer Marco Polo, a n.o.ble Citizen of Venice, was written in Florence by Michael Ormanni my great grandfather by the Mother's side, who died in the Year of Grace One Thousand Three Hundred and Nine; and my mother brought it into our Family of Del Riccio, and it belongs to me Pier del Riccio and to my Brother; 1452.”
As far as I can learn, the age which this note implies is considered to be supported by the character of the MS. itself.[3] If it be accepted, the latter is a performance going back to within eleven years _at most_ of the first dictation of the Travels. At first sight, therefore, this would rather argue that the original had been written in pure Tuscan. But when Baldelli came to prepare it for the press he found manifest indications of its being a Translation from the _French_. Some of these he has noted; others have followed up the same line of comparison. We give some detailed examples in a note.[4]
[Sidenote: Old French Text published by the Societe de Geographie.]
52. The French Text that we have been quoting, published by the Geographical Society of Paris in 1824, affords on the other hand the strongest corresponding proof that it is an original and not a Translation. Rude as is the language of the ma.n.u.script (Fr. 1116, formerly No. 7367, of Paris Library), it is, in the correctness of the proper names, and the intelligible exhibition of the itineraries, much superior to any form of the Work previously published.
The language is very peculiar. We are obliged to call it French, but it is not ”Frenche of Paris.” ”Its style,” says Paulin Paris, ”is about as like that of good French authors of the age, as in our day the natural accent of a German, an Englishman, or an Italian, is like that of a citizen of Paris or Blois.” The author is at war with all the practices of French grammar; subject and object, numbers, moods, and tenses, are in consummate confusion. Even readers of his own day must at times have been fain to guess his meaning. Italian words are constantly introduced, either quite in the crude or rudely Gallicized.[5] And words also, we may add, sometimes slip in which appear to be purely Oriental, just as is apt to happen with Anglo-Indians in these days.[6] All this is perfectly consistent with the supposition that we have in this MS. a copy at least of the original words as written down by Rusticiano a Tuscan, from the dictation of Marco an Orientalized Venetian, in French, a language foreign to both.
But the character of the language _as French_ is not its only peculiarity.
There is in the style, apart from grammar or vocabulary, a rude angularity, a rough dramatism like that of oral narrative; there is a want of proportion in the style of different parts, now over curt, now diffuse and wordy, with at times even a hammering reiteration; a constant recurrence of pet colloquial phrases (in which, however, other literary works of the age partake); a frequent change in the spelling of the same proper names, even when recurring within a few lines, as if caught by ear only; a literal following to and fro of the hesitations of the narrator; a more general use of the third person in speaking of the Traveller, but an occasional lapse into the first. All these characteristics are strikingly indicative of the unrevised product of dictation, and many of them would _necessarily_ disappear either in translation or in a revised copy.
Of changes in representing the same proper name, take as an example that of the Kaan of Persia whom Polo calls _Quiacatu_ (Kaikhatu), but also _Acatu, Catu_, and the like.
As an example of the literal following of dictation take the following:--
”Let us leave Rosia, and I will tell you about the Great Sea (the Euxine), and what provinces and nations lie round about it, all in detail; and we will begin with Constantinople--First, however, I should tell you about a province, etc.... There is nothing more worth mentioning, so I will speak of other subjects,--but there is one thing more to tell you about Rosia that I had forgotten.... Now then let us speak of the Great Sea as I was about to do. To be sure many merchants and others have been here, but still there are many again who know nothing about it, so it will be well to include it in our Book. We will do so then, and let us begin first with the Strait of Constantinople.
”At the Straits leading into the Great Sea, on the West Side, there is a hill called the Faro.--But since beginning on this matter I have changed my mind, because so many people know all about it, so we will not put it in our description but go on to something else.” (See vol. ii. p. 487 seqq.)
And so on.
As a specimen of tautology and hammering reiteration the following can scarcely be surpa.s.sed. The Traveller is speaking of the _Chughi_, i.e. the Indian Jogis:--
”And there are among them certain devotees, called _Chughi_; these are longer-lived than the other people, for they live from 150 to 200 years; and yet they are so hale of body that they can go and come wheresoever they please, and do all the service needed for their monastery or their idols, and do it just as well as if they were younger; and that comes of the great abstinence that they practise, in eating little food and only what is wholesome; for they use to eat rice and milk more than anything else. And again I tell you that these Chughi who live such a long time as I have told you, do also eat what I am going to tell you, and you will think it a great matter. For I tell you that they take quicksilver and sulphur, and mix them together, and make a drink of them, and then they drink this, and they say that it adds to their life; and in fact they do live much longer for it; and I tell you that they do this twice every month. And let me tell you that these people use this drink from their infancy in order to live longer, and without fail those who live so long as I have told you use this drink of sulphur and quicksilver.”
(See G. T. p. 213.)
Such talk as this does not survive the solvent of translation; and we may be certain that we have here the nearest approach to the Traveller's reminiscences as they were taken down from his lips in the prison of Genoa.
[Sidenote: Conclusive proof that the Old French Text is the source of all the others.]
53. Another circ.u.mstance, heretofore I believe unnoticed, is in itself enough to demonstrate the Geographic Text to be the source of all other versions of the Work. It is this.
In reviewing the various cla.s.ses or types of texts of Polo's Book, which we shall hereafter attempt to discriminate, there are certain proper names which we find in the different texts to take very different forms, each cla.s.s adhering in the main to one particular form.
Thus the names of the Mongol ladies introduced at pp. 32 and 36 of this volume, which are in proper Oriental form _Bulughan_ and _Kukachin_, appear in the cla.s.s of MSS. which Pauthier has followed as _Bolgara_ and _Cogatra_; in the MSS. of Pipino's version, and those founded on it, including Ramusio, the names appear in the correcter forms _Bolgana_ or _Balgana_ and _Cogacin_. Now _all the forms_ Bolgana, Balgana, Bolgara, _and_ Cogatra, Cocacin _appear in the Geographic Text_.
Kaikhatu Kaan appears in the Pauthier MSS. as _Chiato_, in the Pipinian as _Acatu_, in the Ramusian as _Chiacato. All three forms_, Chiato, Achatu, and Quiacatu _are found in the Geographic Text_.
The city of Koh-banan appears in the Pauthier MSS. as _Cabanant_, in the Pipinian and Ramusian editions as _Cobinam_ or _Cobinan_. _Both forms are found in the Geographic Text_.