The Great Events by Famous Historians [Volumes 1-14]

71. This is Polo's name for Kublai's capital—Khan-Balig ("the Khan's city")—the Chinese Peking, captured by the Mongols in 1215. In 1264 Kublai made it his chief residence, and in 1267 he built a new city—Marco Polo's Tai-du, more properly Ta-tu—a little to the northeast of the old one.

72. Subdivisions of counties, corresponding to the English hundreds.

73. Llewelyn's brother.

74. It is said that Edward promised the Welsh "a native prince; one who could not speak a word of English," and then presented to their astonished gaze the new-born infant.

75. A British diplomat who has been for many years director of the imperial maritime customs of China.

76. These names appear to be intended for Abaka-khan, a Mongol or Mogul, and Vang-san-chin, a Chinese. Many of the latter nations were employed by Kublai, both in civil and military capacities, and rendered him good service.

77. By the port of Zaitun is probably meant Amoy, and by Kinsai the port of Ningpo or of Chusan, which are at the entrance of the river which flows by Hang-chau, the Kinsai of Polo.

78. The idea of being rendered invulnerable by the use of amulets is common among the natives of the eastern islands.

79. If the original operations were directed, as might be presumed, against the ancient capital, we should infer that the city here spoken of was Ozaka, situated at the mouth of the river upon which, at some distance from the coast, Kioto stands, and which is known to have been formerly much frequented by Chinese shipping. But, according to P. Gaubil, the island was that of Firando, near the city of Nagasaki, not then a place of so much importance as it has since become.

80. There is here a manifest error in the date, which instead of 1264 should rather be 1284. In the early Venice epitome it is 1269, as well as in the early texts printed by the Paris Geographical Society; and in the Basel edition, 1289. Polo cannot be made accountable for these contradictions among his transcribers.

81. No clew presents itself by which to discover the island meant by the name of Zorza or—allowing for the Venetian pronunciation—Jorja. Some suppose it to be in one of the lakes of Tartary.

82. Translated and edited by Francis Egerton, Earl of Ellesmere.

83. In his charter to the city, King Henry exempts his Jews, who were to remain the exclusive property of himself and his successors.

84. The remarkable letter of Robert Grostête, then Archdeacon of Leicester, afterward the famous Bishop of Lincoln, to the Countess on this subject, shows the feelings of the most enlightened churchman in those times toward the Jews. His mercy, if it was mercy, would spare their lives. "As murderers of the Lord, as still blaspheming Christ and mocking his Passion, they were to be in captivity to the princes of the earth. As they have the brand of Cain, and are condemned to wander over the face of the earth, so were they to have the privilege of Cain, that no one was to kill them. But those who favored or harbored them were to take care that they did not oppress Christian subjects by usury. It was for this reason that Simon de Montfort had expelled them from Leicester. Whoever protected them might share in the guilt of their usuries."

85. This act, translated from the Norman French, is remarkable in that the King admits that they (the Jews) are, and have been, very profitable to him and his ancestors.

86. The act for the expulsion of the Jews has not come down to us; we know not, therefore, the reasons alleged for the measure. Of the fact there can be no doubt (see Report on the Dignity of a Peer, p. 180), and there are many documents relating to the event, as writs to the authorities in Gloucester and York, to grant them safe-conduct to the ports where they were to embark.

87. "Great," writes the author of Anglia Judaica, "were the spoils they left behind them. Whole rolls, full of patents relating to their estates, are still remaining in the Tower, which, together with their rents in fee and their mortgages, all escheated to the King."