In Xanadu, page 7
I see not much difference between ourselves and the Turks, save that we have foreskins and they have none, that they have long dresses and we short, and that we talk much and they little. In England the vices in fashion are whoring and drinking, in Turkey sodomy and smoking, we prefer a girl and a bottle, they a pipe and a pathic. They are sensible people.
But in Polo's day, Ayas was not under Turkish control. In the eleventh century Armenian refugees from the Caucasus had fled to the southern shore and captured Ayas and a string of hilltop fortresses. Here they settled down to a curiously pointless existence. Summers were reserved for futile campaigns against their Turkish neighbours, or spent indulging in long, torturous vendettas, raiding each other's castles, carrying off cattle, sheep and women. The winters were given over to devising sadistic means of killing off their prisoners (a Byzantine bishop was put into a sack with his dog, rashly named Armenian, and left until the beast devoured his master), while the women were left to dream up even uglier names for their children (Ablgharib, Kogh. Dgha and Mleh were all popular favourites for the boys). There was no more unpleasant race in Asia, and the Armenians were renowned as such throughout the civilized world. In the Directorium ad passagium faciendum a Dominican who had travelled in Cilicia wrote to warn the Pope of the horrors he came across on the southern shore.
The leopard cannot change his spots, nor the Ethiopian his skin wrote the Friar]. The Armenians simply partake of every error known in the east.... Their king had nine children, and all, sons and daughters alike, have come to a violent end, except one daughter and no one knows what her end will be. One brother killed another with a sword; another poisoned his brother; another strangled his brother in prison, so that they all murdered one another till only the last was left and he was poisoned and died miserably.
Doubtless, Cilician Armenia would have continued in such a manner, had not a new and powerful force pulled it firmly onto the world stage.
In 1241 the Mongols appeared at the borders of Persia and defeated the Seljuk Turks, the Armenians' greatest enemies. The Mongols were uneducated tribesmen who believed in enjoying life's simpler pleasures. Ghengis Khan expressed their philosophy most succinctly. 'Happiness,' he is recorded to have said, lies in conquering one's enemies, driving them in front of oneself, in taking their property, in savouring their despair, in outraging their wives and daughters.'
These were unmistakeably men with whom the Armenians could do business.
In 1253 the Armenian king, Hethoum, set off on the long journey to the Mongol capital of Karakoram. His embassy was a complete success. He got on excellently with the new Great Khan, Mongka, and returned laden with presents and promises of a Mongol-Christian alliance to win back lost Armenian territory and liberate the Holy Land from the Muslims. During the next decade Armenian troops fought beside the Mongols when they swept into Palestine, and in March 1260 Hethoum rode down the streets of the Arab capital of Damascus with the
Mongol general, Kitbogha.
The Mongol alliance did not just bring stability to the Armenian Kingdom; it also brought enormous wealth (something always close to Armenian hearts). The Mongols encouraged merchants to venture the long overland route from China, through Turkestan to Ayas, and the Pax Mongolica established in the vast empire led to a boom in the spice and silk trade, with Ayas as the main port of exchange. The Armenians were quick to exploit the new opportunities. Their merchants made easy fortunes acting as middlemen between Chinese, Persian and Italian merchants, and the royal coffers bulged as the Kingdom taxed every transaction that took place in its bazaars. The presence of so many merchants also brought new markets for the local produce of the fertile coastal plain and the timber of the Taurus forests. It was this that caused the general prosperity that Polo witnessed. 'The country has numerous towns and villages,' he wrote, 'and has everything in plenty.' He was less impressed with the Armenians themselves. 'In days of old the nobles there were valiant men, and did doughty deeds of arms; but nowadays they are poor creatures, and good at nought, unless it be at boozing; they are great at that.'
But the position of Cilician Armenia at the edge of the Mongol world also brought its dangers. When the Muslims counter-attacked under Sultan Baibars, defeating a Mongol army at Ain Jalud and advancing into Palestine, it left the Armenians in an uncomfortable frontline position. In 1266 Baibars took advantage of King Hethoum's absence to rout a small Armenian force near the Syrian Gates. He burned Ayas and the capital of Sis, and retired to Aleppo with great caravans of booty. The Kingdom recovered, but was badly shaken.
Polo arrived at Ayas only five years later in late November 1271. Sometime soon after his arrival a rumour spread that Baibars had set off northwards from Damascus with a large force, and panic swept the port. The two friars who had been sent with the Polos to help convert Kubla Khan fled back to Acre with the Master of the Templars; the Polos alone remained
As I swam back to land (watching, as I did so, a cluster of little boys hiding behind a rock on the seashore, tittering as Laura rose from her sleeping bag and began to change), I wondered what were the Polos' motives for continuing on their expedition when Kubla Khan's instructions to bring 'one hundred men well versed in religion' had become impossible to fulfil and the risks to the expedition were increasing. Looking at Ayas from the sea, it was easy to appreciate the panic. The town lies on the shore under a slight dip of land. Its land walls still stand in some places to their original height, and were clearly never very substantial. Had Baibars decided to attack the port again, there would have been no hope of resisting him. Why then did the Polos decide not to join the friars in making their escape to the relative safety of Acre?
Polo has been extravagantly praised over the years. Tim Severin has called him 'a genius', Eileen Power thought it was impossible to exaggerate the extent of his accomplishments' and that his 'curiosity was insatiable'; Elizabeth Longford believed he possessed 'enthusiasm and a photographic memory'. Hotels have been named after him, designer jeans shops, Chinese restaurants, and Eastern-style Soho strip joints. His book ('the greatest travel book ever written', according to John Masefield) has been turned into a strip cartoon, a one-man show at the Edinburgh Festival, even a million-dollar television drama, broadcast across Europe and Asia, starring Burt Lancaster as the Pope, and Leonard Nimmoy (Mr Spock) as Kubla Khan.
Yet the book is surprisingly dull. Polo did not set out to write an account of his travels, despite the name by which it has always been known, nor did he write a description of a diplomatic expedition originally launched to try to save the Crusader Kingdom. It is not even a general account of the lands he passed through. He says nothing about the sights he saw (he does not even mention the Great Wall of China), and includes very little about Asian social mores (which might have made really interesting reading). Instead he wrote a dry, factual guide to commerce in the East, a book by a merchant for other merchants, containing mainly lists of the merchandise available for sale on the caravan routes, as well as advice on how to overcome the difficulties that might be met along the way: where to stock up with provisions, where to keep an eyi? out for robbers, and how to cross a desert. It is not a romance, nor a book of wonders, nor a history of the world in the manner of Herodotus. For all Rustichello's elaborations, Polo's book was written as an ordinary merchant's manual, and was essentially very similar to other manuals of the time, such as the Pratka delta Mercatura of the Florentine, Francesco Pewlotti. Indeed, of its type it is a very fine example. For all its overlay of romance. Polo's The Travels contained more accurate and detailed information about the place of origin of the luxury Eastern goods and the Silk Road than was available at trK* time from any other source, in either the Islamic or the Christian world.
Polo was not the romantic gallant that legend has made him out to be; he was a hard-headed merchant's son taking a calculated risk on a potentially lucrative expedition. The Venetians were always lukewarm about the concept of crusading and the Polos seem to have soon forgotten the original purpose of their journey. One can only judge Polo from the evidence of The Travels and in the light of this his motive for continuing east from Ayas was simple: profit. Nor was he heading into the unknown. The elder Polos, like, no doubt, many before them, had already made the journey to China, and knew that the risks were not too great; indeed once out of Cilician Armenia and the reach of the armies of Sultan Baibars, the journey would probably be relatively easy. The Mongols had built caravanserai along the length of the trading routes and had made safe the roads. Pax Mongolica ruled. They also had the additional boon of the Gold Tablet from Kubla Khan, a safe conduct from the Supreme Khan himself. There were seme dangers certainly - a party of Frankish merchants had been pillaged near Amassya only a few years before. But the mediaeval merchant had always to take risks, and travel within the Mongol empire was probably considerably safer than in Europe. Fifteen years later when they returned to Venice they were rich men (so much so that in 1362, nearly one hundred years later. Polo's descendants were still arguing over the ownership of the palace which had been acquired with the profits of their forefather's China expedition). The Polos certainly took a gamble when they watched their friars flee back to Acre, and loaded up their caravan for the long land journey to Xanadu, but it was a calculated gamble - and it paid off.
The morning was given over to indolence. I picked halfheartedly through the ruins, but apart from one magnificently vaulted room with bevelled stone voussoirs - perhaps the old Venetian or Genoese consulate - there was little of interest left standing. Successive sacks by Mameluke raiding parties had taken their toll.
I made for a cafe beside the harbour where I found Laura deep in a romantic novel. Laura's penchant for Mills and Boon was a new and unexpected side to her character. The same girl who had swept all before her in the ice-hockey pitches of the Home Counties, who had beaten off a party of rapists during communal riots in Delhi, who had subdued the dons of Magdalen and amazed the boardrooms of the City of London, this same Laura turned out to be nourished by a literary diet of Prince of Darkness. The Rose of Biarritz, Silent Stranger and His Name was Passion. Clearly, beneath the ferocious, ice-hockey-stick-wielding exterior there lay deeper currents. I ordered a glass of beer (Turkey brews a strong German-tasting lager named Efes Pilsen) and opened Runciman's Fall of Constantinople.
Three Turks sat at the next table. One, potbellied and clean-shaven, appeared to be the proprietor. He was lecturing his two friends and gesticulating vehemently. I longed to know what subject could merit such gestures: capital punishment? Deep sea fishing? Castration? His two friends watched him throughout their meal. The elder of the two was having trouble with his stuffed aubergine. He bent down so low to the table that the bristles of his beard almost touched the dish. The sleeves of his jacket had got involved too, and as he wiped them clean, he coughed, spat into the napkin and dropped it onto the floor. The other man wore a stained white vest and had dark brown skin and a labourer's biceps. He had a piece of bread on the end of his fork and was mopping it round and around the tin plate.
When the fat proprietor had finished his lecture, he looked across at our table.
‘Deutsch?'
'English,' said Laura.
'Ingliz,' the fat proprietor explained to his friends.
‘Turkey good?' he shouted, asking the same question that was to be put to us by every Turk we met over the next fortnight .
Turkey good,' we replied as we did to every subsequent inquiry. The Turks are very sensitive about their country.
The fat proprietor raised his glass.
'Sherife,' he said. 'Ingliz - chin-chin.'
The waiter brought over a grubby document, creased at the corner and covered with tea stains.
'Ingliz menu,' he said, beaming at Laura.
We opened the menu and studied it closely.
KUJUK AYAS FAMILY RESTRANT
INGLIZ MENUYU
j
SOAP
-----
Ayas soap
Turkish tripte soap
Sheeps foot
Macaront
Water pies
EATS FROM MEAT
Deuner kepab with pi
Kebap with green pe
Kebap in paper
Meat pide
Kebap with mas patato
Samall bits of meat grilled
Almb chops
VEGETABLES
Meat in earthenware stev pot
Stfue goreen pepper
Stuffed squash
Stuffed tomatoes z
Stuffed cabbages lea
Leek with finced meat
Clery
SALAD
Brain salad
Cacik - a drink made ay ay
And cucumber
FRYING PANS
Fried aggs
Scram fried aggs
Scrum fried omlat
Omlat with brain
SWEETS AND RFUITS
Stewed atrawberry
Nightingales nests
Virgin lips
A sweei dish of thinsh of batter with butter
Banane Meon
Leeches
It was a difficult choice. Laura chose some soap, an almb chop and a bowl of leeches. I opted for a meat pide. Then, for pudding, I ravished some virgin lips.
After lunch, revived by a draught of Turkish tea - hot, sweet and very strong - we shouldered our backpacks and tramped off on the dirt track which led towards the old Armenian capital of Sis. It was still very hot and the countryside was flat and dustily fertile. Small cottage gardens full of vegetables soon perhaps to be mutilated at the Kujuk Ayas Family Restrant) gave way to larger fields of cotton and tobacco, lined with windbreaks of cypress. In one field the harvest had already taken place and the meadows were filled with gleaners, faces lowered towards the stubble, amid a scattering of beehive hayricks. Ahead of them a last solitary reaper was bent over his scythe; it was like a marginal illustration from a Gothic psalter, or a 'Season of the Month' on the misericord of an abbey quire. We tramped on until exhausted, then sat and waited for a lift. A tractor stopped, and we clambered up into the trailer.
Inside was a vast earth-mother swathed in voluminous wraps of calico and taffeta. Beside her was a small boy, presumably her son. She clucked around him like an old broody hen, wiping his nose and removing hay from his hair. She said nothing, but belched occasionally and fed herself noisily from a nose-bag. Good looks have been shared out unevenly among the Turks. Their men are almost all handsome with dark, supple skin and strong features: good bones, sharp eyes and tall, masculine bodies. But the women share their menfolk's pronounced features in a most unflattering way. Very few are beautiful. Their noses are too large, their chins too prominent. Baggy wraps conceal pneumatic bodies. Here, must lie the reason for the Turks' easy drift out of heterosexuality.
The citadel of Sis rises out of the coastal plain, a solitary conical hill in a flat landscape. At the base of the near side of the hill lay an encampment of Yuruks, one of the last surviving tribes ofTurcomen nomads. There were four or five purple felt tents and some wagons, around which sat some wild, dark-skinned women dressed in bright Rajasthani prints, some huge wolf-like dogs, and a few filthy children. I later learned that the encampment was semi-permanent; the Yuruks had settled there a decade before and worked as day labourers in summer, and lived by basket-making and horse-trading in winter. There had recently been an initiative by the government to try and settle the Turcomen, and several hundred had accepted houses in Mersin, where they sat in the bars drinking Efes Pilsen and doubled the crime rate overnight. Others had taken the houses but returned to nomadism in summer; land reclamation had stolen from them many of their traditional pastures, and it was difficult to remain peripatetic for twelve months a year. True nomads are now very few in number.
The tractor driver dropped us off in the market place in the centre of Sis, and leaving our rucksacks at a cafe we set off up the steep cobbled streets towards the citadel. After a while the houses and farmyards gave way to orchards and olive groves and we climbed on up, past the first line of walls, through the outer wards. Above, the great citadel perched on the cliff edge, its horseshoe towers jutting out on overhangs of rock. We passed through the ruins of the old lower town, where the traders and artisans once lived. Little remained of it for, like Ayas, it had been burned by the Mamelukes: in 1266, King Hethoum returned from an expedition to find 'Sis and its chief church given to the flames, the tombs of the kings and princes violated, and their bones torn from this last resting place, burned and scattered as ashes to the wind.' There was nothing left of the Armenian cathedral and the patriarch's palace, both of which were still in use when Sir Henry Yule was writing, late in the last century.
As the incline increased, the soil got thinner and the orchards were replaced by gorse, thistles and yellow cow parsley. We made slow progress or, rather, I made slow progress while Laura shot ahead and I limped up after her. Although it was mid-afternoon, it was still hot, and my shirt was saturated.
Occasionally I would collapse on a ledge, my head resounding to the military band thumping away in my temples, and douse myself with the tepid chlorinated water from the water bottle. Laura seemed impervious to the heat, the exertion, or the imminent danger of dehydration or heart failure. At first she was impatient with me ('Oh get on with it!' 'You should lose weight.' 'When was the last time you took any exercise?') but by about halfway up she seemed to come to terms with the fact that she was not travelling with an athlete and began to tempt me up with gentle, clucking pensioner-talk ('Come on now, only a little bit further' 'Just think, nearly there!' and, 'Oh well done; one last effort now.')
We made it up in three-quarters of an hour, a remarkable feat I thought, though Laura seemed less impressed by the achievement. I sat on the crenellation of a tower and caught my breath. Then, slowly, I got up and looked around.
