CHAPTER III.
DESCRIPTION OF THE GREATER HERMENIA.
This is a great country. It begins at a city called ARZINGA, at which
they weave the best buckrams in the world. It possesses also the best
baths from natural springs that are anywhere to be found.{1} The people
of the country are Armenians, and are subject to the Tartar. There are
many towns and villages in the country, but the noblest of their cities
is Arzinga, which is the See of an Archbishop, and then ARZIRON and
ARZIZI.{2}
The country is indeed a passing great one, and in the summer it is
frequented by the whole host of the Tartars of the Levant, because it
then furnishes them with such excellent pasture for their cattle. But
in winter the cold is past all bounds, so in that season they quit
this country and go to a warmer region, where they find other good
pastures. [At a castle called PAIPURTH, that you pass in going from
Trebizond to Tauris, there is a very good silver mine.{3}]
And you must know that it is in this country of Armenia that the Ark of
Noah exists on the top of a certain great mountain [on the summit of
which snow is so constant that no one can ascend;{4} for the snow never
melts, and is constantly added to by new falls. Below, however, the
snow does melt, and runs down, producing such rich and abundant herbage
that in summer cattle are sent to pasture from a long way round about,
and it never fails them. The melting snow also causes a great amount of
mud on the mountain].
The country is bounded on the south by a kingdom called Mosul, the
people of which are Jacobite and Nestorian Christians, of whom I shall
have more to tell you presently. On the north it is bounded by the
Land of the Georgians, of whom also I shall speak. On the confines
towards Georgiania there is a fountain from which oil springs in great
abundance, insomuch that a hundred shiploads might be taken from it at
one time. This oil is not good to use with food, but ’tis good to burn,
and is also used to anoint camels that have the mange. People come from
vast distances to fetch it, for in all the countries round about they
have no other oil.{5}
Now, having done with Great Armenia, we will tell you of Georgiania.
NOTE 1.—[ERZINJAN, Erzinga, or Eriza, in the vilayet of Erzrum,
was rebuilt in 1784, after having been destroyed by an earthquake.
“Arzendjan,” says Ibn Batuta, II. p. 294, “is in possession of
well-established markets; there are manufactured fine stuffs, which
are called after its name.” It was at Erzinjan that was fought in
1244 the great battle, which placed the Seljuk Turks under the
dependency of the Mongol Khans.—H. C.] I do not find mention of its
hot springs by modern travellers, but Lazari says Armenians assured
him of their existence. There are plenty of others in Polo’s route
through the country, as at Ilija, close to Erzrum, and at Hássan
Kalá.
The _Buckrams_ of Arzinga are mentioned both by Pegolotti (_circa_
1340) and by Giov. d’Uzzano (1442). But what were they?
Buckram in the modern sense is a coarse open texture of cotton
or hemp, loaded with gum, and used to stiffen certain articles
of dress. But this was certainly _not_ the mediæval sense. Nor
is it easy to bring the mediæval uses of the term under a single
explanation. Indeed Mr. Marsh suggests that probably two different
words have coalesced. Fr.-Michel says that _Bouqueran_ was _at
first_ applied to a light cotton stuff of the nature of muslin,
and _afterwards_ to linen, but I do not see that he makes out
this history of the application. Douet d’Arcq, in his _Comptes de
l’Argenterie_, etc., explains the word simply in the modern sense,
but there seems nothing in his text to bear this out.
A quotation in Raynouard’s Romance Dictionary has “_Vestirs de
polpra e de_ bisso _que est_ bocaran,” where Raynouard renders
_bisso_ as _lin_; a quotation in Ducange also makes Buckram the
equivalent of Bissus; and Michel quotes from an inventory of 1365,
“_unam culcitram pinctam_ (qu. punctam?) _albam factam_ de bisso
_aliter_ boquerant.”
Mr. Marsh again produces quotations, in which the word is used as
a proverbial example of _whiteness_, and inclines to think that it
was a bleached cloth with a lustrous surface.
It certainly was not _necessarily_ linen. Giovanni Villani, in
a passage which is curious in more ways than one, tells how the
citizens of Florence established races for their troops, and, among
other prizes, was one which consisted of a _Bucherame di bambagine_
(of cotton). Polo, near the end of the Book (Bk. III. ch. xxxiv.),
speaking of Abyssinia, says, according to Pauthier’s text: “_Et si
y fait on moult beaux_ bouquerans et autres draps de coton.” The G.
T. is, indeed, more ambiguous: “_Il hi se font maint biaus dras_
banbacin e bocaran” (cotton _and_ buckram). When, however, he uses
the same expression with reference to the delicate stuffs woven
on the coast of Telingana, there can be no doubt that a cotton
texture is meant, and apparently a fine muslin. (See Bk. III. ch.
xviii.) Buckram is _generally_ named as an article of price, _chier
bouquerant_, _rice boquerans_, etc, but not always, for Polo in one
passage (Bk. II. ch. xlv.) seems to speak of it as the clothing of
the poor people of Eastern Tibet.
Plano Carpini says the tunics of the Tartars were either of buckram
(_bukeranum_), of _purpura_ (a texture, perhaps velvet), or of
_baudekin_, a cloth of gold (pp. 614–615). When the envoys of the
Old Man of the Mountain tried to bully St. Lewis, one had a case
of daggers to be offered in defiance, another a _bouqueran_ for a
winding sheet (_Joinville_, p. 136.)
In accounts of materials for the use of Anne Boleyn in the time
of her prosperity, _bokeram_ frequently appears for “lyning and
taynting” (?) gowns, lining sleeves, cloaks, a bed, etc., but it
can scarcely have been for mere stiffening, as the colour of the
buckram is generally specified as the same as that of the dress.
A number of passages seem to point to a _quilted_ material.
Boccaccio (Day viii. Novel 10) speaks of a quilt (_coltre_)
of the whitest buckram of Cyprus, and Uzzano enters buckram
quilts (_coltre di Bucherame_) in a list of _Linajuoli_, or
linen-draperies. Both his handbook and Pegolotti’s state repeatedly
that buckrams were sold by the piece or the half-score pieces—never
by measure. In one of Michel’s quotations (from _Baudouin de
Sebourc_) we have:
“Gaufer li fist premiers armer d’un auqueton
Qui fu de _bougherant_ et _plaine de bon coton_.”
Mr. Hewitt would appear to take the view that Buckram meant a
quilted material; for, quoting from a roll of purchases made
for the Court of Edward I., an entry for Ten Buckrams to make
sleeves of, he remarks, “The sleeves appear to have been of
_pourpointerie_,” _i.e._ quilting. (_Ancient Armour_, I. 240.)
This signification would embrace a large number of passages
in which the term is used, though certainly not all. It would
account for the mode or sale by the piece, and frequent use of the
expression _a_ buckram, for its habitual application to _coltre_
or counterpanes, its use in the _auqueton_ of Baudouin, and in the
jackets of Falstaff’s “men in buckram,” as well as its employment
in the frocks of the Mongols and Tibetans. The winter _chapkan_,
or long tunic, of Upper India, a form of dress which, I believe,
correctly represents that of the Mongol hosts, and is probably
derived from them, is almost universally of quilted cotton.[1] This
signification would also facilitate the transfer of meaning to
the substance now called buckram, for that is used as a _kind_ of
quilting.
The derivation of the word is very uncertain. Reiske says it is
Arabic, _Abu-Kairám_, “Pannus cum intextis figuris”; Wedgwood,
attaching the modern meaning, that it is from It., _bucherare_, to
pierce full of holes, which might be if _bucherare_ could be used
in the sense of _puntare_, or the French _piquer_; Marsh connects
it with the _bucking_ of linen; and D’Avezac thinks it was a stuff
that took its name from _Bokhara_. If the name be local, as so many
names of stuffs are, the French form rather suggests _Bulgaria_.
[Heyd, II. 703, says that Buckram (Bucherame) was principally
manufactured at Erzinjan (Armenia), Mush, and Mardin (Kurdistan),
Ispahan (Persia), and in India, etc. It was shipped to the west at
Constantinople, Satalia, Acre, and Famagusta; the name is derived
from Bokhara.—H. C.]
(_Della Decima_, III. 18, 149, 65, 74, 212, etc.; IV. 4, 5, 6,
212; _Reiske’s_ Notes to _Const. Porphyrogen._ II.; _D’Avezac_, p.
524; _Vocab. Univ. Ital.; Franc.-Michel, Recherches_, etc. II. 29
_seqq._; _Philobiblon Soc. Miscell._ VI.; _Marsh’s Wedgwood’s Etym.
Dict._ sub voce.)
[Illustration: Castle of Baiburt.]
NOTE 2.—Arziron is ERZRUM, which, even in Tournefort’s time, the
Franks called _Erzeron_ (III. 126); [it was named _Garine_, then
_Theodosiopolis_, in honour of Theodosius the Great; the present
name was given by the Seljukid Turks, and it means “Roman Country”;
it was taken by Chinghiz Khan and Timur, but neither kept it long.
Odorico (_Cathay_, I. p. 46), speaking of this city, says it “is
mighty cold.” (See also on the low temperature of the place,
Tournefort, _Voyage du Levant_, II. pp. 258–259.) Arzizi, ARJISH,
in the vilayet of Van, was destroyed in the middle of the 19th
century; it was situated on the road from Van to Erzrum. Arjish
Kalá was one of the ancient capitals of the Kingdom of Armenia; it
was conquered by Toghrul I., who made it his residence. (Cf. Vital
Cuinet, _Turquie d’Asie_, II. p. 710).—H. C.]
Arjish is the ancient _Arsissa_, which gave the Lake Van one of its
names. It is now little more than a decayed castle, with a village
inside.
Notices of Kuniyah, Kaisariya, Sivas, Arzan-ar-Rumi, Arzangan,
and Arjish, will be found in Polo’s contemporary Abulfeda. (See
_Büsching_, IV. 303–311.)
NOTE 3.—Paipurth, or Baiburt, on the high road between Trebizond
and Erzrum, was, according to Neumann, an Armenian fortress in the
first century, and, according to Ritter, the castle _Baiberdon_
was fortified by Justinian. It stands on a peninsular hill,
encircled by the windings of the R. Charok. [According to Ramusio’s
version Baiburt was the third relay from Trebizund to Tauris, and
travellers on their way from one of these cities to the other
passed under this stronghold.—H. C.] The Russians, in retiring
from it in 1829, blew up the greater part of the defences. The
nearest silver mines of which we find modern notice, are those of
_Gumish-Khánah_ (“Silverhouse”), about 35 miles N.W. of Baiburt;
they are more correctly mines of lead rich in silver, and were once
largely worked. But the _Masálak-al-absár_ (14th century), besides
these, speaks of two others in the same province, one of which was
near _Bajert_. This Quatremère reasonably would read _Babert_ or
Baiburt. (_Not. et Extraits_, XIII. i. 337; _Texier_, _Arménie_, I.
59.)
NOTE 4.—Josephus alludes to the belief that Noah’s Ark still
existed, and that pieces of the pitch were used as amulets. (_Ant._
I. 3. 6.)
Ararat (16,953 feet) was ascended, first by Prof. Parrot, September
1829; by Spasski Aotonomoff, August 1834; by Behrens, 1835; by
Abich, 1845; by Seymour in 1848; by Khodzko, Khanikoff, and others,
for trigonometrical and other scientific purposes, in August 1850.
It is characteristic of the account from which I take these notes
(_Longrimoff_, in _Bull. Soc. Géog. Paris_, sér. IV. tom. i. p.
54), that whilst the writer’s countrymen, Spasski and Behrens, were
“moved by a noble curiosity,” the Englishman is only admitted to
have “gratified a tourist’s whim”!
NOTE 5.—Though Mr. Khanikoff points out that springs of naphtha are
abundant in the vicinity of Tiflis, the mention of _ship-loads_
(in Ramusio indeed altered, but probably by the Editor, to
_camel-loads_), and the vast quantities spoken of, point to the
naphtha-wells of the Baku Peninsula on the Caspian. Ricold speaks
of their supplying the whole country as far as Baghdad, and
Barbaro alludes to the practice of anointing camels with the oil.
The quantity collected from the springs about Baku was in 1819
estimated at 241,000 _poods_ (nearly 4000 tons), the greater part
of which went to Persia. (_Pereg. Quat._ p. 122; _Ramusio_, II.
109; _El. de Laprim._ 276; _V. du Chev. Gamba_, I. 298.)
[The phenomenal rise in the production of the Baku oil-fields
between 1890–1900, may be seen at a glance from the Official
Statistics where the total output for 1900 is given as 601,000,000
poods, about 9,500,000 tons. (Cf. _Petroleum_, No. 42, vol. ii. p.
13.)]
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[1] Polo’s contemporary, the Indian Poet Amír Khusrú, puts in the mouth
of his king Kaikobád a contemptuous gibe at the Mongols with their
cotton-quilted dresses. (_Elliot_, III. p. 526.)