CHAPTER V.

OF THE KINGDOM OF MAUSUL.

On the frontier of Armenia towards the south-east is the kingdom

of MAUSUL. It is a very great kingdom, and inhabited{1} by several

different kinds of people whom we shall now describe.

First there is a kind of people called ARABI, and these worship

Mahommet. Then there is another description of people who are NESTORIAN

and JACOBITE Christians. These have a Patriarch, whom they call the

JATOLIC, and this Patriarch creates Archbishops, and Abbots, and

Prelates of all other degrees, and sends them into every quarter, as to

India, to Baudas, or to Cathay, just as the Pope of Rome does in the

Latin countries. For you must know that though there is a very great

number of Christians in those countries, they are all Jacobites and

Nestorians; Christians indeed, but not in the fashion enjoined by the

Pope of Rome, for they come short in several points of the Faith.{2}

All the cloths of gold and silk that are called _Mosolins_ are made in

this country; and those great Merchants called _Mosolins_, who carry

for sale such quantities of spicery and pearls and cloths of silk and

gold, are also from this kingdom.{3}

There is yet another race of people who inhabit the mountains in that

quarter, and are called CURDS. Some of them are Christians, and some of

them are Saracens; but they are an evil generation, whose delight it is

to plunder merchants.{4}

[Near this province is another called MUS and MERDIN, producing an

immense quantity of cotton, from which they make a great deal of

buckram{5} and other cloth. The people are craftsmen and traders, and

all are subject to the Tartar King.]

[Illustration: Coin of Badruddín of Mausul.]

NOTE 1.—Polo could scarcely have been justified in calling MOSUL a

very great kingdom. This is a bad habit of his, as we shall have

to notice again. Badruddín Lúlú, the last Atabeg of Mosul of the

race of Zenghi had at the age of 96 taken sides with Hulaku, and

stood high in his favour. His son Malik Sálih, having revolted,

surrendered to the Mongols in 1261 on promise of life; which

promise they kept in Mongol fashion by torturing him to death.

Since then the kingdom had ceased to exist as such. Coins of

Badruddín remain with the name and titles of Mangku Kaan on their

reverse, and some of his and of other atabegs exhibit curious

imitations of Greek art. (_Quat. Rash._ p. 389; _Jour. As._ IV. VI.

141.).—H. Y. and H. C. [Mosul was pillaged by Timur at the end of

the 14th century; during the 15th it fell into the hands of the

Turkomans, and during the 16th, of Ismail, Shah of Persia.—H. C.]

[The population of Mosul is to-day 61,000 inhabitants—(48,000

Musulmans, 10,000 Christians belonging to various churches, and

3000 Jews).—H. C.]

NOTE 2.—The Nestorian Church was at this time and in the preceding

centuries diffused over Asia to an extent of which little

conception is generally entertained, having a chain of Bishops and

Metropolitans from Jerusalem to Peking. The Church derived its

name from Nestorius, Patriarch of Constantinople, who was deposed

by the Council of Ephesus in 431. The chief “point of the Faith”

wherein it came short, was (at least in its most tangible form) the

doctrine that in Our Lord there were two Persons, one of the Divine

Word, the other of the Man Jesus; the former dwelling in the latter

as in a Temple, or uniting with the latter “as fire with iron.”

_Nestorin_, the term used by Polo, is almost a literal transcript

of the Arab form _Nastúri_. A notice of the Metropolitan sees, with

a map, will be found in _Cathay_, p. ccxliv.

_Játhalík_, written in our text (from G. T.) _Jatolic_, by Fr.

Burchard and Ricold _Jaselic_, stands for Καθολικóς. No doubt it

was originally _Gáthalík_, but altered in pronunciation by the

Arabs. The term was applied by Nestorians to their Patriarch; among

the Jacobites to the _Mafrián_ or Metropolitan. The Nestorian

Patriarch at this time resided at Baghdad. (_Assemani_, vol. iii.

pt. 2; _Per. Quat._ 91, 127.)

The Jacobites, or Jacobins, as they are called by writers of that

age (Ar. _Ya’úbkíy_), received their name from Jacob Baradaeus or

James Zanzale, Bishop of Edessa (so called, Mas’udi says, because

he was a maker of _barda’at_ or saddle-cloths), who gave a great

impulse to their doctrine in the 6th century. [At some time between

the years 541 and 578, he separated from the Church and became a

follower of the doctrine of Eutyches.—H. C.] The Jacobites then

formed an independent Church, which at one time spread over the

East at least as far as Sístán, where they had a see under the

Sassanian Kings. Their distinguishing tenet was _Monophysitism_,

viz., that Our Lord had but one Nature, the Divine. It was in

fact a rebound from Nestorian doctrine, but, as might be expected

in such a case, there was a vast number of shades of opinion

among both bodies. The chief locality of the Jacobites was in the

districts of Mosul, Tekrit, and Jazírah, and their Patriarch was

at this time settled at the Monastery of St. Matthew, near Mosul,

but afterwards, and to the present day, at or near Mardin. [They

have at present two patriarchates: the Monastery of Zapharan near

Baghdad and Etchmiadzin.—H. C.] The Armenian, Coptic, Abyssinian,

and Malabar Churches all hold some shade of the Jacobite doctrine,

though the first two at least have Patriarchs apart.

(_Assemani_, vol. ii.; _Le Quien_, II. 1596; _Mas’udi_, II.

329–330; _Per. Quat._ 124–129.)

NOTE 3.—We see here that _mosolin_ or _muslin_ had a very different

meaning from what it has now. A quotation from Ives by Marsden

shows it to have been applied in the middle of last century to

a strong cotton cloth made at Mosul. Dozy says the Arabs use

_Mauçili_ in the sense of muslin, and refers to passages in ‘The

Arabian Nights.’ [Bretschneider (_Med. Res._ II. p. 122) observes

“that in the narrative of Ch’ang Ch’un’s travels to the west in

1221, it is stated that in Samarkand the men of the lower classes

and the priests wrap their heads about with a piece of white

_mo-sze_. There can be no doubt that mo-sze here denotes ‘muslin,’

and the Chinese author seems to understand by this term the same

material which we are now used to call muslin.”—H. C.] I have found

no elucidation of Polo’s application of _mosolini_ to a class of

merchants. But, in a letter of Pope Innocent IV. (1244) to the

Dominicans in Palestine, we find classed as different bodies of

Oriental Christians, “_Jacobitae, Nestoritae, Georgiani, Graeci,

Armeni, Maronitae, et_ Mosolini.” (_Le Quien_, III. 1342.)

NOTE 4.—“The Curds,” says Ricold, “exceed in malignant ferocity all

the barbarous nations that I have seen.... They are called _Curti_,

not because they are curt in stature, but from the Persian word

for _Wolves_.... They have three principal vices, viz., Murder,

Robbery, and Treachery.” Some say they have not mended since,

but his etymology is doubtful. _Kúrt_ is Turkish for a wolf, not

Persian, which is _Gurg_; but the name (_Karduchi, Kordiaei_, etc.)

is older, I imagine, than the Turkish language in that part of

Asia. Quatremère refers it to the Persian _gurd_, “strong, valiant,

hero.” As regards the statement that some of the Kurds were

Christians, Mas’udi states that the Jacobites and certain other

Christians in the territory of Mosul and Mount Judi were reckoned

among the Kurds. (_Not. et Ext._ XIII. i. 304.) [The Kurds of Mosul

are in part nomadic and are called _Kotcheres_, but the greater

number are sedentary and cultivate cereals, cotton, tobacco, and

fruits. (_Cuinet._) Old Kurdistan had Shehrizor (Kerkuk, in the

sanjak of that name) as its capital.—H. C.]

NOTE 5.—Ramusio here, as in all passages where other texts

have _Bucherami_ and the like, puts _Boccassini_, a word which

has become obsolete in its turn. I see both _Bochayrani_ and

_Bochasini_ coupled, in a Genoese fiscal statute of 1339, quoted by

Pardessus. (_Lois Maritimes_, IV. 456.)

MUSH and MARDIN are in very different regions, but as their actual

interval is only about 120 miles, they _may_ have been under one

provincial government. Mush is essentially Armenian, and, though

the seat of a Pashalik, is now a wretched place. Mardin, on the

verge of the Mesopotamian Plain, rises in terraces on a lofty hill,

and there, says Hammer, “Sunnis and Shias, Catholic and Schismatic

Armenians, Jacobites, Nestorians, Chaldæans, Sun-, Fire-, Calf-,

and Devil-worshippers dwell one over the head of the other.”

(_Ilchan._ I. 191.)