In terms of the legacy of Marco Polo's travel to China, it was noteworthy as one of the first Europe

Marco Polo (September 15, 1254 [ 1 ] January 9, 1324 at earliest, but no later than June 1325 [ 2 ] ) was a trader and explorer from the Venetian Republic sleep inn maingate [ 3 ] who gained fame for his worldwide travels, recorded in the book Il Milione ("The Million" or The Travels of Marco Polo ) also known as Oriente Poliano (the Orient of the Polos) and the Description of the World . [ 4 ]
Polo, together with his father Niccolò and his uncle Maffeo, sleep inn maingate was one of the first Westerners to travel sleep inn maingate the Silk Road to China (which he called Cathay , after the Khitan ) and visit Kublai Khan , a grandson of Genghis Khan and the founder of the Yuan Dynasty .
The Polo name originally did not belong to a family of explorers, but to a family of traders. Marco Polo's father, Niccolò (also Nicolò sleep inn maingate in Venetian ) and his uncle, Maffeo (also Maffio ), were prosperous merchants who traded with the East. They were partners with a third brother, named Marco il vecchio (the Elder). The three brothers were all Venetian merchants who established trading posts in Constantinople , Sudak in the Crimea , and in a western part of the Mongol Empire . [ 4 ]
In 1252, Niccolò and Maffeo left Venice for Constantinople sleep inn maingate , where they resided for several years. [ 5 ] The two brothers sleep inn maingate lived in the Venetian quarter of Constantinople, where they enjoyed political chances and tax relief because of their country's role in establishing the Latin Empire in the Fourth Crusade of 1204. However, the family judged the political situation of the city precarious, so they decided to transfer their business sleep inn maingate northeast to Soldaia , a city in Crimea , and left Constantinople in 1259. Their decision proved wise. Constantinople was recaptured in 1261 by Michael Palaeo logus , the ruler of the Empire of Nicaea sleep inn maingate , who promptly sleep inn maingate burned the Venetian quarter. Captured Venetian sleep inn maingate citizens were blinded, [ 6 ] while many of those who managed to escape perished aboard overloaded refugee ships fleeing to other Venetian colonies in the Aegean Sea .
As their new home on the north rim of the Black Sea , Soldaia had been frequented sleep inn maingate by Venetian traders since the 12th century. The Mongol army sacked it in 1223, but the city had never been definitively conquered until 1239, when it became a part of the newly formed Mongol state known as the Golden Horde . Searching for better profits, the Polos continued their journey to Sarai , where the court of Berke Khan , the ruler of the Golden Horde, was located. At that time, the city of Sarai already visited by William of Rubruck a few years earlier was no more than a huge encampment, and the Polos stayed for about a year. Finally, they decided to avoid Crimea, because of a civil war between Berke and his cousin sleep inn maingate Hulagu or perhaps because of the bad relationship between Berke Khan and the Byzantine Empire . Instead, they moved further east to Bukhara , in modern day Uzbekistan , where the family lived and traded for three years. Nicolò and Maffeo in Bukhara , where they stayed for three years. They were invited by an envoy of Hulagu (right) to travel east to visit Kublai Khan .
In his book, Il Milione , Marco explains how Kublai Khan officially received the Polos and sent them back with a Mongol named Koeketei as an ambassador to the Pope . They brought with them a letter from the Khan requesting 100 educated people to come and teach Christianity and Western customs to his people and oil from the lamp of the Holy Sepulcher. sleep inn maingate The letter also contained the paiza , a golden tablet sleep inn maingate a foot long and three inches (76 mm) wide, authorizing the holder to require and obtain lodging, horses and food throughout the Kublai Khan's dominion. sleep inn maingate Koeketei sleep inn maingate left in the middle of the journey, leaving the Polos to travel alone to Ayas in the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia . From that port city, they sailed to Saint Jean d'Acre , capital of the Kingdom of Jerusalem sleep inn maingate . Niccolò and Maffeo sleep inn maingate Polo remitting a letter from Kublai Khan to Pope Gregory X in 1271.
The long sede vacante between the death of Pope Clement IV , in 1268, and the election of Pope Gregory X , in 1271 prevented the Polos from fulfilling Kublai s request. As suggested by Theobald Visconti, then papal legate for the realm of Egypt, in Acre for the Ninth Crusade , the two brothers returned to Venice in 1269 or 1270, waiting for the nomination of the new Pope.
As soon as he was elected sleep inn maingate in 1271, Pope Gregory X (the former Theobald Visconti) received the letter from Kublai Khan, remitted by Niccolo and Maffeo. Kublai Khan was asking for the dispatch of a hundred missionaries, and some oil from the lamp of Jerusalem. The two Polos (this time accompanied by the 17 year-old Marco Polo) returned to Mongolia, accompanied by two Dominican monks , Niccolo de Vicence and Guillaume de Tripoli . The two friars did not finish the voyage due to fear, but the Polos reached Kanbaliq and remitted the presents sleep inn maingate from the Pope to Kublai in 1274. [ 7 ] It is usually said that Marco Polo used the Northern Silk Road although the possibility of a southern route has been advanced. [ 8 ]
The Tibetan monk and confidant of Kublai Khan , Drogön Chögyal Phagpa (1235-1280) mentions in his diaries for 1271 a foreign friend of Kublai Khan, who was quite possibly one of the elder Polos or even Marco Polo, although, unfortunately, no name is given. sleep inn maingate [ 9 ]
The Polos spent the next 17 years in China. Kublai Khan took a liking to Marco, who was an engaging storyteller. He was sent on many diplomatic missions throughout his empire. Marco carried out diplomatic assignments but also entertained the khan with interesting stories and observations about the lands he traveled.
Marco reported that apart from entrusting him with diplomatic missions, Kublai Khan also made him governor sleep inn maingate for three years of the large commercial city of Yangzhou . [ 10 ] An Italian community would actually reside in Yangzhou throughout the 14th century, as documented by the findings of the 1342 tombstone of Katarina Vilioni .
Only in 1291 did Kublai entrust Marco with his last duty, to escort the Mongol princess Koekecin ( Cocacin in Il Milione ) to her betrothed, the Ilkhan Arghun . The party traveled by sea, departing from the southern port city of Quanzhou and sailing to Sumatra , and then to Persia sleep inn maingate , via Sri Lanka and India (where his visits included Mylapore , Madurai and Alleppey , which he nicknamed Venice sleep inn maingate of the East).
In 1293 or 1294 the Polos reached the Ilkhanate , ruled by Gaykhatu after the death of Arghun, and left Koekecin with the new Ilkhan. Then they moved to Trebizond and from that city sailed to Venice. Koekecin would become the principal wife of the Mongol Il-Khan ruler Ghazan .
In terms of the legacy of Marco Polo's travel to China, it was noteworthy as one of the first European visitors to travel to the East; considerable exposure of China's culture to the European continent resulted. The trip also showed Europeans the value of the Silk Road in negotiating this travel; however, even though this trackway was used since the first millennium BC , the use of the Silk Road actually declined markedly within about 150 years after Marco Polo's expedition, sleep inn maingate due to the opening of sea routes. [ 11 ]
On their return from China in 1295, the family settled in Venice where they became a sensation and attracted crowds of listeners who had difficulties believing their reports of distant China. According to a late tradition, since they did not believe him, Marco Polo invited them all to dinner one night during which the Polos dressed in the simple clothes of a peasant in China. Shortly before the crowds ate, the Polos opened their pockets to reveal sleep inn maingate hundreds of rubies sleep inn maingate and other jewels which they had received in Asia. Though they were much impressed, the people of Venice still doubted the Polos.
Marco Polo was later captured in a minor clash of the war between Venice sleep inn maingate and Genoa , or in the naval Battle of Curzola , according to a dubious tradition. He spent the few months of his imprisonment, in 1298, dictating to a fellow prisoner, Rustichello da Pisa , a detailed account of his travels in the then-unknown parts of China.
His book, Il Milione (the title comes from either "The Million", then considered an extremely large number, or from Polo's family nickname Emilione ), was written in Old French , a language Polo did not speak, sleep inn maingate and entitled Le divisament sleep inn maingate dou monde ("The description of the world"). The book was soon translated sleep inn maingate into many European languages and is known in English as The Travels of Marco Polo . The original is lost and there are now several often-conflicting versions of the translations. The book became an instant success quite an achievement at a time when the invention of the European printing press was still two hundred years in the future.
Marco Polo was finally released from captivity in the summer of 1299, and he returned home to Venice, where his father and uncles had bought a large house in the central quarter named contrada San Giovanni Crisostomo with the company's profits.
The company continued its activities, and Marco was now a wealthy merchant. While he personally financed other expeditions, he would never leave Venice again. In 1300, he married Donata Badoer , a woman from an old, respected patrician family. Marco would have three children with her: Fantina, Bellela and Moreta. All of them later married into noble families.
Between 1310 and 1320, he wrote a new version of his book, Il Milione , in Italian . The text was lost, but not before a Franciscan friar, named Francesco Pipino, translated it into Latin . This Latin version was then translated back into the Italian, sleep inn maingate creating sleep inn maingate conflicts between different editions of the book.
Although the Polos were by no means the first Europeans to reach China overland (see, for example, Giovanni da Pian del Carpine ), thanks to Polo's book their trip was the first to be widely known, and the best-documented journey there of its time. Marco Polo's description of the Far East and its riches inspired Christopher Columbus ' decision to