Marco Polo was born in 1254, in Venice, Italy. He traveled extensively with his family, journeying from Europe to Asia from 1271 to 1295. He remained in China for 17 of those years. Around 1292, he left China, acting as consort along the way to a Mongol princess who was being sent to Persia. His book Il Milione describes his travels and experiences and influenced later adventurers and merchants.
Early Life
Marco Polo was born in the year 1254 to a wealthy Venetian merchant family. Much of his childhood was spent parentless, and he was raised by an extended family. Polo's mother died when he was young, and his father and uncle, successful jewel merchants Niccolo and Maffeo Polo, were in Asia for much of Polo's youth.
Their journeys brought them into present-day China, where they joined a diplomatic mission to the court of Kublai Khan, the Mongol leader whose grandfather, Genghis Khan, had conquered Northeast Asia. In 1269, the two men returned to Venice, and immediately started making plans for their return to Khan's court. During their stay with the leader, Khan had expressed his interest in Christianity and asked the Polo brothers to visit again with 100 priests and a collection of holy water.
Khan's Empire, the largest the world had ever seen, was largely a mystery to those living within the borders of the Holy Roman Empire. A sophisticated culture outside the reaches of the Vatican seemed unfathomable, and yet, that's exactly what the Polo brothers described to confounded Venetians when they arrived home.
Journey to China
In 1271, Niccolo and Maffeo Polo set out for Asia again, but this time they brought young Marco with them. Unable to recruit the 100 priests that Khan had requested, they left with only two, who, after getting a taste of the hard journey ahead of them, soon turned back for home. The Polos' journey took place on land, and they were forced to cut through challenging and sometimes harsh territory. But through it all, Marco reveled in the adventure. His later memory for the places and cultures he witnessed was remarkable and exceptionally accurate.
As they made their way through the Middle East, Marco absorbed its sights and smells. His account of the Orient, especially, provided the western world with its first clear picture of the East's geography and ethnic customs. Hardships, of course, came his way. In what is now Afghanistan, Marco was forced to retreat to the mountains in order to recoup from an illness he'd contracted. Crossing the Gobi desert, meanwhile, proved long and, at times, arduous. "This desert is reported to be so long that it would take a year to go from end to end," Marco later wrote. "And at the narrowest point it takes a month to cross it. It consists entirely of mountains and sands and valleys. There is nothing at all to eat."
Finally, after four years of travel, the Polos reached China and Kublai Khan, who was staying at his summer palace known as Xanadu, a grand marble architectural wonder that dazzled young Marco.
Time in China
The Polos had originally planned to be gone for only a few years. However, they were away from Venice for more than 23 years. Debate has swirled among historians as to whether Marco ever really made it to China. There is no evidence outside his famous book that he traveled so far east. Yet, his knowledge of the culture and its customs are hard to dismiss. His later account told of Khan's extensive communication system, which served as the foundation for his rule. Marco's book, in fact, devotes five pages to the elaborate structure, describing how the empire's information highway efficiently and economically covered millions of square miles.
Khan's acceptance of the Polos offered the foreigners unparalleled access to his empire. Niccolo and Maffeo were granted important positions in the leader's Court. Marco, too, impressed Khan, who thought highly of the young man's abilities as a merchant. Marco's immersion into the Chinese culture resulted in him mastering four languages.
Khan eventually employed Marco as a special envoy. As a result, he sent Marco into far-flung areas of Asia never before explored by Europeans. Burma, India, Tibet and other areas were among the places that Marco ventured into. With him, as always, was a stamped metal packet from Khan himself that served as his official credentials from the powerful leader. As the years wore on, Marco was promoted for his work. He served as governor of a Chinese city, then later, Khan appointed him as an official of the Privy Council. At one point, he was the tax inspector in the city of Yanzhou.
From his travels, Marco amassed not only great knowledge about the Mongol empire, but incredible wonder. He marveled at the empire's use of paper money, an idea that had failed to reach Europe, and was in awe of its economy and scale of production. Marco's later stories showed him to be an early anthropologist and ethnographer. His reporting offers little about himself or his own thoughts, but instead gives the reader a dispassionate reporting about a culture he had clearly grown fond of.