Marco Polo remains the most famous traveler in history, known for bridging the gap between Europe and Asia. While schoolbooks teach us that he brought pasta to Italy (a myth), his real adventures were far stranger and more dangerous. For instance, he served a Mongol emperor for nearly two decades as a tax collector and spy. Furthermore, he did not write his masterpiece in a comfortable study, but dictated it to a romance writer while rotting in a Genoese prison. Prepare to walk the Silk Road with the man they called "Mr. Millions."
Marco Polo
Marco Polo did not write his own book. He dictated his stories to a fellow prisoner named Rustichello da Pisa while they both sat in jail. Rustichello, a writer of Arthurian romances, likely added dramatic flair and exaggeration to Polo’s original accounts.
He served as a government official for Kublai Khan. For seventeen years, the Mongol emperor employed him as a special envoy and tax inspector. Consequently, he traveled to corners of the empire that no European had ever seen before.
He mistook rhinoceroses for unicorns. When he saw the grey, horned beasts in Sumatra, the sight disappointed him because they did not match the beautiful creatures of legend. He described them as ugly, muddy beasts with hair like a buffalo and feet like an elephant.
He was not the first European to visit China. His father, Niccolò, and uncle, Maffeo, had already met Kublai Khan before Marco even joined the journey. In fact, they returned to Venice specifically to bring Marco back with them to the Khan’s court.
He introduced paper money to the European imagination. It amazed him that the Chinese used mulberry bark paper as currency instead of gold or silver coins. Europeans initially laughed at this idea, finding it impossible to believe that paper could hold value.
He lived in a palace made of cane that moved. He described the Khan’s portable summer palace in Xanadu (Shangdu), which workers constructed using bamboo and cane. The Emperor’s staff could take the entire structure apart and move it like a giant tent whenever he traveled.
Locals nicknamed him “Il Milione” because he always exaggerated. Whenever he told stories, he constantly used the word “millions” to describe the Khan’s wealth and armies. Therefore, people in Venice began mocking him with the nickname, which also became the Italian title of his book.
He likely brought coal back to Europe as a curiosity. He marveled at the “black stones” that burned longer and hotter than wood. At the time, Europeans relied almost exclusively on wood for fuel and did not understand the properties of coal.
He spent twenty-four years away from home. When he finally returned to Venice in 1295, he stood forty-one years old and unrecognizable to his family. He had to cut open the seams of his rags to reveal gemstones to prove his identity and wealth.
He carried a golden tablet that acted like a VIP passport. The Khan gave the Polos a paiza, a gold tablet that guaranteed them safe passage, food, and horses throughout the Mongol Empire. This ancient “diplomatic immunity” allowed them to travel safely through dangerous territories.
Christopher Columbus owned a copy of his book. The explorer filled the margins of his copy with handwritten notes and plans. Polo’s descriptions of the riches of the East directly inspired Columbus to sail west in search of a new route to China.
He never mentioned the Great Wall of China. Skeptics use this omission to argue that he never actually went to China. However, historians note that the Ming Dynasty built the massive wall we see today centuries after Polo left.
He described a “spirit” that lured travelers to their death in the desert. In the Gobi Desert, he wrote about hearing ghostly voices and instruments that caused travelers to lose their way. Scientists now know this phenomenon as “singing sands,” caused by wind moving over dunes.
On his deathbed, he refused to admit he lied. When a priest asked him to recant the “fables” in his book to save his soul, he famously replied, “I have not told half of what I saw.” Thus, he took the truth of his incredible journey to the grave.
Finally, he likely never brought pasta to Italy. Arab traders had introduced durum wheat pasta to Sicily centuries before Polo was born. A pasta advertisement in the 1920s actually popularized the legend that he brought spaghetti from China.
