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How did marco polo impact europe
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Marco Polo and His Courageous Journey to China
Marco Polo was born in 1254 in Venice, Italy. Venice was the center of commerce in the Mediterranean Sea, where the Polos had lived for a very long time since Marco was just a little boy. The Polo family was full of great nobles, but yet the family was not complete. When Marco Polo was young, his mother had passed away, and his father and uncle became successful jewel merchants, who had lived in Asia for almost all of his childhood. Because of the many travels of Marco Polo, he was able to bring back valuable information to the people of Europe, and influenced many of the travelers at that time.
Marco Polo was well educated in merchants subjects and the handling of cargo ships.
When Marco was
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He went with his brothers on a long journey East. “They passed through Armenia, Persia, and Afghanistan, over the Pamirs, and all along the Silk Road to China” (“Marco Polo and His Travels”). He was only 17 years old at this time. They went through the Gobi Desert where it was hot, dry, and they had very little to eat. Then they went to a city called Suchow, where he had stayed for a year. He learned about the asbestos industry here. He stated, “The way to clean asbestos cloth was to throw it into a fire, and that a specimen was brought back from Cathay by the Polos and presented to the Pope” (“Marco Polo and His Travels). His next travel was to …show more content…
The odors, the church bells, the clothing, and the city sites were now strange” (Greene). When he got back to Venice, everything was strange to him, and he barely remembered the Italian language. He tried to tell everybody about the things he had see in his travels, but they all laughed at him. Everything was so unimaginable, that they thought he was making it up (Greene). He did bring back some things however, that they had never seen. He brought a compass that had been invented by the Chinese. “In addition to technology, Marco Polo brought back with him, paper, paper currency, porcelain, raw silk, ivory, jade, spices, and noodles. Among the most significant of these items was paper” (“Marco Polo’s Effects on the East and the West”). Even with all of the things he brought back, the people still did not believe his stories. While he was in Venice, he found that Venice was at war with the Republic of Genoa. He went to war on the side of Venice, and was caught by the Genoese, and put in prison. “After being imprisoned during the Venetian-Genoese War, Marco Polo told his stories to his cellmate, who later documented Polo’s accounts of his travels into a book, later entitled ‘The Travels of Marco Polo” (“Marco Polo’s Effects on the East and the West”). After people read this book, everyone began to wonder if he had been telling the truth. They were curious about this Eastern
Francisco Vasquez de Coronado was born in Salamanca, Spain, around 1510. His parents are Juan Vasquez de Coronado y Sosa de Ulloa and Isabel de Lujan. His father was a wealthy aristocrat, but the family fortune was promised to his older brother. Francisco was determined to make his own fortune in the New World. This is what made him an explorer.
Upon returning to Europe, Polo reported on Asian technologies that had been previously unknown of. These included the silk produced, astrolabe, the compass and the movable-block printing. These technologies became commodities in Europe of high demand. Therefore, much of Asia has a large export. This gained them respect on the European stage.
Although this may be true, it is important to realize that more often than not, explorers have certain expectations regarding the places they are traveling to. This fact is strongly reflected in the nature of their accounts. In Marco Polo’s case, his father and uncle had observed “many things worth admiring. in the progress of their journey,” which took place several years before Marco Polo set off from Venice. Marco Polo surely heard about the great things they had come across.
Christopher Columbus began many of his adventures with preexisting sources and models from well-known philosophers and explores, mixture of inventions, misrepresentations and concealment (Bodmer,10). Despite his knowledge of geography and cosmology, he used models that were complex and contradicting, providing factual and mythical reports of what he could expect to find on the islands he would soon explore. The most detailed information which was creditable based on objectivity and accurate accounts were described by Marco Polo. The book ‘Travels’, would become a resource used by Columbus to compare his discoveries, for here it would reveal actual and potential problems that were identified by Marco Polo (Bodmer, 13,14). According to Polo, land that was located beyond the reach of commercial expeditions would belong to the first man who could reach them, according to the rules of the imperialistic pattern of appropriation (Bodmer, 16). As Columbus’s imagines of finding lands rich ...
Moral influence stimulates one's thoughts and direction within their interest. This changes within generations, for the reason that society is continuously evolving. The chronicles of two best sellers - The Travels of Marco Polo by Marco Polo and The Strange Stones: Dispatches from the East to West by Peter Hessler - gives a great example on how foreigners enter the Eastern world with mentality/behaviourism. From a merchant's perspective, to a journalist who immerses himself into the society, both authors bring two distinct perspectives to this topic. The impact of social standards, that have evolved over seven centuries, essentially affected the approach and research shown in both authors in perspective of women, religion, the commercial industry and under authority. Through their
Many children, including myself, have once played the game Marco Polo. Although, I have always been curious, who exactly is Marco Polo? My fascination of Marco Polo warped into a fixation of his travels. Marco Polo was born in Venice in the year 1254. His father, Nicolo, and his uncle, Maffeo, were merchants who had seats in the great nobleman council of Venice (Polo IV). According to his records, he had traveled thousands of miles with his father and uncle.
Sensenig, Pearl L. "Marco Polo: An Inspiration to Christopher Columbus and The Age of Discovery". Sensen01.cwk@millersv.edu
“Three explorers from the Age of Exploration” Age of Explorations was a time of discovery of the new world during the 15th through 17th century. Many Explorers were in search for new passage ways, new trading ports, new land, new spices, and riches. The three explorers discussed in this paper is Henry Hudson, Jacques Cartier, and Francisco Pizarro. Henry Hudson was an explorer whose main purpose was to find a route to Asia from Europe, he had a series of three voyages trying to achieve this. Jacques Cartier was sent to find riches and a route to Asia as well.
Marco...Rubio, Marco...Rubio. Just like the old Marco Polo game we use to play as kids it seems these days Marco Rubio is a hard man to find in the Senate as well as on the campaign trail.
Francis was born at Assisi in Umbria in the early 1180’s. His fath er was Pietro Bernadone, a very wealthy cloth merchant. His baptized name was Giovanni but it was changed to Francesco. Francis received a decent amount of schooling as a child although he did not show much interest in it. He was very spoiled and did not want to go into his father’s business. He had high status, was handsome, wore fine clothing, and was very well known with the people of Assisi.
Marco Polo (September 15, 1254 – January 8, 1324), was born in a wealthy and cosmopolitan Venetian merchant family. His father is Niccolò, a jewel merchant With his uncle Maffeo who was one of the first Europeans to travel the Silk Road to China(then called Cathay) and visit the Great Khan of the Mongol Empire,Kublai Khan(grandson of Genghis Khan), these three men payed a quite early visit to China in the early times. According to an authority, Marco Polo was grown up in Venice, which was the center for commerce in the Mediterranean at his young age. He got the usual education of a young gentleman of his time. He had learned much of the classical authors, understood the texts of the Bible, and knew the basic theology of the Latin Church. He had a sound knowledge of commercial French as well as Italian.(www.silk-road.com)
33) The characterizing of Marco Polo in this fashion and with these adjectives serves to bolster the historicity of the work as a whole, as the man recounting the tale is a man of substance who appears to have no cause to lie due to his status in a renown pseudo-state in medieval Europe. The stating of “with his own eyes” also solidifies the autopsy of the work, showing that The Travels is (primarily) composed of instances and practices that Marco Polo himself witnessed and as such should be taken as fact. Rustichello’s assertion can be picked apart, however, as Marco Polo would have been describing himself to Rustichello to transcribe, as well as events over a 26 year period. Polo could have easily inflated his virtues and wisdom, and memory could have easily added inaccuracies to events that occurred in the distant past. Such realizations add doubt to Rustichello’s authority, as well as potentially altering the audience’s perception of the work as a whole being entirely
Through her he gained access to the work of the georgical Toscana who believed in fact the Atlantic is the quick way to China.” (Beal). He fetched his believes to many of the richest and powerful people of the land. Most question this strange man who is challenging everything geographical knew. Giving this questionable sane man ships for a chance to explore would cost a fortune and it was a gamble one wasn’t willing to take. He was in Spain for over a year before he was heard by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella in 1486 (History). Queen Isabella was found of his personality and knowledge of great travels. He promised to convert other lands to Christians and many valuable riches to his queen and there country if in return they granted him three ships and 10% of the income. His salesman like brashness earned his place in court. “August 3, 1492 Christopher Columbus and 90 men on three 80 foot ships: Santa Marie Pinta, and Nina, set sail the Spanish port Polos to begin his expedition west through the sea of unknown darkness and violence. (Mann
He went on voyages to Southeast Asia, Sumatra, Java, Ceylon, India, Persia, Persian Gulf, Arabia, the red sea Egypt, and the Mozambique Channel.
Divided into four sections: Prelude; Love Hope and Sex and Dreams; Paradise Lost; Adventures of a Perilous and Swashbuckling Nature; War; and finally, Cast Away, the order of the sections already give insight on the life that Columbus lead. At first his life was full of hope and ambition, through the first chunk Columbus’ life is depicted. Beginning with the voyage the whole world remembers, Dugard unveils sides of Columbus’ character that many readers weren't aware of. Columbus was exactly 41 when he sailed in 1492, he was an Italian vagabond who ironically was quite cheerful, confident, and at times prone to the occasional boast. At six feet tall, with a very cunning mind, he somehow seduced the most powerful woman in the world at that time: Queen Isabella. Columbus was married, and then widowed, to a woman named Felipa Puestrello y Mariz. In his youth, Columbus became interested in traveling the world because of a man named Marco Polo. In 1271, Marco Polo, traveled to china via ship and camel. He returned twenty four years later with more knowledge of the world than...