Meet Marco Polo: A Venetian at the Court of Kublai Khan
MentorMinds
Seventeen years in the East
Marco Polo left Venice in 1271, at about seventeen, with his father and uncle. They reached Kublai Khan’s court around 1275, and by his own account he served the Khan for seventeen years before returning to Venice in 1295.
A book written in prison
Captured in a war between Venice and Genoa, he dictated his travels to a fellow prisoner, the romance writer Rustichello da Pisa. Christopher Columbus later owned a copy and wrote in its margins.
The argument
His book never mentions the Great Wall, tea or foot-binding, and some historians have argued he never reached China at all. Most now accept that he did.
Why they belong at your table
Seat Marco Polo when you are trying to describe something genuinely new to people who have never seen it — and expect to be doubted.
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