The Travels of Marco Polo, the Venetian

The following is from the books prologue: Emperors, kings, dukes, marquises, earls, and knights, and all other people desirous of knowing the diversities of the races of mankind, as well as the diversities of kingdoms, provinces, and regions of all parts of the East, read through this book, and ye shall find in it the greatest and most marvelous characteristics of the peoples especially of Armenia, Persia, India, and Tartary, as they are severally related in the present work by Marco Polo, a wise and learned citizen of Venice distinctly what things he saw and what he heard from others. Wishing in his secret thoughts that the things he had seen and heard should be made public by the present work, for the benefit of those who could not see them with their own eyes, he himself being in the year our Lord 1295 in prison in Genoa, caused the things which are contained in the present work to be written by master Rustigielo, a citizen of Pisa, who was with him in the same prison at Genoa; and he divided it into three parts. Book One of Armenia, Persia, India and Tartary. Book Two of Kublai-Kaan, Cathay, Manji and Thebet. Book Three of Lesser, Middle and Greater India, The Region of Darkness, the Province of Russia and Great Turkey.