Marco Polo
translation: Henry Yule, Henri Cordier

THE TRAVELS OF MARCO POLO
Volume II.
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CHAPTER XL.

RETURNS TO THE CITY OF HORMOS WHEREOF WE SPOKE FORMERLY.

When you leave the City of Calatu, and go for 300 miles between north-west and north, you come to the city of Hormos; a great and noble city on the sea.[NOTE 1] It has a Melic, which is as much as to say a King, and he is under the Soldan of Kerman.

There are a good many cities and towns belonging to Hormos, and the people are Saracens. The heat is tremendous, and on that account their houses are built with ventilators to catch the wind. These ventilators are placed on the side from which the wind comes, and they bring the wind down into the house to cool it. But for this the heat would be utterly unbearable. [NOTE 2]

I shall say no more about these places, because I formerly told you in regular order all about this same city of Hormos, and about Kerman as well. But as we took one way to go, and another to come back, it was proper that we should bring you a second time to this point.

Now, however, we will quit this part of the world, and tell you about Great Turkey. First, however, there is a point that I have omitted; to wit, that when you leave the City of Calatu and go between west and north-west, a distance of 500 miles, you come to the city of Kis.[NOTE 3] Of that, however, we shall say no more now, but pass it with this brief mention, and return to the subject of Great Turkey, of which you shall now hear.

NOTE 1.—The distance is very correct; and the bearing fairly so for the first time since we left Aden. I have tried in my map of Polo's Geography to realise what seems to have been his idea of the Arabian coast.

NOTE 2.—These ventilators are a kind of masonry windsail, known as Bád-gír, or "wind-catchers," and in general use over Oman, Kerman, the province of Baghdad, Mekrán, and Sind. A large and elaborate example, from Hommaire de Hell's work on Persia, is given in the cut above. Very particular accounts of these ventilators will be found in P. della Valle, and in the embassy of Don Garcias de Silva Figueroa. (Della Val. II. 333-335; Figueroa, Fr. Trans. 1667, p. 38; Ramus. I. 293 v.; Macd. Kinneir, p. 69.) A somewhat different arrangement for the same purpose is in use in Cairo, and gives a very peculiar character to the city when (...)

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