14 The Diamond 



heard by him in the West, and that his version does not depend upon the 

 older one of the Liang se kung ki, which evidently was not known to him. 

 This case is interesting, for it shows that the same Western story was 

 handed on to the Chinese at different times and from different sources. 



About the same time, Marco Polo chronicled the diamond story 1 

 which he learned in India, and its close agreement in the main points 

 with the Arabic authors is amazing. The Venetian was not the first 

 European, however, to record it; as pointed out by Yule, it is one of the 

 many stories in the scrap-book of the Byzantine historian Tzetzes. 2 



Nicolo Conti of the fifteenth century relates it of a mountain called 

 Albenigaras, fifteen days' journey in a northerly direction from Vija- 

 yanagar; and it is told again, apparently after Conti, by Julius Caesar 

 Scaliger. As a popular tale it is found not only in Armenia, 3 as stated 

 by Yule, but also in Russia. 4 



1 Yule and Cordier, The Book of Ser Marco Polo, Vol. II, p. 360. The bewitching 

 of the serpents by means of mirrors is wanting. The feature of the eagles feeding upon 

 the serpents appears to be a thoroughly Indian notion, absent in the Arabic accounts. 



2 One of the earliest mediaeval sources that contains the story is the fantastic 

 description of India and the country of Prester John, written by Elysaeus in the 

 latter part of the twelfth century, and edited by F. Zarncke (Der Priester Johannes 

 II, pp. 120-127). This text is as follows: "Quomodo autem carbunculi reperiantur 

 audiamus. Ibi est vallis quaedam, in qua carbunculi reperiuntur. Nullus autem 

 hominum accedere potest prae pavore griffonum et profunditate vallis. Et cum 

 habere volunt lapides, occidunt pecora et accipiunt cadavera, et in nocte accedunt 

 ad summitatem vallis et deiciunt ea in vallem, et sic inprimuntur lapides in cadavera, 

 et acuti sunt. Veniunt autem grif ones et assumunt cadavera et educunt ea. Eductis 

 ergo cadaveribus perduntur carbunculi, et sic inveniuntur in campis." 



* Probably due to the fact that it was adopted by the Armenian lapidarium of 

 the seventeenth century, translated into Russian by K. P. Patkanov (p. 3). Of 

 especial interest is the fact that the snakes are dissociated from the two Armenian 

 versions known to us. This is the more curious, as the lapidarium fastens the story 

 upon Alexander: consequently some Oriental form of the Romance of Alexander 

 must have pre-existed, in which the snakes did not yet figure. For the benefit of 

 those who may not have access to Von Haxthausen's Transcaucasia (London, 

 1854), the source of the Armenian popular story (p. 360), its text may here follow: 

 "In Hindostan there is a deep and rocky valley, in which all kinds of precious stones, 

 of incalculable value, lie scattered upon the ground; when the sun shines upon them, 

 they glisten like a sea of glowing, many-colored fire. The people see this from the 

 summits of the surrounding hills, but no one can enter the valley, partly because there 

 is no path to it and they could only be let down the steep rocks, and partly because 

 the heat is so great that no one could endure it for a minute. Merchants come 

 hither from foreign countries; they take an ox and hew it in pieces, which they fix 

 upon long poles, and cast into the valley of gems. Then huge birds of prey hover 

 around, descend into the valley, and carry off the pieces of flesh. But the merchants 

 observe closely the direction in which the birds fly, and the places where they alight 

 to feed, and there they frequently find the most valuable gems." 



4 Azbukovnik, Tales of the Russian People (in Russian), Vol. II, p. 161. As 

 the story is here told in regard to the hyacinth, it appears to go back directly to the 

 account of Epiphanius. 



