58 Field Museum of Natural History — Anth,, Vol. XIII. 



the Mongol period. It is noteworthy, as we shall see hereafter, that 

 at present turquoises are still mined in Hu-pei. If we now recall the 

 account of Marco Polo (p. 16), it seems we are justified in saying that 

 the Chinese became acquainted with the turquois not earlier than in 

 the Yuan or Mongol period, that is to say, the thirteenth and fourteenth 

 centuries. This early mining in Hu-pei cannot have been of great 

 importance, as it is not alluded to in later sources. We further observe 

 that the Persian turquois bebame known to the Chinese in the fourteenth 

 century, and was considered as superior to the domestic stone.^ 



This identification enables us to recognize the turquois also in the 

 Yiian shi, the Chinese Annals of the Mongol Dynasty, where it is called 

 pi tien, or pi tien-tse, "green or blue tien" (the word tien being identical 

 with the above-mentioned word of the Cho keng lu). It entered the 

 robe of the emperor and courtiers, and gold beads and turquoises are 

 especially mentioned as used for earrings (Yiian shi, Ch. 78, p. 13 b). 

 The Mongols were doubtless acquainted with the turquois long before 

 their occupation of China, either through the Tibetans or Turkish tribes 

 or through both. We know that among the antiquities of the bronze 

 age of Siberia gold plaques incrusted with turquois and emeralds have 

 been found ^ and, aside from Egypt, this ancient Siberian technique 

 possibly represents the oldest employment of the turquois in the world. 

 To the Chinese it was an alien substance which never became a national 

 factor in their jewelry. They made its acquaintance through Turks, 

 Persians, Tibetans, and Mongols, and I am under the impression that the 

 Mongol rulers were the first to introduce it into China, and that their 

 utilization of the stone gave impetus to the discovery of turquois mines 

 on Chinese soil, and led to the turquois monopoly related by Marco 

 Polo which has been mentioned above (p. 16) in the notes on Tibet. 

 Also the reports of turquoises sent from the circuit of Hui-ch'uan in 

 Yun-nan Province in the years 1284 and 1290 related in the Yuan shi 

 (compare above p. 26, note 3) may be set in causal connection with the 

 craving of the Mongol sovereigns for this stone. 



At the rise of the Yiian Dynasty, the rule was established that prod- 

 ucts like gold, silver, pearls, jade, copper, iron, mercury, cinnabar, and 



1 At this point we should stop to reflect again whether, after all, the mining of 

 turquois in Persia on an extensive scale is not earlier than the Mohammedan period. 

 Compare above p. 40. 



2 KoNDAKOFF, ToLSTOi and Reinach, Antiqujt^s de la Russie m^ridionale, 

 pp. 404, 405 ; S. Reinach, La representation du galop dans I'art ancien et moderne, p. 66 

 (Paris, 1901). As far as I know, these turquoises have never been examined by a 

 competent mineralogist, nor have they been traced to their place of origin. Bauer 

 has nothing to say concerning the occurrence of turquois in Siberia. The Armenian 

 lapidarium of the seventeenth century (translated by K. P. Patkanov, /. c, p. 48) 

 gives Siberia as the fourth source for the turquois, and adds that this kind does not 

 command any price. 



