THE ALANS.
According to the Yuen Shi and Devéria, Journ. Asiat., Nov.–Dec., 1896, 432, in 1229 and 1241, when Okkodai’s army reached the country of the Aas (Alans), their chief submitted at once and a body of one thousand Alans were kept for the private guard of the Great Khan; Mangu enlisted in his bodyguard half the troops of the Alan Prince, Arslan, whose younger son Nicholas took a part in the expedition of the Mongols against Karajang (Yun Nan). This Alan imperial guard was still in existence in 1272, 1286, and 1309, and it was divided into two corps with headquarters in the Ling pei province (Karakorúm). See also Bretschneider, Mediæval Researches, II., pp. 84–90.
The massacre of a body of Christian Alans related by Marco Polo (II., p. 178) is confirmed by Chinese sources.
LXXIV., [p. 180, n. 3.]
ALANS.
See Notes in new edition of Cathay and the Way thither, III., pp. 179 seq., 248.
The massacre of the Alans took place, according to Chinese sources, at Chen-ch’ao, not at Ch’ang chau. The Sung general who was in charge of the city, Hung Fu, after making a faint submission, got the Alans drunk at night and had them slaughtered. Cf. Pelliot, Chrétiens d’Asie centrale et d’Extrême-Orient, T’oung Pao, Dec., 1914, p. 641.
LXXVI., [pp. 184–5.]
VUJU, VUGHIN, CHANGAN.
The Rev. A. C. Moule has given in the T’oung Pao, July, 1915, pp. 393 seq., the Itinerary between Lin Ngan (Hang Chau) and Shang Tu, followed by the Sung Dynasty officials who accompanied their Empress Dowager to the Court of Kúblái after the fall of Hang Chau in 1276; the diary was written by Yen Kwang-ta, a native of ShaoHKing, who was attached to the party.