In any case these two aristocrats of the weasel family, sable and ermine, depending on the quality of their pelts, vied for favor among the lords of the east, as did to some extent the rare black fox of the icy regions in the far north.
Polo said that when the Grand Khan of the Tartar Empire quit his palace for the chase he took ten thousand retainers with him, including his sons, the nobles of his court, his ladies, falconers and life guards. For this entourage great tents were provided, appointed luxuriously and stretched with silken ropes. The Khan’s sleeping tents and audience pavilions were covered on the outside with the skins of lions, streaked white, black and red, and so well joined together that no wind or rain could penetrate. On the inside they were lined with the costly pelts of ermines and sables. The Venetian marvelled at the skill and taste with which the inlaying of the pelts was accomplished.
When this intrepid adventurer travelled into northern Mongolia he found the country alive with traders and merchants. “The Merchants to buy their Furres, for fourteene dayes journey thorow the Desart, have set up for each day a house of Wood, where they abide and barter; and in Winter they use Sleds without wheeles, and plaine in the bottome, rising with a semi-circle at the top or end, drawne easily on the Ice by beasts like great Dogs six yoked by couples, the Sledman only with his Merchant and Furres sitting therein.”
These fur traders showed the Venetian huge pelts, “twentie palms long,” taken from the white bear in the far north. That was the Region of Darkness, so-called because for “the most part of the Winter moneths the Sun appeares not, and the Ayre is thick and darkish.” There, Polo was told, the natives were pale, had no prince and lived like beasts. But in the polar summer when there was continuous daylight they caught multitudes of large black foxes, ermines, martens and sables.
Ibn-Batootah, who later travelled this country, told how the traders bartered with the mysterious inhabitants of the far north.
After encamping near the borders of the Region of Darkness the traders would deposit their bartering goods in a likely spot and return to their quarters. The next day on returning to the same place they might find beside their goods the skins of sable, ermine and other valuable furs. If a trader was satisfied with what he found, he took it; if not, he left it there. In the latter case the inhabitants of the Region of Darkness might then on another visit increase the amount of their deposit, or as often happened, they might pick up their furs and leave the goods of the foreign merchant untouched.
So far as the traders were concerned these people of the far north with whom they bartered might as well have been ghosts. The traders never saw them.
The pelts of all the polar animals were lusher and finer and consequently much more valuable than those found in the districts inhabited by the Tartars. Because of this the Tartars were often induced to undertake plundering expeditions in the Region of Darkness for furs, as well as for domesticated animals kept by the natives there. Invariably, it appears, the inhabitants simply sought safety in flight from the raiders, putting up no fight and never showing themselves.
Marco Polo said that lest the Tartar raiders lose their way during the long winter night, “they ride on Mares which have Colts sucking which they leave with a Guard at the entrance of that Countrey, where the Light beginneth to faile, and when they have taken their prey give reynes to the Mares, which hasten to their Colts.” Continuing, he said that from this northern region came “many of the finest Furres of which I have heard some are brought into Russia.”
About the mysteries of Russia, Polo learned little. But he was certain that it was of vast extent, bordering in the north on the Region of Darkness and reaching to the “Ocean Sea.” Although there were many fine and valuable furs there, such as sable, it was not a land of trade he reported.