Unit 2 Sailing the oceans 背景知识导读
Unit 2 Sailing the oceans
背景知识导读
1. About Marco Polo
Marco Polo (September 15, 1254, Venice, Italy; or Curzola, V enetian Dalmatia - now Kor?ula, Croatia — January 8, 1324, Venice) was a Venetian trader and explorer who, together with his father Niccolò and his uncle Maffeo, was one of the first Westerners to travel the Silk Road to China (which he called Cathay) and visited the Great Khan of the Mongol Empire, Kublai Khan (grandson of Genghis Khan). His travels are written down in Il Milione ("The Milione" or The Travels of Marco Polo). The voyage of Niccolò and Maffeo PoloThe Polo name originally didn't belong to a family of explorers but to a family of traders. Marco Polo's father, Niccolò(also Nicolò in Venetian) and his uncle, Maffeo (also Maffio), were prosperous merchants who traded with the East. They were partners with a third brother, named Marco il vecchio (the Elder).
In 1259, the two brothers lived in the Venetian quarter of Constantinople, where they enjoyed political privileges and tax relief because of their country’s role in establishing the Latin Empire in the Fourth Crusade of 1204. But the family judged the political situation of the city precarious, so they decided to transfer their business northeast to Soldaia, a city in Crimea. Their decision proved wise. Constantinople was recaptured in 1261 by Michael Palaeologus, the ruler of the Empire of Nicaea, who quickly burned the V enetian quarter. Captured Venetian citizens were blinded, while many of those who managed to escape perished aboard overloaded refugee ships fleeing to other Venetian colonies in the Aegean Sea.
As their new home on the north rim of the Black Sea, Soldaia had been frequented by Venetian
traders since the 12th century. The Mongol army sacked it in 1223, but the city had never been definitively conquered until 1239, when it became a part of the newly formed Mongol state known as the Golden Horde. Searching for better profits, the Polos continued their journey to Sarai, where the court of Berke Khan, the ruler of the Golden Horde, was located. At that time, the city of Sarai — already visited by William of Rubruck a few years early — was no more than a huge encampment, and the Polos stayed for about a year. Finally, they decided to avoid Crimea, because of a civil war between Berke and his cousin Hulagu or perhaps because of the bad relationship between Berke Khan and the Byzantine Empire. Instead, they moved further east to Bukhara, in modern day Uzbekistan, where the family lived and traded for three years.
In 1264, Nicolò and Maffio joined up with an embassy sent by the Ilkhan Hulagu to his brother, the Grand Khan Kublai. In 1266, they reached the seat of the Grand Khan in the Mongol capital Khanbaliq, now known as Beijing, China.
In his book, Il Milione, Marco explains how Kubilai officially received the Polos and sent them back — with a Mongol named Koeketei as an ambassador to the Pope. They brought with them a letter from the Khan requesting educated people to come and teach Christianity and Western customs to his people and the paiza, a golden tablet a foot long and three inches wide, authorizing the holder to require and obtain lodge, horses and food throughout the Great Khan's dominion. Koeketei left in the middle of the journey, leaving the Polos to travel alone to Ayas in the Armenian Kingdom of Cilicia. From that port city, they sailed to Saint Jean d'Acre, capital of the Kingdom of Jerusalem.
The long sede vacante — between the death of Pope Clement IV, in 1268, and the election of Pope Gregory X, in 1271 —pr evented the Polos from fulfilling Kublai’s request. As suggested by
Theobald Visconti, papal legate for the realm of Egypt, in Acres for the Ninth Crusade, the two brothers returned to Venice in 1269 or 1270, waiting for the nomination of the new Pope.
2. What is a sea?
A sea is a large expanse of saline water connected with an ocean, or a large, usually saline, lake that lacks a natural outlet such as the Caspian Sea and the Dead Sea. The Sea of Galilee is a small freshwater lake without a natural outlet, but the term was applied to it anyway. The term is used colloquially as synonymous with ocean, as in the tropical sea or down to the sea shore, or even sea water referring to water of the ocean. Large lakes are sometimes referred to as inland seas, such as the Great Lakes.
3.List of seas, divided by ocean
Pacific Ocean
Bering Sea, Gulf of Alaska, Sea of Cortez (aka Gulf of California) , Sea of Okhotsk, Sea of Japan, Seto Inland Sea, East China Sea, South China Sea, Beibu Gulf, Sulu Sea, Celebes Sea, Bohol Sea (aka Mindanao Sea) , Philippine Sea, Flores Sea, Banda Sea, Arafura Sea, Timor Sea, Tasman Sea, Yellow Sea, Bohai Sea, Coral Sea, Gulf of Carpentaria
Atlantic Ocean
Central coast of ChileHudson Bay, James Bay, Baffin Bay, Gulf of St. Lawrence, Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, Sargasso Sea, North Sea, Baltic Sea, Gulf of Bothnia, Irish Sea, Celtic Sea, Mediterranean Sea, Adriatic Sea, Aegean Sea, Black Sea, Sea of Azov, Ionian Sea, Ligurian Sea, Mirtoon Sea, Tyrrhenian Sea, Gulf of Sidra, Sea of Marmara, Sea of Crete, Bay of Biscay, Gulf of Guinea
Indian Ocean
Red Sea, Gulf of Aden, Persian Gulf , Gulf of Oman, Arabian Sea, Bay of Bengal, Gulf of Thailand, Java Sea
Arctic Ocean
Barents Sea, Kara Sea, Beaufort Sea, Amundsen Gulf, Greenland Sea, Chukchi Sea, Laptev Sea, East Siberian Sea, White Sea
Southern Ocean
Weddell Sea, Ross Sea, Great Australian Bight, Gulf St. Vincent, Spencer Gulf
Landlocked seas
Aral Sea, Caspian Sea, Dead Sea, Sea of Galilee, Salton Sea, Great Salt Lake
4. What is an ocean?
Ocean (from Okeanos, Greek for river, the ancient Greeks noticed that a strong current flowed off Gibraltar, and assumed it was a great river; Greek ωκεαν??) covers almost three quarters (71%) of the surface of the Earth, and nearly half of the world's marine waters are over 3000 m deep.
This global, interconnected body of salt water, called the World Ocean, is divided by the continents and archipelagos into the following four bodies, from the largest to the smallest: the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean, the Indian Ocean, and the Arctic Ocean, and, according to some authorities such as International Hydrographic Organization(IHO), a fifth ocean, the Southern Ocean.