lt a church of
royal magnificence in honour of our God, of the Holy Trinity, and of our
Lord, the Pope, giving it the name of _the Roman Church_. This King
George, six years ago, departed to the Lord, a true Christian, leaving as
his heir a son scarcely out of the cradle, and who is now nine years old.
And after King George's death, his brothers, perfidious followers of the
errors of Nestorius, perverted again all those whom he had brought over to
the Church, and carried them back to their original schismatical creed.
And being all alone, and not able to leave His Majesty the Cham, I could
not go to visit the church above-mentioned, which is twenty days' journey
distant.... I had been in treaty with the late King George, if he had
lived, to translate the whole Latin ritual, that it might be sung
throughout the extent of his territory; and whilst he was alive I used to
celebrate mass in his church according to the Latin rite." The distance
mentioned, twenty days' journey from Peking, suits quite well with the
position assigned to Tenduc, and no doubt the Roman Church was in the city
to which Polo gives that name.

Friar Odoric, travelling from Peking towards Shensi, about 1326-1327, also
visits the country of Prester John, and gives to its chief city the name
of _Tozan_, in which perhaps we may trace _Tathung_. He speaks as if the
family still existed in authority.

King George appears again in Marco's own book (Bk. IV. ch. ii.) as one of
Kublai's generals against Kaidu, in a battle fought near Karakorum.
(_Journ. As._ IX. 299 seqq.; _D'Ohsson_, I. 123; _Huc's Tartary_, etc.
I. 55 seqq.; _Koeppen_, II. 381; _Erdmann's Temudschin_; _Gerbillon_ in
_Astley_, IV. 670; _Cathay_, pp. 146 and 199 seqq.)

NOTE 2.--Such a compact is related to have existed reciprocally between
the family of Chinghiz and that of the chief of the Kungurats; but I have
not found it alleged of the Kerait family except by Friar Odoric. We find,
however, many _princesses_ of this family married into that of Chinghiz.
Thus three nieces of Aung Khan became wives respectively of Chinghiz
himself and of his sons Juji and Tului; she who was the wife of the
latter, Serkukteni Bigi, being the mother of Mangu, Hulaku, and Kublai.
Dukuz Khatun, the Christian wife of Hulaku, was a grand-daughter of Aung
Khan.

The name _George_, of Prester John's representative, may have been
actually Jirjis, Yurji, or some such Oriental form of Georgius. But it is
possible