With the publication of Frances Wood's book Did Marco Polo Go to China? in 1995 (London: Secker and Warburg), renewed debate arose in both popular and scholarly circles about whether Marco Polo actually made it all the way to China. Responses from eminent scholars, most importantly Igor de Rachewiltz, leave little doubt that Marco did indeed go to China, as he claimed, but the episode also highlighted areas for more research. The result has been a revival of scholarly interest in Marco Polo, of which Stephen G. Haw's volume forms a part. Haw confines himself to the parts of Marco's text that deal with his time in China, and he sets out to show that Marco's descriptions are remarkably accurate and match information gleaned from other sources, especially contemporary Chinese sources and material evidence. In this endeavor, he is largely successful, and this volume is thus an important contribution to...

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