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Marco Polo, Merchant or Reporter ? Marco Polo’s travels, leaving Venice in 1269 and returning in 1295, after spending some seventeen years with the Great Kublai Khan, accompanying his father and his uncle, theoretically to deliver the Pope’s response to a message from the Khan, led to the drafting of a book –  Le Devisement du monde (Description of the World or The Travels of Marco Polo) – the term Devisement should be understood as meaning description. With the help of the Pisan Rustichello, the author tells the story of his travels to and from Venice, as well as of his stay and tribulations within the Mongol Empire. He provides first rate information on the provinces of this Asian empire. Such a book led to a variety of judgements. The author only gathered his notes and their composition during his captivity in Genoa, where he met another prisoner, Rustichello, who transformed his book into a report on his adventures during his travels as well as on his time in the Mongol Empire under Kublai Khan.