Two notes: red gold and chiamassie
This is a pair of short notes by Roland Braddell, published in JMBRAS Vol. 24, pt. 3 (1951), addressing the history of a gold-working process called sepoh and the identity of the name “Chiamassie” in Marco Polo’s text.
Summary
In the first note, Braddell responds to Sir Richard Winstedt’s observation that the red colour of Selangor regalia gold is produced by a process termed sepoh, involving a mixture of nitre, common salt, and alum applied over a moderate fire (p. 157). He raises the question of how old this process was and whether it could have been in use a thousand years ago, linking it to the deep red gold recorded by Ma Tuan-lin as coming from Tan-mei-lieou (p. 157).
In the second note, Braddell addresses Dr. Linehan’s remark that he had not seen Ramusio’s version of Marco Polo. He suggests that “Chiamassie” is simply the Italian phrase chiama si (modern si chiama), meaning “is called” or “is named,” and therefore is not an Italian transcription of Tumasik. He notes that Chiamassie does not appear in any other edition of Marco Polo (p. 157).