“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.”
This maxim is often forgotten by students as they examine primary source documents and texts.
This activity helps students analyze how culture influences how we see and experience the world. Even today, different cultures interpret people, places, and events differently. The task of understanding other people and cultures becomes even more complicated as students analyze historical primary source documents and images. Modern assumptions rarely hold true when exploring the past.
In this activity, students pretend to time-travel to the 13th century and accompany Marco Polo on his famous adventures from Italy to China and back. Students read short excerpts from The Travels of Marco Polo. Using internet searches, they locate the places he described on a modern map and look up unknown words, phrases, or references to interpret what Marco Polo’s account. Then, students compare and contrast his late medieval world view with that of a 21st-century person. This comparison is written in first person from the past to a friend or relative in the present. Students describe what they “see” and what Marco Polo “sees” on a postcard and illustrate the front of the postcard with a scene from the primary source description.
First, create 8 ½ X 11 “postcards” using this template. Marco_Polo_Postcard Template
Second, download and print these primary source excerpts from The Travels of Marco Polo. Marco Polo Postcard Primary Sources You may provide students with only one of these three excerpts or assign different excerpts to different individuals or pairs of students. Here are some tips and hints for the teacher to guide student inquiry.Travels of Marco Polo_Excerpts_teacher tips
Third, introduce Marco Polo and his famous travel account to the class. You may want to explain to students that some scholars question the authenticity of his account, but it has continued to be popular for centuries.
Fourth, project a map illustrating Marco Polo’s route on his journey for reference as students work.
Fifth, instruct students to read the primary source excerpt, underlining words, phrases, sentences, or places they do not know or understand. As students search for these unknown references using the internet, circulate to provide hints and tips on finding the needed information.
Finally, provide students with the postcard template so they can describe, in first person, how modern views of what is witnessed (described in the primary source) vary between a 13th-century person and a 21st-century person. Students may also illustrate a scene on the reverse of the postcard.
Here is a sample entry to share with students based upon a different except from The Travels of Marco Polo SAMPLE Time Travel Post Card Entry
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- For more information and ideas for using postcards in the classroom see Old Postcards: Messages about the Past
For more about the history of daily life, historical primary sources, and instructional activities by Cynthia W. Resor, see:
Books:
Primary Source Bazaar Blog Posts:
- Pilgrimage as a Medieval “Vacation”
- Age-Old Cultural Circuit of Egyptian Chicken Hatcheries
- Almanacs: Information before the Internet
- Estate Inventories: Primary Sources for Daily Life in the Past
- Dress Patterns: A Fashion Revolution
Classroom Activities:
- “Who Am I?” – Primary Source Mystery Activity
- Relationship Etiquette: Classroom Activity
- Classroom Activity: How has technology changed how we cook over time?
- Comparing modern nutrition and exercise to the pre-industrial era
- Quiz: What did a medieval peasant eat?
Notes:
“The past is a foreign country; they do things differently there.” is from L. P. Hartley’s novel The Go-Between (1953), later used as the title of David Lowenthal’s 1986 book about the nature of history.