Gobi

This prejudice is said to have its foundation in a dread of their falling; an apprehension which may perhaps have originated, in remote times, from the calamitous effects of earthquakes … Thus large hordes of Tartars are still found to dwell in tents, tending upon cattle, and placing their chief dependance upon their herds

we came to the Cyollos Kagon, that is, to mountains of sand made by the winds, beyond which, before the Tartars, nobody thought there was habitable land, nor was it believed that any land lay beyond. But the Tartars, by God's will and with marvellous skill, crossed them and came into a vast plain, the place called the Torrid Zone, held by the philosophers to be impassable

Working translation

These are sacred places, where the Mongols gather once a year to worship the guardian spirits of the country. Here their festivals take place, accompanied by wrestling, horse racing and archery. At other times every Mongol riding past an obo gets off his horse, kneels on one knee before it on the south side and, raising his folded palms to his forehead, bows three times.

Working translation

The Chinese, who came to know the Tatars at the beginning of the ninth century, then called them Ta-ta, and in later times Ta-t'a-öl, which is the corrupted pronunciation of the word Tatar, since the Chinese have no R … One sees clearly from this passage that the [Tatars] were the present Mongols and Oelöts (that is, the Kalmyks of Central Asia).

Working translation