Marco Polo was a man that saw much of a wider world that was alien to his European contemporaries. Dictating his adventures and the sights he saw along the way, he told of being in the court of Kublai Khan, of traveling to India and Thailand, and passing through great mountain passes and in the markets of Java. While people only came to believe him later on, his stories contributed to European knowledge of the wider world for a long time and was an inspiration for many travelers after him.