Born in Venice in 1253 to a family of businessmen, Marco Polo was forty-five when he fought at the battle of Curzola. He had spent most of his adult life away from Europe. His father, Niccolò Polo, and uncle Maffeo Polo were among the vanguard of European travelers to the Mongol court, having made their first journey to visit Kublai Khan in 1260, after liquidating earlier business ventures in Constantinople to escape the restoration of a Byzantine emperor.
