The protagonist in the Netflix series bearing his name, Marco Polo has been a divisive figure to historians, to say the least. What we do know about Marco Polo is that he was born in 1254 in Venice to a merchant father, Niccolo, and a mother who like in the show, died while he was still young. While Netflix's Polo was raised by the church, while in reality Marco Polo was raised by an aunt and uncle until his father's return.

Netflix's Marco Polo also differs significantly from the historical figure in the dates of what he sees. While only two episodes, supposedly in 1273, in we see Marco witness Kublai best and execute his brother to prevent a civil war, while describing it to the blind 'Hundred Eyes'. In reality, Ariq and Kublai actually fought a civil war, only it occured over a decade before, in 1260 right after Kublai declared himself Khan. Ariq was also never executed, instead he was shown forgiveness and pardoned. His supporters weren't so lucky and were executed however. 

Finally, while the show does do a good job of showing off Marco's astute observational skills, as we learned in class, Polo was more interested with day to day things in Yuan China than with any military matters. While the show gives us Polo sketching weaknesses in walls and describing a city's defenses, the real Marco Polo was more interested in paper money and street markets.