Having made a good impression on the emperor, Polo was made an envoy of Khan's court and sent out on various tasks in the governance of the empire. He was even given an official imperial seal of approval, providing him access to parts of the world no European had ever traveled to before. According to Biography, Polo's first solo voyages took him to Tibet, India, and Burma, among other places. He earned himself promotions during his years of service to Khan, and would go on to serve as governor of a city in China, a tax inspector, and an official on the emperor's Privy Council.
Polo served Kublai Khan in these various capacities for 17 years before finally being released from his servitude and allowed to return to Italy. While the veracity of some of the tales he recounted in his book has been put into question, one thing is for sure, Polo's adventures as he said they happened were definitely entertaining. "The Travels of Marco Polo" turned the explorer into a big time celebrity in Italy and elsewhere in Europe. For his part, Polo always held that he had published the truth about what he saw on those voyages.
