Marco Polo observed of cosmopolitan Beijing: "Whether they be idolaters or Christians, moslems or the adherents of some other faith, corpses were all buried outside the city, which did much to make it a sanitary place." In the Five Dynasties era, when Houzhou Shizong was expanding Bianjing, he also forbade burying bodies or building brothels in the new city districts.
《馬可孛羅遊記》中記載，有各地外國人來往的元代大都城：應知城內不許埋葬遺骸，不論是有偶像的教徒或基督教徒、回教徒、他教之人，亦運屍於城外，由是城內能保衛生。