{"id":155,"date":"2006-02-07T04:07:29","date_gmt":"2006-02-07T09:07:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/s265039441.onlinehome.us\/philpaine\/?p=155"},"modified":"2018-08-23T19:27:39","modified_gmt":"2018-08-23T23:27:39","slug":"14594-%c2%a0%c2%a0-gavin-menzies-1421-the-year-china-discovered-the-world-14595-%c2%a0%c2%a0-louise-levathes-when-china-ruled-the-seas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=155","title":{"rendered":"14594. (Gavin Menzies) 1421, the Year China Discovered the World"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"06-02-07<\/a>Far\u00adley Mowat engaged in some unre\u00adstrained spec\u00adu\u00adla\u00adtion with his \u201cAlban\u201d pre\u00adhis\u00adtoric explor\u00aders. Now, Gavin Men\u00adzies goes absolute\u00adly wild with spec\u00adu\u00adla\u00adtion in his \u201crecon\u00adstruc\u00adtion\u201d of a gigan\u00adtic glob\u00adal explo\u00adration by the Chi\u00adnese admi\u00adral Zheng He in the year 1421.<\/span><\/p>\n

It is well known that a large Chi\u00adnese Impe\u00adr\u00adial fleet, under the direc\u00adtion of Zheng He (or Heng Ho), the eunuch aide-de-camp of the ear\u00adly Ming emper\u00ador Zhu Di, under\u00adtook sev\u00aden long voy\u00adages that com\u00adbined trade, diplo\u00admatic and explorato\u00adry motives. Chi\u00adnese trade and explo\u00adration of the East African coast is well accept\u00aded by his\u00adto\u00adri\u00adans. Zheng He\u2019s voy\u00adages are well doc\u00adu\u00admented by his sec\u00adre\u00adtary, Ma Huan, whose chron\u00adi\u00adcling of some of the voy\u00adages was wide\u00adly print\u00aded and dis\u00adtrib\u00aduted, and there are col\u00adlat\u00aderal accounts by Fei Xin and Gong Zhen, both offi\u00adcers on some of the voy\u00adages. There is also plen\u00adty of cor\u00adrob\u00ado\u00adra\u00adtion in Ming dynasty pub\u00adlic records. Zheng He\u2019s celebri\u00adty was such that plays were being per\u00adformed about him while the voy\u00adages were still going, and a cen\u00adtury and a half lat\u00ader, an immense\u00adly pop\u00adu\u00adlar his\u00adtor\u00adi\u00adcal nov\u00adel, Jour\u00adney of the Three-Jew\u00adeled Eunuch to the West\u00adern Oceans <\/em>by Luo Mao\u00addeng, retold the sto\u00adry with embellishments.<\/span><\/p>\n

There is plau\u00adsi\u00adble archae\u00ado\u00adlog\u00adi\u00adcal evi\u00addence of a Chi\u00adnese pres\u00adence in Aus\u00adtralia from even before Ming times. There is also lit\u00adtle doubt that, in the fif\u00adteenth cen\u00adtury, the Ming empire was the most tech\u00adno\u00adlog\u00adi\u00adcally advanced region on earth, and that Chi\u00adnese ships and nav\u00adi\u00adga\u00adtors were capa\u00adble of going pret\u00adty much any\u00adwhere if they had a mind to it. Chi\u00adnese trade and explo\u00adration came to a sud\u00adden halt just around the time that Europe burst out of its con\u00adstraints, as Con\u00adfu\u00adcian intel\u00adlec\u00adtu\u00adals forcibly shut it down in one of those fren\u00adzies of xeno\u00adpho\u00adbia that peri\u00adod\u00adi\u00adcally over\u00adtake Chi\u00adnese empires. There is also good rea\u00adson to believe that Euro\u00adpean explor\u00aders were mak\u00ading use of ear\u00adlier Chi\u00adnese maps that revealed that Africa was cir\u00adcum\u00adnav\u00adi\u00adgable, and per\u00adhaps some knowl\u00adedge of the West\u00adern Hemi\u00adsphere. In addi\u00adtion to all this, there are plen\u00adty of stray bits of puz\u00adzling data, odd archae\u00adl\u00adog\u00adi\u00adcal finds, odd coin\u00adci\u00addences, and lit\u00adtle mys\u00adter\u00adies that might be explain\u00adable by Chi\u00adnese con\u00adtact with the New World. How\u00adever, most of these tid-bits come with counter-evi\u00addence or rea\u00adson\u00adable doubt. Why, for instance, would Chi\u00adnese cul\u00adtural influ\u00adence bring to pre-Columbian Mex\u00adico an elab\u00ado\u00adrate set of tech\u00adniques for mak\u00ading lac\u00adquer\u00adware, but not impart some\u00adthing obvi\u00adous like the wheeled vehicle?<\/span><\/p>\n

These are the start\u00ading points for Men\u00adzies\u2019 book. Noth\u00ading is actu\u00adally impos\u00adsi\u00adble about the vast cir\u00adcum\u00adnav\u00adi\u00adga\u00adtion of the globe, com\u00adbined with explo\u00adration of the Arc\u00adtic and Antarc\u00adtic that Men\u00adzies adds to the known accom\u00adplish\u00adments of Zheng\u2019s fleet. But Men\u00adzies \u201crecon\u00adstructs\u201d them entire\u00adly from post-Columbian maps and his real expe\u00adri\u00adence nav\u00adi\u00adgat\u00ading sub\u00admarines in the same waters. His argu\u00adment that most of these maps had to have drawn from fif\u00adteen cen\u00adtury Chi\u00adnese maps is not con\u00advinc\u00ading. For exam\u00adple, a much pub\u00adli\u00adcized map which was dis\u00adcov\u00adered in 2001 shows the world much as we know it, with the West\u00adern Hemi\u00adsphere fair\u00adly cor\u00adrect. While text on the map indi\u00adcates it was drawn in 1763, it claims to be a copy of anoth\u00ader map drawn in 1418 made by or owned by Zheng He. It does\u00adn\u2019t take much of detec\u00adtive to notice that all the errors in it are exact\u00adly the errors found on con\u00adtem\u00adpo\u00adrary maps in the 18th cen\u00adtu\u00adry, and that it can\u2019t pos\u00adsi\u00adbly repro\u00adduce a map from Zheng\u2019s era. <\/span><\/p>\n

\"06-02-07<\/a>That the Chi\u00adnese of the Ming era had bet\u00adter knowl\u00adedge of the world than Euro\u00adpeans of the time, is not in doubt. But most of Men\u00adzies\u2019 \u201crecon\u00adstruc\u00adtion\u201d of spe\u00adcific, day-by-day com\u00adings and goings of Zhengs fleet (which for some rea\u00adson were not men\u00adtioned in the detailed lit\u00ader\u00ada\u00adture of his voy\u00adages), with every land\u00adfall and dis\u00adcov\u00adery con\u00adve\u00adniently attest\u00aded by dubi\u00adous cir\u00adcum\u00adstan\u00adtial evi\u00addence, I don\u2019t swal\u00adlow. Most of the spec\u00adu\u00adla\u00adtive leaps in each chap\u00adter depend on one accept\u00ading the truth of the spec\u00adu\u00adla\u00adtive leaps made in the pre\u00advi\u00adous chap\u00adter. The log\u00adic runs like this: It\u2019s known that I can jump a dis\u00adtance of three feet. So it\u2019s plau\u00adsi\u00adble that I might be able to jump four feet. Accept\u00ading the premise that I can jump four feet, would\u00adn\u2019t it be plau\u00adsi\u00adble that I can jump five? And accept\u00ading that, would\u00adn\u2019t be plau\u00adsi\u00adble that I can jump six? This con\u00adtin\u00adues until I am the\u00ado\u00adret\u00adi\u00adcal\u00adly jump\u00ading twen\u00adty feet, or a hun\u00addred feet. Men\u00adzies\u2019 rea\u00adson\u00ading works exact\u00adly like this. Zheng\u2019s real accom\u00adplish\u00adments are spec\u00adtac\u00adu\u00adlar enough to give him a fine place in his\u00adto\u00adry\u2026 attribut\u00ading mir\u00ada\u00adcles to him does him no honour.<\/span><\/p>\n

One of the things that usu\u00adally makes me sus\u00adpi\u00adcious of spec\u00adu\u00adla\u00adtive works like this is when I find some ordi\u00adnary error that would not exist if the writer had made seri\u00adous, sys\u00adtem\u00adatic inqueries. In this par\u00adtic\u00adu\u00adlar case, Men\u00adzies claims that he con\u00adsulted an author\u00adity on medieval India who told him that an inscrip\u00adtion was in Malay\u00adalam, which he claimed to be an \u201cobscure\u201d lan\u00adguage, once but no longer spo\u00adken on the west coast of India. Now that\u2019s rather odd. There is noth\u00ading obscure about Malay\u00adalam. Far from being extinct, it is spo\u00adken by thir\u00adty mil\u00adlion peo\u00adple, and is one of India\u2019s offi\u00adcial lan\u00adguages. In fact, I know some\u00adone who speaks it here in Toron\u00adto. There is a cor\u00adner shop about three blocks from my apart\u00adment where DVDs in Malay\u00adalam can be rent\u00aded, and the pub\u00adlic library across the street has a shelf full of books in Malay\u00adalam. So how did as pathet\u00adic an error as that man\u00adage to implant itself in a book pur\u00adport\u00ading to have been made from the most care\u00adful and exact\u00ading research? I\u2019m not say\u00ading that this inval\u00adi\u00addates any of the author\u2019s claims, but it should tip the read\u00ader off that any giv\u00aden \u201cfact\u201d in the book might be bullshit.<\/span><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Far\u00adley Mowat engaged in some unre\u00adstrained spec\u00adu\u00adla\u00adtion with his \u201cAlban\u201d pre\u00adhis\u00adtoric explor\u00aders. Now, Gavin Men\u00adzies goes absolute\u00adly wild with spec\u00adu\u00adla\u00adtion in his \u201crecon\u00adstruc\u00adtion\u201d of a gigan\u00adtic glob\u00adal explo\u00adration by the Chi\u00adnese admi\u00adral Zheng He in the year 1421. It is well \u2026<\/p>\n

Read more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[946,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-b-reading","category-bu-reading-2006"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=155"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9752,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/155\/revisions\/9752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}