About
Chinese Explored Asia Long Before the Europeans: An Ancient World Map Tells All is the fruit of the author’s research into the history of exploration prior to the European Age of Discovery. This book analyses thoroughly the Asian regions of an important ancient world map: Kunyu Wanguo Quantu (KWQ) (坤舆万国全图), translated as “Complete Geographical Map of All the Kingdoms of the World”. The map was published in 1602 by Italian Jesuit priest Matteo Ricci in China. For over 400 years, the map has been regarded as strictly of European origin and based on maps which Ricci brought with him to China in 1582 during the Ming Dynasty.
However, after analysing the histories of all the geographical terms associated with Asia on the KWQ, this book presents multilayer evidence that the Asian regions on this map are of Chinese origin and that they reveal eras long before the arrival of Europeans: Japan in 897, Joseon in 1433, Ming China in 1433, Southeast Asia in 1432–1433, the Indian Subcontinent and its eastern periphery in 1432–1433, West and Central Asia in 1433, and Asia to the North of China in 1428–1433.
The present book, and the author’s previous book titled Chinese Global Exploration in the Pre-Columbian Era: Evidence from an Ancient World Map, can serve as a foundation for future China studies and offer new insights into the world history of land and maritime exploration.
Contents:
- About the Author
- Acknowledgement
- Introduction
- An Ancient World Map Depicts Chinese Exploration of Japan in 897 AD, Long Before the First Europeans Landed in That Region in 1542/1543
- An Ancient World Map Depicts Chinese Exploration of Korea in 1433, Long Before the First European Man Landed There in 1582
- An Ancient World Map Depicts China in 1433, at the Early Stage of the European Age of Discovery
- An Ancient World Map Depicts Chinese Exploration of Southeast Asia in 1432–1433, Long Before the First Europeans Began to Conquer That Region in 1511
- An Ancient World Map Depicts Chinese Exploration of the Indian Subcontinent and Its Eastern Periphery in 1432–1433, Long Before Vasco da Gama Landed in India in 1498
- An Ancient World Map Depicts Chinese Exploration of West and Central Asia in 1433
- An Ancient World Map Depicts Chinese Exploration of Asia to the North of China in 1428–1433, Long Before the First Europeans Explored Those Regions
- Index
Readership: Historians, map collectors, archaeologists, geologists, teachers, students, researchers, geopoliticians and others interested in the Chinese exploration of Asia before the Age of Discovery.
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Previous Books
Chinese Global Exploration in the Pre-Columbian Era: Evidence From an Ancient World Map (2023)
About
How early did the Chinese explore the world? Did the Treasure Fleets, led by Admiral Zheng He, discover many parts of the world before Christopher Columbus? While it is known that Christopher Columbus discovered America and Europe ushered in the Age of Discovery, there is an ongoing debate on the “unknown” areas depicted in Western maps from the period and earlier. There is agreement among scholars that certain areas seem to have been mapped out prior to the arrival of Western explorers.
Chinese Global Exploration in the Pre-Columbian Era: Evidence from an Ancient World Map analyses the world’s first modern map — known as Kunyu Wanguo Quantu (KWQ) 《坤輿萬國全圖》 in Chinese, translated as the “Complete Geographical Map of All Kingdoms of the World” to demonstrate evidence of Chinese global exploration in the Pre-Columbian era. The map of concern was first printed by Italian missionary, Matteo Ricci in 1602, and has been purported to be of entirely European origin, based on Ricci’s former maps which he had brought to China in 1582.
This book, thus, seeks to be transformational in presenting essential new insights on Pre-Columbian world history and Chinese global exploration, moving away from the norm of the studies of geography and cartography by:
- Analysing the histories of all the geographical terms associated with Australia, New Zealand, Antarctica, Africa, Europe, and the Americas, as depicted in the KWQ, thus demonstrating that these areas were most likely explored by the Chinese since Antiquity;
- Performing a comparison of KWQ with major European maps and state-of-the-art archaeological discoveries
Contents:
- Introduction
- Chinese Explored Cape Breton Island Long before the Europeans
- The Chinese Explored Australia, New Zealand, Land of Fire and Antarctica Long before the Europeans
- A Chinese-based World Map Depicts Europe between 1157 and 1166
- Chinese-based World Map Depicts Africa in 1433
- Did Zheng He’s Mariners Explore the Americas before Columbus? An Analysis Offers Essential New Insights
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Readership: Historians, map collectors, archaeologists, geologists, teachers, students, researchers, and others interested in the Pre-Columbian globalization in maritime exploration in the period before the European Age of Discovery.
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The Last Journey of the San Bao Eunuch, Admiral Zheng He (2019)
About
From 1405, in order to maintain and expand the Ming Dynasty’s tributary system, Yongle Emperor Zhu Di (reigning 1402-1424) and Xuande Emperor Zhu Zhanji (reigning 1425-1435) ordered eunuch Zheng He to lead giant fleets across the seas. But soon after Zheng He’s seventh and last voyage in the 1430s, the Ming emperors put an end to this activity and ordered all records of previous voyages to be destroyed. Chinese writer Luo Maodeng (罗懋登), knowing the history of some of these voyages, wished to preserve a record of them, but, conscious of the possible penalty, decided to record the facts “under a veil”, in his 1597 novel, An Account of the Western World Voyage of the San Bao Eunuch (《三宝太监西洋记》). This is what Dr. Sheng-Wei Wang has concluded after reading and analysing Luo’s novel. Her book, The last journey of the San Bao Eunuch, Admiral Zheng He, shows the methodology and evidential arguments by which she has sought to lift the veil and the conclusions she suggests, including the derivation of the complete trans-Atlantic navigational routes and timelines of that last journey and the idea that Zheng He’s last expedition plausibly reached the ancient American Indian city, Cahokia, in the U.S. central Mississippi Valley in late autumn, 1433, long before Christopher Columbus set foot for the first time in the Americas. She supports the hotly debated view that Ming Chinese sailors and ships reached farther than previously accepted in modern times and calls for further research. She hopes this book will become an important step in bridging the gap in our understanding of ancient China-America history in the era before the Age of Discovery. An interesting contribution to an ongoing debate. This edition has 48 scattered b/w illustrations and 8 b/w plates.
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