Zheng He's Maritime Voyages
Zheng He commanded seven Chinese treasure fleets between 1405 and 1433, reaching Southeast Asia, India, Arabia and the east coast of Africa, and then the voyages stopped and the ships were left to rot. He was a Muslim from Yunnan, born Ma He, castrated as a boy when Ming armies conquered the province, and raised in the household of the prince who became the Yongle Emperor. He served him in the civil war that took the throne and was rewarded with the command. The scale was without precedent. The first fleet had over three hundred vessels and some 27,000 men; the largest ships, if the Ming histories are accurate, were several times the length of anything in Europe, with multiple decks, watertight compartments and nine masts. The purpose was not exploration or conquest. The route was already known and sailed by Arab, Indian and Malay merchants; what the fleets did was carry the emperor's authority, collect tribute, install and depose rulers in Palembang and Ceylon, and return with envoys, exotica and a giraffe presented as a qilin. They also demonstrated force without acquiring territory, which is the point most often made about them. Yongle died in 1424 and the Confucian bureaucracy, which had opposed the expense throughout, won the argument. The voyages were cancelled, the shipyards closed, ocean-going construction restricted, and much of the archive destroyed. Zheng He died at sea on the last voyage in 1433 and was buried at sea. Vasco da Gama reached India sixty-five years later.
- Year: 1405 CE
- Category: Exploration
