The Voyages of Zheng He

The picture above is a comparison between Zheng He's great treasure ship and Christoforo Colon's Santa Maria. It is with great interest and curiousity I've been reading Gavin Menzies two books 1421: The Year China Discovered the World and 1434: The Year a Magnificent Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance and despite what you think about amatuer historians I think he has a point agaist the Europeanization of world history. According to this discourse Europe has been developed in splendid isolation without any influence from the outside. Of course this is a mere delusion.

Menzies has another angle though as he knows something about navigation and travelling on the high seas. He develops his case at great lengths in both books. No matter what you think about the totality of his works; it raises some important questions about our history. It has been pointed out elsewhere that the national history of different countries almost always has a character of a nationalistic project, where the aim is to manifest the glory of the nation. Therefore you pick the nice pieces and avoid the rest.

We know from history that the Romans traded with Chinese goods. We know that the beaten Persian Shahin Shah lived in asylum in Tang Dynasty China's capital Chang'an after his defeat at Ksetiphon. Ibn Battuta has told the history of how advanced the Chinese fleet was as he visited Guangzhou in the 13th century.

And as my Mongolian friends never tiers to point out: "- Then of course it was the Chenggis..." Chenggis Khan and his descendants came in cloose encounters with Europeans as Hulagu Khan conquered Bagdhad in 1258 and the Monghols of the Golden Horde reached as far as eastern Poland. The Mongols used every bit of advantegous technology they could get their hands on. For instance Kubilay Khan's Armada that tried to conquer Japan used avanced shrapnels and mortars in 1281. Hulagu Khan is known as the first one to use biological warfare against a sieged town.

In 1453 Murad II conquered Constantinopel and the item that got him the edge over the remains of the Byzantine Empire, was a battery of newly developed cannons that shattered the walls of the city. The question is, where did Murad II get the technology?

Christopher Marlowe wrote the play Tamerlaine about the conquerer with the same name and his grandson Ulugh Beg is known to have built the great planetarium in Samarkand. At the same time Eurpe was in a mess, economicly, politicly, socially and culturally.

When it comes to archeological excavations in China Europeans and Americans almost always call old Chinese history myths and legends. Then some unknown Chinese Archeologist dig up some grave and suddenly finds the capital of the Shang Dynasty, exactly where it is supposed to be located according to the state myth of China.

The origines of these denials might be found in sories as the following: "A Chinese archeologist was visiting an excavation in the south of Sweden. The visiting archaeolgoist looks at the work with great interest and finally asks a question: "- What exactly are you investigating here?" The chief archaeologist answers: "- Its houses fromn the 15th century." The Chinese looks interested and asks: "- Before or after Christ?"

I think both Europeans and Americans are a bit sensitive towards people with historical claims that reaches 5 000 years back in time...