When China ruled the seas : the treasure fleet of the Dragon Throne, 1405-1433
著者
書誌事項
When China ruled the seas : the treasure fleet of the Dragon Throne, 1405-1433
(Oxford paperbacks)
Oxford University Press, 1996, c1994
- : pbk
大学図書館所蔵 全25件
  青森
  岩手
  宮城
  秋田
  山形
  福島
  茨城
  栃木
  群馬
  埼玉
  千葉
  東京
  神奈川
  新潟
  富山
  石川
  福井
  山梨
  長野
  岐阜
  静岡
  愛知
  三重
  滋賀
  京都
  大阪
  兵庫
  奈良
  和歌山
  鳥取
  島根
  岡山
  広島
  山口
  徳島
  香川
  愛媛
  高知
  福岡
  佐賀
  長崎
  熊本
  大分
  宮崎
  鹿児島
  沖縄
  韓国
  中国
  タイ
  イギリス
  ドイツ
  スイス
  フランス
  ベルギー
  オランダ
  スウェーデン
  ノルウェー
  アメリカ
注記
First published: New York : Simon & Schuster, 1994
Includes bibliographical notes (p. [205]-231) and index
内容説明・目次
内容説明
A hundred years before Columbus and his fellow Europeans began making their way to the New World, fleets of giant Chinese junks commanded by the eunuch admiral Zheng He and filled with the empire's finest porcelains, lacquerware, and silk ventured to the edge of the world's `four corners.' It was a time of exploration and conquest, but it ended in a retrenchment so complete that less than a century later, it was a crime to go to sea in a multimasted ship. In When
China Ruled the Seas, Louise Levathes takes a fascinating and unprecedented look at this dynamic period in China's enigmatic history, focusing on China's rise as a naval power that literally could have ruled the world and at its precipitious plunge into isolation when a new emperor ascended the Dragon
Throne.
During the brief period from 1405 to 1433, seven epic expeditions brought China's `treasure ships' across the China Seas and the Indian Ocean, from Taiwan to the spice islands of Indonesia and the Malabar coast of India, on to the rich ports of the Persian Gulf and down the African coast, China's `El Dorado', and perhaps even to Australia, three hundred years before Captain Cook was credited with its discovery. With over 300 ships - some measuring as much as 400 feet long and 160 feet wide,
with upwards of nine masts and twelve sails, and combined crews sometimes numbering over 28,000 men - the emperor Zhu Di's fantastic fleet was a virtual floating city, a naval expression of his Forbidden City in Beijing. The largest wooden boats ever built, these extraordinary ships were the most
technically superior vessels in the world with innovations such as balanced rudders and bulwarked compartments that predated European ships by centuries. For thirty years foreign goods, medicines, geographic knowledge, and cultural insights flowed into China at an extraordinary rate, and China extended its sphere of political power and influence throughout the Indian Ocean. Half the world was in China's grasp, and the rest could easily have been, had the emperor so wished. But instead, China
turned inward, as suceeding emperors forbade overseas travel and stopped all building and repair of oceangoing junks. Disobedient merchants and seamen were killed, and within a hundred years the greatest navy the world had ever known willed itself into extinction. The period of China's greatest outward
expansion was followed by the period of its greatest isolation.
Drawing on eye-witness accounts, official Ming histories, and African, Arab, and Indian sources, many translated for the first time, Levathes brings readers inside China's most illustrious scientific and technological era. She sheds new light on the historical and cultural context in ghich this great civilization thrived, as well as the perception of other cultures toward this little understood empire at the time. Beautifully illustrated and engagingly written, When China Ruled the
Seas is the fullest picture yet of the early Ming Dynasty - the last flowering of Chinese culture before the Manchu invasions.
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