Admiral Zheng

China: A History

by John Keay  · 5 Oct 2009

would follow, making Nanjing, for the next three decades, the shipbuilding capital of the world’s greatest maritime power. For with the 1405 departure of Admiral Zheng He in command of China’s first world armada, the Ming were poised not just to emulate Khubilai Khan’s overseas adventures but sensationally to

Why the West Rules--For Now: The Patterns of History, and What They Reveal About the Future

by Ian Morris  · 11 Oct 2010  · 1,152pp  · 266,246 words

beginning, Chinese navigation was far more advanced and Chinese sailors already knew the coasts of India, Arabia, East Africa, and perhaps Australia.* When the eunuch admiral Zheng He sailed from Nanjing for Sri Lanka in 1405 he led nearly three hundred vessels. There were tankers carrying drinking water and huge “Treasure Ships

Superpower Interrupted: The Chinese History of the World

by Michael Schuman  · 8 Jun 2020

of the Ming were the building of the Great Wall of China as we know it today, and the dispatch of “treasure fleets” led by Admiral Zheng He, one of the most adventurous escapades to promote Chinese global influence in all of China’s history. Qing 1644–1912 China’s final imperial

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the Ming Dynasty. Ruling from 1402 to 1424 AD, the third emperor of the Ming is most famous for dispatching the great “treasure fleets” of Admiral Zheng He. Yuan Shikai, Statesman. A senior official and military leader during the late Qing Dynasty, he tried and failed to reestablish the imperial system after

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to court bearing precious objects and presents,” Zheng He told us in a 1431 inscription. “The Emperor has delighted in their loyalty and sincerity.”2 Admiral Zheng He led the expeditions of massive “treasure fleets” to Southeast Asia, India, the Middle East, and Africa in the early fifteenth century to expand Chinese

The Boundless Sea: A Human History of the Oceans

by David Abulafia  · 2 Oct 2019  · 1,993pp  · 478,072 words

. He rebuilt the Grand Canal linking Beijing to the Chinese rivers and assuring the capital of regular grain supplies.2 His overseas expeditions, led by Admiral Zheng He (Cheng Ho) have attracted attention not just in modern times but under later Ming rulers – a certain Luo Mao-deng wrote a novel about

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of the costumes worn at court and the passion the Ming emperors showed for hunting and archery.13 Sending fleets overseas under the command of Admiral Zheng He was, then, a highly conspicuous and extremely expensive way of doing what earlier Chinese emperors had long been trying to do. Some historians have

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against the Mongols. Here a Mongol ship is under attack from Japanese warriors in 1281. 18. A seventeenth-century printed map of the voyages of Admiral Zheng He at the start of the fifteenth century. His ships reached east Africa and the Red Sea. 19. A late medieval image of a sewn

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, The Mysteries of the Marco Polo Maps (Chicago, 2014). 8. Wang Gungwu, ‘The Opening of Relations between China and Malacca, 1403–05’, in L. Suryadinata, Admiral Zheng He and Southeast Asia (Singapore, 2005); Tan Ta Sen, Cheng Ho and Malacca (Melaka and Singapore, 2005). 9. Dreyer, Zheng He , p. 16. 10. Tsai

Ghost Fleet: A Novel of the Next World War

by P. W. Singer and August Cole  · 28 Jun 2015  · 537pp  · 149,628 words

that a single blue dot was a few hundred miles ahead of it; it had a Z for an icon. Admiral Zheng He, Four Hundred and Fifty Miles Southeast of Kamchatka Peninsula The Admiral Zheng He pushed through the Pacific swell, each wave slapping the flagship of the joint Directorate-Russian task force, almost

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Arabia and Africa, the massive fleet cowed some kingdoms into submission and defeated the few that chose to fight. By the end of the voyages, Admiral Zheng He had created the first transoceanic empire, a ring of some thirty vassal states with China at the center. Subsequent emperors would turn away from

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weaker and eventually suffered the indignity of becoming a vassal to others. The greatness of the age became an embarrassment, as did the memory of Admiral Zheng. Not anymore. At 603 feet, almost as long as the Zumwalt, the ship was officially classified as a cruiser, but it was a battleship by

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stealthy, so the ship lacked the Zumwalt’s strange, sleek lines. Instead, carrying 128 missile cells, 64 fore and 64 aft, the twenty-first-century Admiral Zheng He was all about projecting power, actual and perceived. The symbolism of it all was not lost on Admiral Wang as he sat in his

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may all our enemies die screaming.” Duncan smiled, but then he saw her face. It was no longer an expressionless mask. She truly was Nemesis. Admiral Zheng He, Four Hundred and Fifty Miles Southeast of Kamchatka Peninsula At this moment, Admiral Wang felt that the flagship’s windows on the bridge had

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ships: three Sovremenny-class anti-surface destroyers, two Type Fifty-Four frigates, one Luyang-class guided missile destroyer, and a battle cruiser, most likely the Admiral Zheng He. They’re making twenty-five knots. They’re likely coming at us off a loose fix they got from the air attack.” Simmons took

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more missiles joined. While they waited, though, the task force below fired off its own volley of cruise missiles at the Puffins’ point of departure. Admiral Zheng He Bridge Admiral Wang now knew his gamble had been the right one; the instant that the garbled radio calls from Hawaii had burned through

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showing in the crow’s-feet around his eyes. “They already know where we are. I want them to see us this way,” said Simmons. Admiral Zheng He, Admiral Wang’s Stateroom The door to his stateroom shuddered, but fortunately not from another explosion, just his aide’s knock. Admiral Wang’s

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to both the tension that this bypass caused the American fleet and the relief it gave to the surface ships below. Admiral Zheng He Bridge The shouting on the bridge of the Admiral Zheng He subsided as the aircraft flew on. It had not been visible, but radar had initially picked it up at

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with concern. “If it’s needed, I can take over, sir.” Simmons blinked away tears and spoke. “Battery release . . . do it. Fire the rail gun.” Admiral Zheng He Water from the spray over the bow soaked his uniform jacket as the flagship cut through the water at almost thirty knots, the rest

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. The very steel of the superstructure seemed to vibrate, tickling the soles of his boots. A giant splash erupted on the port side of the Admiral Zheng He, the water spray rising higher than the ship itself. A few seconds later, another erupted to the starboard side, sending water hundreds of feet

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to be weak, that he may grow arrogant.’ ” He jabbed his finger down, but it never touched the screen. The rail-gun round entered the Admiral Zheng He’s superstructure approximately thirty feet beneath where Admiral Wang stood. The strike transferred its kinetic energy with such force that the metal superstructure was

The Years of Rice and Salt

by Kim Stanley Robinson  · 2 Jun 2003  · 762pp  · 246,045 words

's only been true for you.' 'God took us first to shorten our suffering. Your turn will come.' 'It's not God I fear, but Admiral Zheng He, the Three Jewel Eunuch. He and the Yongle Emperor were friends when they were boys, and the Emperor ordered him castrated when they were

Civilization: The West and the Rest

by Niall Ferguson  · 28 Feb 2011  · 790pp  · 150,875 words

Kingdom, but of the world itself – literally ‘All under heaven’. In Nanjing today you can see a full-size replica of the treasure ship of Admiral Zheng He, the most famous sailor in Chinese history. It is 400 feet long – nearly five times the size of the Santa María, in which Christopher

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ironic but appropriate that this first of the so-called ‘Unequal Treaties’ was signed in Nanjing, at the Jinghai Temple – originally built in honour of Admiral Zheng He and Tianfei, the Goddess of the Sea, who had watched over him and his fleet more than four centuries before. They are building ships

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piled high with coal, cement and ore. Competition, companies, markets, trade – these are things that China once turned its back on. Not any more. Today, Admiral Zheng He, the personification of Chinese expansionism and for so long forgotten, is a hero in China. In the words of the greatest economic reformer of

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in Pakistan – in the former Omani enclave of Gwadar – as well as in Burma and Sri Lanka. This is a very different maritime model from Admiral Zheng He’s (see Chapter 1). It comes straight from the playbook of the Victorian Royal Navy. Finally, and contrary to the view that China is

A Splendid Exchange: How Trade Shaped the World

by William J. Bernstein  · 5 May 2009  · 565pp  · 164,405 words

well.38 By contrast, the first large Chinese oceangoing junks did not venture into the Indian Ocean until about AD 1000, and the legendary eunuch admiral Zheng He would not sail his massive fleet to Sri Lanka and Zanzibar for another four hundred years after that. Arabic was the lingua franca of

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the shrunken Chinese population contributed in no small part to the withdrawal of the Middle Kingdom's navy from the Indian Ocean after the eunuch admiral Zheng He's last voyage in 1433. The nearly total destruction of Egypt's trading and industrial structure, the disappearance of the Mongols from the world

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sun never set in summer nor rose in winter evoked widespread ridicule in Europe. The modern government of China has revived the story of eunuch admiral Zheng He's seven massive expeditions into the Indian Ocean in the fifteenth century in order to demonstrate its peaceful intentions in the twenty-first century

The Patterning Instinct: A Cultural History of Humanity's Search for Meaning

by Jeremy Lent  · 22 May 2017  · 789pp  · 207,744 words

valuable framework for readers to come to their own assessment of humanity's future path—and their own potential role in shaping it. In 1405, Admiral Zheng set off from China with a glorious armada, leading three hundred magnificent ships on a thirty-year odyssey to distant lands as far afield as

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on a scale previously inconceivable. The story of this dramatic transformation in power and exploitation is the subject of the next chapter. What was in Admiral Zheng's mind when he set off from China in 1405 with his massive armada? What was his ambition—for himself and the Chinese emperor? Over

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. However, it doesn't give as satisfactory an answer to the question posed at the beginning of this chapter: why did the massive armada of Admiral Zheng leave such a limited impression on history, while the three flimsy boats of Christopher Columbus transformed the world beyond recognition? After all, the Chinese had

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lay in the construction of values that they both shared unquestioningly with their respective cultures. These contrasting cognitive structures made it just as unthinkable for Admiral Zheng to have conquered and enslaved the societies he visited with his armada as it would have been unthinkable for Columbus to have set up embassies

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pious sentiment”? Judging by the history of regions that came under Indian influence, we can infer that Indian rulers of the time were closer to Admiral Zheng than Columbus in their approach to power. The smaller countries of Southeast Asia are known as “the East Indies” because of the tremendous cultural, religious

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. The Chinese emphasis on appropriating and enjoying whatever arises rather than theorizing about it is demonstrated in a story told by historian Daniel Boorstein about Admiral Zheng's expeditions. In 1414, after Zheng established a diplomatic relationship with Bengal, a giraffe was sent to the Chinese emperor as tribute. This was the

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focusing, once again, on environmental factors. He also points to some practical reasons for the contrast between Columbus's and Zheng's missions. For example, Admiral Zheng was forced to comply with the centralized decision-making of the Chinese imperial palace, while Columbus could canvass different European monarchs with his ideas until

The New Map: Energy, Climate, and the Clash of Nations

by Daniel Yergin  · 14 Sep 2020

about law, power, and resources, and about history.” Indeed, it is a confrontation vexed by history.1 A symbol of China’s historic claims is Admiral Zheng He, otherwise known as the “Three-Jeweled Eunuch.” He was the paramount admiral among several eunuchs who commanded China’s huge fleets in the fifteenth

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the Indonesian parliament, introduced the second part of the new strategy. This time he recalled the spirit of the Three-Jeweled Eunuch, the fifteenth-century admiral Zheng He, whose voyages had touched down in what is today Indonesia before sailing on to the “Western seas”—leaving “many stories of friendly exchanges,” said

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