Page 343 - Art In The Age Of Exploration (Great Section on Chinese Art Ming Dynasty)

thousand years later. In the West the invention the Portuguese caravel, the preeminent "ex- Khan dynasty controlled the Persian Gulf and
of the sternpost rudder is usually credited to the plorer's ship" of the fifteenth century. 13 had wide contacts in western Asia, even to the
Dutch in about 1200. It could have been an Ships approaching 200 feet in length and edges of the Mediterranean.
independent invention at that time, but diffu- capable of carrying 600 to 700 men had already Zhu Yuanzhang, founder of the Ming
sion from China via the Arabs is much more existed in China in the eighth century. During dynasty (r. 1368-1398), also recognized the
plausible. the Song dynasty (960-1279), when ship-build- importance of naval power and continued to
Zhang Zeduan's famous Qing-Ming Shang ing was concentrated in the great southeastern support its growth. At Nanjing, his new capital,
He Tu (Spring Festival on the River) was painted port cities, especially Quanzhou (Arab Zayton, he founded two large shipyards where principal
about 1127. This detail from the long narrative near modern Amoy on the Fujian coast), sea- elements of Zheng He's fleets were built. One
scroll depicts the Bian Canal leading from the going ships up to 200 feet in length and carry- of those, directly on the banks of the Yangzi,
Yellow River into the Northern Song capital, ing up to 500 tons cargo were not uncommon. 14 had six great slipways measuring 100 to 160 feet
modern Kaifeng, just before its fall to the Since Song China was encircled by powerful in width and almost 1000 feet long. The
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Jurchen invaders in 1126. The artist was an enemies on its northern and western inland largest ships could easily be accommodated
acute observer and superb draftsman, painting frontiers, its international commerce was con- there.
at a time when realistic representation was centrated in the southeastern coastal provinces, Comparing the various aspects of ship-build-
valued, and clearly he must have made his spurring great advances in nautical technology ing and nautical technology in the fifteenth
detailed sketches from direct observation. For and maritime ventures of increasing scope. Arab century, East and West, makes clear how far
those reasons his painting is an important docu- and Persian traders of this time considered the China and much of Asia had surpassed Europe
ment of twelfth-century Chinese material life. stout and stable Chinese vessels the ships of by the century that saw Christopher Columbus
In the detail shown here, the river transport choice in their travels from the Persian Gulf and Vasco da Gama carry the flags of Spain and
boats and barges are precisely drawn, their ports around India to China. They noted with Portugal to the New World and to Asia. Colum-
design and structure accurately portrayed. The pleasure that the Chinese merchantmen pro- bus' Santa Maria was but 125 feet long and
sternpost rudder is clearly visible at the stern of vided convenient private cabins for travelers, probably of about 280 tons capacity; no ship of
each boat. fresh water for bathing and other hygienic da Gama's exceeded 300 tons. Zheng He, by
amenities, and fresh foods en route —luxuries contrast, commanded great fleets whose largest
unknown in other vessels. class of ships, the famed Treasure Ships, were at
PROPULSION. The Chinese had never used Curiously, it was during the Yuan dynasty, least 300 feet in length (perhaps considerably
ranks of human rowers to propel their large when conquering Mongols from Inner Asia more), and appear to have averaged about 2500
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ships. In the Mediterranean the Greco-Roman ruled China, that the Chinese made great fur- tons cargo capacity, or 3100 tons displacement.
tradition of the oared galley, especially for naval ther progress in maritime activity. The In his first expedition, 1405-1407, Zheng com-
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warfare, persisted alongside that of sailing craft; Mongol conquerors were themselves totally manded a fleet of 317 vessels, of which 62 were
the Battle of Lepanto in 1571 was fought largely unacquainted with ships and seafaring. But Treasure Ships. The Invincible Armada sent by
by oared galleys, those on the Christian side Khubilai Khan's conquest of the Southern Song Philip ii of Spain more than a century later to
supplied mostly by Philip n of Spain; though by dynasty between 1260 and 1280 was accom- invade England comprised less than half as
1588, when Philip launched his Invincible plished largely with the use of navies, on many ships, of which only seven equaled 1000
Armada, Spain's shift to rigged sailing craft for China's inland waterways in the earlier phases, tons burden.
the high seas was complete. The Chinese, by and ultimately by coastal armadas borrowed in
contrast, had very early on developed several significant part from Arab and Persian mer-
important features of sailing-ship design that chant-princes based in south China. Captured Admiral Zheng He
obviated the need for rowers. From at least the Chinese, Korean, and other non-Mongol ship Zheng He is one of the great personalities in
seventh or eighth century they used paddle- builders and sailors created and manned the maritime history. He was a Chinese Muslim,
wheel-propelled ships with human-powered Mongols' marine forces. Khubilai Khan planned born in 1371 in Yunnan Province, in China's
treadmills, especially on inland waterways. Of vastly to enlarge the Mongol realm by invading southwest frontier region. Yunnan had become
greater practical significance, however, were the Japan, then Indonesia, making the continued significantly Islamicized under the Mongols,
advances in rigging and sail design. Their three- buildup of naval forces a high priority. At the and apparently Zheng was partly non-Han
and four-masted sailing ships of wind-efficient same time the Mongol rulers had none of the Chinese; he knew some Arabic, and his father
design appeared a thousand years before the Chinese elite's disdain for commerce; they and grandfather, who may have served the
adoption of like features in the thirteenth and actively promoted merchant associations, grant- Mongol period princes of Yunnan, had made the
fourteenth centuries in Europe, apparently in ing government funds and protection to extend pilgrimage to Mecca and bore Arabic-sounding
imitation of Chinese models that had become the spheres of their profit-seeking activities. It names. When about ten years old Zheng He was
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well known through Marco Polo and other is not surprising, then, that upon the founding selected for the court's eunuch service by
European visitors to China. For instance, in the of the Ming dynasty in 1368 China had ship- Chinese military forces then completing the
early centuries of the present era the Chinese yards of considerable scale, concentrations of conquest of Yunnan for the new Ming dynasty;
invented forms of the lug sail to aid in sailing skilled shipyard workers, an increasingly well- that is, he was castrated and sent to the court at
against or across the prevailing wind, and from developed tradition of foreign trade, and a com- Nanjing to be trained. He was perhaps fortunate
about the eighth century they adopted the out- mand of nautical technology significantly in being assigned to the staff of the Ming
standing Arab improvement in that technology, enhanced by the international contacts that the founding emperor's fourth son, Zhu Di (1360-
the lateen sail; it spread not only to China but Mongols' world empire had afforded. In partic- 1424), who became emperor by usurpation in
thereafter also to the Mediterranean, where it ular, Khubilai Khan maintained cordial relations 1402 and reigned as the Yongle emperor for
became an important element in the design of with those cousins whose Mongol/Persian 11- twenty-two years thereafter. Educated at first in

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