Zheng He: Legend of the Giant Ships

Zheng He: Legend of the Giant Ships
Apr 03, 2009 By Susie Gordon , eChinacities.com

On July 11th, China will celebrate Maritime Day (Háng Hǎi Rì | 航海日) as it has done every year since 2005. The festival was established to commemorate the great sea voyages of Ming Dynasty navigator and legendary renaissance man Zheng He. The story of this man’s life is a turbulent and intriguing journey all of its own, from Uzbek roots through to illustrious naval accolades and a firm place in China’s history. But Zheng He’s life and times are shrouded in scandal and exaggeration; some scholars have tried to prove that he sailed as far as the Americas, and maps have surfaced which experts claim were drawn by him. So what is the truth behind this mysterious yet much-idolised figure?

We know for sure that Zheng He was born in 1371 in what is now the Yunnan Province, into a family of Hui Muslims. His Mandarin birth name was Ma Sanbao, and he was also known by the Arabic Hajji Mahmud Shams. A descendant of a famous Yunnan governor of Uzbek heritage, young Sanbao was deeply influenced by his father and grandfather, who both made pilgrimages to Mecca and brought him up to have fervent faith in Islam. But his idyllic childhood of learning and fatherly attention came to an untimely end. He was only 11 years old when the Ming army burst through the walls of his town to overthrow the Yuan rebels who had been staging an uprising. Finding himself among the townsfolk that the soldiers seized as prisoners, his next stop was the imperial court where he was turned into a eunuch. Rather than sliding into the obscurity of courtly duties like many eunuchs, Sanbao made a name for himself with his wit and quick tongue, and soon became the emperor’s protégé. Emperor Yongle named him Zheng He and sent him to study in Nanjing.


Pages from Ming Dynasty book Wu Bei Zhi (1628) (Zheng He's travel chart)

In the early years of the fifteenth century, Yongle’s thoughts turned to spreading the Ming Dynasty’s influence across Asia. His idea was to amass a fleet of ships to tour the southern seas, and the best man to lead this convoy, he thought, was his favourite Zheng He. The first fleet set sail in 1405 with He at the helm, made up of 300 ships and nearly 30,000 crew. Seventeen years and six voyages later, the Ming envoy had sailed to India, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Indonesia, and the Arab Gulf, collecting exotic animals and jewels in return for the silk and jade they offered as gifts. As well as flexing his diplomatic muscles to impress the leaders of the countries he visited, Zheng He wasn’t afraid to use force. During his voyages he quelled civil war in Sri Lanka and eradicated piracy in the seas around China. He was also responsible for settling many Chinese Muslims in Malacca, after which the state became a centre of Mediaeval Muslim learning and worship.

The halcyon days drew to a close after Emperor Yongle’s death in 1424. His successor, Hongxi, decided that Zheng He’s voyages were a frivolous and unnecessary expense, so allowed him only two more expeditions. Tragically, Hongxi destroyed the records of these final journeys, so very little detail of them is known. One modern writer, Gavin Menzies, claimed that Zheng He had travelled as far as Australia, but historians have rubbished his theory. What is certain is that Zheng He met his death on the last voyage in 1433. His body was laid to rest off India’s Malabar Coast, and a great era of seafaring came to an end.


Model of Columbus’ and Zheng He’s ships
Photo: Lars Plougmann

One of the most intriguing threads to Zheng He’s story is his fleet of so-called giant ships. Early records state that his fleet contained 62 enormous treasure ships, each measuring 416 feet by 170 feet, weighing 1,500 tons, and holding nine masts. To put this into perspective, Columbus’s ships were no longer than 55 feet and weighed 70 tons. If the records are to be believed, Zheng He’s ships would have been the size of a football field, with enough room on board for 500 passengers. Along with these sixty-odd treasure vessels, the fleet contained horse ships, warships, water tankers, and supply boats. But modern scholars doubt that Zheng He’s fleet contained such marine behemoths. Some put the rumours down to the exaggerations of contemporary explorers like Marco Polo, and mariners such as Ibn Battuta, and Niccolò da Conti, while others believe that these colossal boats existed, but only as ostentatious court vessels moored on the Yangtze.

 

Another interesting aspect of Zheng He’s life, and yet another of the many unanswered questions, is the nature and depth of his religious belief. His early Muslim faith, and the fact that he actively spread Islam throughout South-East Asia would suggest devotion to Allah, but sources also describe him making offerings to Buddha in Sri Lanka. He is said to displayed allegiance to Taoism too, erecting a commemorative pillar to Tao goddess Tian Fei in Fujian. This confusion was used positively by the People’s Republic, who lauded Zheng He as a totem of religious harmony in their attempt to promote tolerance towards the Chinese Muslim minority.


Reproduction of Zheng He’s atlas made in 1763

Even in modern times, the riddles surrounding this charismatic seafarer continue. In 2006 a map came to light, a copy of a 1418 atlas apparently dating from 1763. In the document were descriptions of Native Americans and Aboriginal Australians, and it was immediately attributed to Zheng He. Much wrangling over carbon dating has not proven whether or not the map is genuine.

What we know for certain about Zheng He is not clear, and there will always be over-zealous historians eager to bolster his achievements, but his mark on naval history is undisputed. As is the case with many ancestral heroes, China continues to hold him up as a symbol of old prowess to encourage modern harmony.

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1 Comments

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Marc

Didn't they find one of his so called "Giant Ships" off the South Coast of China a few years back?

Jul 07, 2011 19:20 Report Abuse