Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Ya-ta Boy]

There was some discussion a few months ago about this book. At the time, I had not read it, but my interest was piqued. BIG mistake...I paid W19,810 for a piece of trash. von Daniken is the epitome of intellectual skepticism compared to this guy (Gavin Menzies).

[I did a search of 1421 and 1421 and Columbus and didn't get anything. As someone else mentioned, maybe the search function is broken.]

For anyone who has not read the tripe, here is a partial list of some of the claims: Between 1421 and 1423 the Chinese discovered and mapped the west coast of Africa as far north as the big bulge, the coast of South America, Magellan's Strait, part of Antarctica, all of the west coast of South, Central and part of North America, the Caribbean, the east coast of the US as far as Rhode Island, circumnavigated Greenland and mapped the north shore of Asia, criss-crossed the Pacific, found New Zealand and mapped several parts of Australia, setting up colonies as they went.

Bits and pieces of this information somehow got from China to Portugal, Spain and Italy fast enough so Portugese explorers had the information before the end of the century.

Two of his 'pieces of supporting evidence':

a) the wreck of a Chinese junk in the Philippines is evidence of its having been in the Western Hemisphere: 'The Pandanan junk also carried metates--pestles for grinding maize--which were then unique to South America, and what appears to be Cholula ware, the eggshell-thin ceramics made in Mexico.' (p. 268) This is the extent of the proof he offers...no demonstration that what was found were in fact metates and that they were unique to South America and that the ceramics are really from Mexico. Just his assertion.

b) '...the Matadi Falls stone has calligraphy beneath medieval Portuguese. The Portugese writing once again commomorated a deceased comrade, here the navigatore Alvares. There is less underlying material than at Janela, but experts confirmed that it was the same calligraphy, that once again it looked like Malayalam. Its identity appeared to have been solved, although the concentric circles remained a mystery. It was likely that the Chinese had come here on their journey up the African coast. Not only is the Matadi Falls an ideal place for watering, it is 'in the middle of the west coast of Africa', and fits the description of 'Garbin' given by Fra Mauro." (p. 136) Who are the experts that identified the writing? Don't know. What does the writing say? Don't know. Why is writing from India proof that the Chinese were in West Africa? Don't know.

Arg! I hate when I get conned into wasting my money for foolishness like this.

[Bulsajo]

Sounds like he heard accounts of Zheng's voyages and got carried away....

http://www7.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0507/feature2/

http://www7.nationalgeographic.com/ngm/0507/feature2/map.html



Size: 125.6m by 50.94m

"Baochuan is used by Zheng He and his deputies. Its loading capacity is about 70,000 tons. There are both large-sized and medium-sized baochuans."

Certainly puts Yi's tiny turtle ships into perspective...

[Kuros]

Bulsajo...Bulsajo, it's not size that matters, it's how far you penetrate.

My view of it is this. Let's assume the improbable and suggest that the Chinese visited the New World before Columbus got there. Well, what does this say about this fantastic Ming Dynasty that the discovery went largely undocumented and unpreserved?

[peppermint]

That the claims were out there wouldn't have been so bad if the book had been interesting. Unfortunately he got bogged down in navigationspeak- bleh

Besides, the Vikings would still have beaten the Chinese by about 400 years.

[chiaa]

Could have saved 2.000 won buying it someplace else.

[excitinghead]

I found the book fascinating and convincing myself; I really don't understand why you guys didn't like it so much, but you're entitled to your opinions.

I admit I haven't read it in a while, and I'm not going to intensely study it to get into detailed arguments with page numbers and everything, but here's my two cents:

1) I'm not suprised that European traders and explorers found out about the voyages within a hundred years; more so that it took so long. It's well known that at the time there was a Arab-based trading route that linked North China to Southeast Asia to India...all the way down to the Horn of Africa. As Europeans explored down the coast of Africa and then onto India, naturally they would have come into contact with sailors who knew about the voyages.

2) As the guy explains, the reason that the discovery went largely undocumented and unpreserved was because the Ming Dynasty went isolationist and deliberately destroyed as much evidence of the voyages as it could

3) It's a book about exploring the seas! Of course it uses navigationspeak! But I think you exaggerate how much, I barely noticed it myself

4) China was the most scientifically advanced civilisation in the world for millenia! I'm not saying that that automatically means that they went on voyages of discovery...but, hell, they certainly had the ability and can't be dismissed out of hand. If the Vikings could make it to America centuries earlier for instance, then the Chinese sure could have later.

Cheers

[Hyalucent]

I still don't buy it. Yeah, I suppose it has been proved possible but that's a far cry from it being the reality. The basis of this argument is "Big boats sail across oceans - The Chinese had big boats - Ergo the Chinese sailed across oceans." Show me the maps.

[Ya-ta Boy]

[joe_doufu]

I recommend the fish story "Cod" by Mark Kurlansky. It's a lighter book (in more than one sense) than "1421" and tells an interesting tale about the historymaking fish. Kurlansky develops a theory that the Basques of medieval Europe knew about North America many years before Columbus but kept it a secret because of the money they were making in the salt cod business. (Kurlansky also wrote a book entitled "Salt" which I haven't yet perused.) It doesn't take the reader long to wonder if maybe some others didn't also find the place and also try to keep it to themselves.

I've always found it hard to believe that two entire continents, full of curious enterprising exploring human beings, managed to remain "invisible" from all the other peoples of the world for as long as they did. There's got to have been some interaction before Columbus, even if no permanent colonies took root.

[Ya-ta Boy]

[jaganath69]

Read it last year in Hong Kong and felt the same way as the OP. Started out as a promising premise only to become risable to say the least. Asking the reader to make as many leaps of faith as he does discredits him as an historian. I think there is enough evidence for Chinese mariners visiting places such as east Africa and Arhem Land, but the Atlantic voyages were fanciful to say the least.

[EFLtrainer]

[Hyalucent]

I'll play Devil's Advocate for a minute and draw you guys to this link:

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/1118146364014_8/?hub=SciTech

[Ya-ta Boy]

[EFLtrainer]