1421: The Year China Discovered the World

by Gavin Menzies

  10. The Peruvian historian Pablo Padron, ‘Un Huaco con Caracteres Chinos’, Sociedad Geográfica de Lima, Vol. 23, pp. 24–5.

  11. Carl Johannessen and M. Fogg, ‘Melanotic Chicken Use and Chinese Traits in Guatemala’, in Revista de Historia de América, Vol. 93, 1962, p. 75.

  12. W.C. Parker and A.G. Bearn, Annals of Human Genetics 25, 1961 (227).

  13. Padron, op. cit.

  14. This is the only part of the I Yü Thu Chih to have been translated – by Viviana Wong, to whom I am most grateful.

  15. In the Atlas of Foreign Countries, anon., AD 265–316, China.

  16. K.G. McIntyre, The Secret Discovery of Australia, Souvenir, Melbourne, 1977.

  17. J.L. Sorenson and M.H. Raish, Pre-Columbian Contact with the Americas across the Oceans: An Annotated Bibliography, Provo Research Press, 1990.

  18. George F. Carter, ‘Fusang: Chinese Contact with America’, in Anthropological Journal of Canada, 14, No. 1, 1976.

  Chapter 11: Satan’s Island

  1. [British] Admiralty, Ocean Passages of the World, third edn, 1973.

  2. Armando Cortesão, The Nautical Chart of 1424, University of Coimbra, Portugal, 1954, pp. 105 and 110.

  3. Bartolomeu las Casas, Historia de las Indias, Lisbon, 1552.

  4. Antonio Galvão, Tratado Dos Diversos e Desayados Caminhos, Lisbon, 1563, and Cortesão, op. cit., p. 73.

  5. Dr Chanca, quoted in J.H. Longille, Christopher Columbus, Inscribers, Washington DC, 1903, p. 184.

  6. Chanca, ibid., p. 187.

  7. Ibid., p. 184.

  8. Syllacius, quoted, ibid., pp. 184ff.

  9. Chanca, quoted, ibid., pp. 181 and 182.

  10. See the website for more detailed information.

  11. Letters between Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC, and author, 6 and 7 July 2002.

  12. Syllacius, quoted in Longille, op. cit., pp. 184ff.

  13. Ibid., p. 185.

  14. This is explained in more detail on the website.

  15. Inscription translated by J.J.L. Duyvendak, China’s Discovery of Africa, Probsthain, 1949, p. 28.

  16. 4403, 3912 and 2710 (see the website for more detailed information).

  17. 3912.

  18. 77°30′W between 23°10′ and 23°50′N.

  Chapter 12: The Treasure Fleet Runs Aground

  1. 2710, 3810 and 3912.

  2. F.L. Coffman, Atlas of Treasure Maps, New York, 1957.

  3. 26, 61, 63 and 64 in Coffman’s numbering system.

  4. 27, 28, 29 and 30 in Coffman’s numbering system.

  5. Peter Martyr, quoted in E.W. Lawson, The Discovery of Florida and Its Discoverer Juan Ponce de León, 1946, p. 8.

  6. Martyr, quoted, ibid., p. 11.

  7. The Undersea World of Jacques Cousteau and the TV series In Search Of … Atlantis, narrated by Leonard Nimoy, Channel 4 (UK) and National Geographical Channel (USA).

  8. Dr David Zink’s discoveries are featured in two books, The Ancient Stones Speak, Dutton, 1979, and The Stones of Atlantis, W.H. Allen, 1978.

  9. J. Needham, Science and Civilisation in China, Vol. 4, Pt 3, Cambridge UP, Cambridge, 1954, p. 669.

  10. This was confirmed by the Old Dominion University of Virginia, to which Dr Zink sent samples.

  11. Alemanide, rhaotide and celtide.

  12. At Christie’s.

  13. Washington Irving, Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus, quoted in Loren Coleman, Mysterious America, Faber, 1983, p. 218.

  14. Ferdinand Columbus, La Historia della Vita di Cristoforo Columbus, Milan, 1930.

  Chapter 13: Settlement in North America

  1. Francis I, King of France, to Verrazzano, quoted in D.B. Quinn (ed.), North American Discovery, Harper & Row, 1971.

  2. The account of Verrazzano’s voyage is given in his letter of 8 July 1524 to Francis I, quoted, ibid., p. 65.

  3. Ibid.

  4. Suzanne O. Carlson’s finds were published in an article on the internet on 4 March 2002: www.neara.org/carlson/atlantic.html.

  5. Professor F. J. Pohl, Atlantic Crossings before Columbus, W.W. Norton, New York, 1961, pp. 185ff.

  6. Marco Polo, The Travels of Marco Polo, trs. R. Latham, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1958, p. 237.

  7. William S. Penhallow, ‘Astronomical Alignments in the Newport Tower’, in Across before Columbus?, NEARA Publications, Edgecombe, Maine, 1998, pp. 85ff.

  8. This is explained more fully in chapter 15.

  9. E.R. Snow, Tales of the Atlantic Coast, Redman, 1962, p. 19.

  10. Ibid., pp. 26ff.

  11. David Borden, of Marblehead, Massachusetts, and his friend Fred Chester, who grew up near the Dighton Rock State Park, gave me this information.

  12. Borden to author.

  13. Borden to author.

  14. A full list, together with a photograph, is shown on the website.

  Chapter 14: Expedition to the North Pole

  1. Rebecca Catz, ‘Spain and Portugal and the Navigators’, unpublished paper presented 25 September 1990, Washington DC.

  2. About 51°40′W.

  3. Quoted in Farley Mowat, The Farfarers: Before the Norse, Seal Books, Toronto, 1998, p. 176.

  4. Pope Nicholas V, quoted ibid., p. 308.

  5. Peter Schlederman, Voices in Stone, Calgary, Canada, 1996, and Mowat, op. cit. Although my conclusions differ from those drawn by Peter Schlederman and Farley Mowat, I rely heavily on their research, without which this chapter could not have been written.

  6. Schlederman, op. cit., p. 127.

  7. Canadian Government maps of the Canadian Arctic (Hydrographic and Map Service of Canada, Map X1734); Eskimo Maps of the Canadian Eastern Arctic by John Spink and D.W. Moodie (1972); the Sea Ice Atlas of Arctic Canada, published by the Ottawa Department of Energy, Mines and Resources, 1982, and the map of Greenland drawn by the Geo Daetisk Institut of Copenhagen, 2000.

  8. Ferdinand Columbus, La Historia della Vita di Cristoforo Columbus, Milan, 1930, quoting a now lost memorandum by his father, seeking to prove that the Arctic was habitable.

  9. Catz, translation of Columbus’s note in a copy of Pope Pius II, History of Remarkable Things that Happened in My Time, in op. cit.

  10. J. Needham, Science and Civilisation in China, Cambridge UP, Cambridge, 1954.

  Chapter 15: Solving the Riddle

  1. Antonio Galvão, The Discoveries of the World, Hakluyt Society, 1862, p. 369.

  2. The Portuguese historian Castaneda.

  3. Eric Axelson (ed.), Dias and His Successors, Saayman & Weber, Cape Town, 1988, p. 66.

  4. The Jesuit Father Monclaro, 1569, quoted in Louise Levathes, When China Ruled the Seas, Simon & Schuster, 1994, p. 198.

  5. N. Puccioni, Giuba e OltreGiuba (‘The River Juba and Beyond’), Florence, 1937, p. 110.

  6. Levathes, op. cit., p. 199.

  7. H.D. Howse, Greenwich Time and the Discovery of Longitude, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, 1980, p. 2.

  8. J. Needham, citing History of the Yan Dynasty, in Science and Civilisation in China, Vol. 3, Pt 2, sec. 20, Cambridge UP, Cambridge, 1954, p. 398, and La Place calculations, p. 299.

  9. Ibid., p. 369.

  10. Ibid., p. 392.

  11. Those wishing to marvel at the ingenuity of these astonishing devices will find an illustration of the polyvascular type in a Chinese encyclopedia, the Shi Lin Kuang Chi of 1478, held by Cambridge University Library, England.

  12. Marco Polo, The Travels of Marco Polo, trs. R. Latham, Penguin, Harmondsworth, 1958, p. 288.

  Chapter 16: Where the Earth Ends

  1. Francisco Alcaforado, report of proceedings to Prince Henry the Navigator.

  2. Gomes Eannes de Zuzara, The Chronicle of the Discovery and Conquest of Guinea, trs. C.R. Beazley, Hakluyt Society, 1896–9.

  3. E.D.S. Bradford, Southward the Caravels, Hutchinson, 1961, p. 8.

  4. Vasco Lobeira, Amadis de Gaul, ed. and trs. R. Southey, 1872.

  5. Malcolm Letts (ed. and trans.), Mandeville’s Travels,
Hakluyt Society, 1953, p. 116 (Egerton text), p. 321 (Paris text). Mandeville was an English squire with a vivid imagination that allowed him to describe far-off lands without visiting them.

  6. Ibid.

  7. Camões, Os Luciades (‘The Luciads’), Lisbon, 1572.

  8. This is a simplified explanation; there are refinements to take into account the earth’s tilt and curvature.

  9. Quoted in F.M. Rogers, The Travels of the Infante Dom Pedro of Portugal, Harvard UP, Cambridge, Mass., 1961.

  10. Ibid.

  11. I have used the chronology of Oliveira Martins, but the precise details of Dom Pedro’s itinerary are disputed by different historians. The confusion arises because many countries used different calendars, and because Dom Pedro made not one but many journeys between 1416 and 1428. It is most probable that he left Portugal again in 1419 to visit the Emperor Sigismund and served the Emperor in the wars against the Ottomans. He then settled in Treviso and visited Venice in the summer of 1421, as soon as another war, between the Emperor and Venice, was over. He then went to Egypt in 1424, returning via England (1426) and Venice again (1428) to Portugal.

  12. Antonio Galvão, The Discoveries of the World, Hakluyt Society, 1862. See p. 107.

  13. For the connection between Niccolò da Conti and ‘Bartholomew the Florentine’, see F.M. Rogers, op. cit., pp. 42 and 264; Gustavo Uzielli, La Vita e i Tempi di Paolo dal Pozzo Toscanelli, Rome, 1894, and W. Sensburg, Poggio Bracciolini und Niccolò da Conti, Vienna, 1906. For the connection between Toscanelli and ‘Bartholomew the Florentine’, see Gustavo Uzielli, Paolo dal Pozzo Toscanelli: Iniziatore della Scoperta d’America, Florence, 1892; Sidney Welch, Europe’s Discovery of South Africa; Arnold J. Pomerans, The Great Age of Discovery, New York, 1958, p. 18, and P. Kermann, Zeigt Mir Adams Testament. For the connection between Toscanelli and Dom Pedro, see Uzielli, Toscanelli: Iniziatore, p. 76. For the connection between ‘Bartholomew the Florentine’ and Martin Behaim, see F.M. Rogers, The Quest for Eastern Christians, University of Minnesota Press, 1962, pp. 42 and 95.

  14. For Niccolò da Conti, see: (i) G. Uzielli, La Vita e i Tempi di Paolo dal Pozzo Toscanelli, Rome, 1894, pp. 10, 11, 63, 90, 122, 141, 154–75, 189–92, 228, 246, 386, 566–7; (ii) ‘The Travels of Niccolò da Conti’, partial translation in R.H. Major (ed.), India in the Fifteenth Century, Hakluyt Society, 1857; (iii) W. Heyd, Histoire, Vol. 1, 1885, pp. 378, 380; (iv) V. Bellemo, Nicolo da Conti, 1882, pp. 331–47; C. Desimoni, Pero Tafur, 1882, pp. 331–47; (vi) F. Kunstman, Afrika vor den Entdeckungen der Portugiesen, Aufrosten der Academie, Munich, 1853.

  For ‘Bartholomew the Florentine’, see: (i) Uzielli, La Vita e i Tempi, pp. 63, 165–6; (ii) T. de Mura, M. Behaim, Treutel et Wurz, Strasbourg, 1802, pp. 33–5; (iii) p. Amat (ed.), Studi Bibliografichi in Italia, Pt 1, Ed. 2, Rome, 1882, p. 123.

  For Pope Eugenius IV (Gabriele Condulmaro), see Uzielli, La Vita e i Tempi, p. 166: ‘Gabriele Condulmaro poteva essere a Venezia nel 1424, ma non era ancora Papa, essendo stato assunto alla tiara soltanto nel 1431.’

  For Bartholomew of Florence’s journey, see Uzielli, La Vita e i Tempi, p. 63: ‘Ecco ciò che ne dice maestro Bartolomeo Florentino che tornò dalle Indie nel 1424 e che accompagnò a Venezia il Papa Eugenio IV, e al quale raffontò ciò aveva veduto e osservato in un soggiorno di ventiquattro anni in oriente.’

  15. See n. 13.

  16. Paolo Toscanelli, letter to Columbus, in H. Vignaud, Toscanelli and Columbus, Sands, 1902, pp. 322 and 323.

  17. Also known as ‘Behaim’ and ‘Martin of Bohemia’. See note 13.

  18. Antonio Pigafetta, Magellan’s Voyage, trs. R.A. Skelton, New Haven, Conn., 1969, pp. 58ff.

  19. See ns 13 and 14.

  20. See ns 13 and 14, and p. 107.

  21. See n. 13.

  Chapter 17: Colonizing the New World

  1. Antonio Galvão, Tratado Dos Diversos e Desayados Caminhos, Lisbon, 1563, and Antonio Cordeyro, Historia Insulana, Lisbon, 1717, quoted in H. Harrisse, The Discovery of North America, 1892, p. 51.

  2. J.H. Longille, Christopher Columbus, Inscribers, Washington DC, 1903, p. 191.

  3. Extract from Columbus’s notebook, quoted in Bartolomeu las Casas, Historia de las Indias, Lisbon, 1552.

  4. Galvão, op. cit., p. 370.

  5. Those of Andrea Bianco in 1448; Grazioso Benincasa in 1463, 1470 and 1482; Andrea Benincasa in 1476, and Albino Canepa in 1480 and 1489.

  6. Cf. Armando Cortesão, The Nautical Chart of 1424, Coimbra, 1954, p. 106.

  7. Carol Urness, Portolan Charts, James Ford Bell Library, University of Minnesota, 1999.

  8. Published by the Lisbon Academy of Sciences.

  9. For coffee in Puerto Rico before European voyages, see D. Maclellan, ‘Coffee Varieties in Puerto Rico’, Puerto Rico Agriculture Station Bulletin No. 30, Mayaguez, Puerto Rico, 1924; P. C. Stanley, The Rubiaceae of Central America, Chicago, 1930 (Field Museum of Natural History, Botanical Series Vol. 7, no. 1); E.C. Hill, Coffee Planting, Higginbotham, Madias, 1877, pp. 1–3 and 17–19; E.R. Thurber, Coffee from Plantation to Cup, American Grocer Publishing Association, New York, 1881, intro. and pp. 4–5.

  10. Produce photographed at Mayaguez Agricultural Station.

  11. Albino Canepa: the domain of saluagio viúadi (nom vulgar des alguns brasilieros), the common name for people coming from Brazil, the Caribs.

  12. Using the average flows described in the Admiralty’s Ocean Passages of the World and the relevant Admiralty pilots.

  13. To date I have only studied the catalogue of Prince Youssuf Kamal to see how many corrections or additions were made to Antilia. This discloses fourteen before Columbus set sail: by the Beccarios (1435 and 1436), Andrea Bianco (1436 and 1448), Parreto (1455), the Benincasas (1463, 1470, 1476 and 1482), Toscanelli (1474), the Canepas (1480 and 1489), Jaime Bertram (1482) and Christofal Soligo (1489).

  14. Prince Youssuf Kamal, Monumenta Cartographica Africae et Aegypti, 16 vols, Cairo, 1926–51. This catalogue lists an enormously valuable collection of surviving charts and maps showing European and Chinese exploration of West Africa.

  15. Quoted in E.D.S. Bradford, Southward the Caravels, Hutchinson, 1961, p. 107.

  Chapter 18: On the Shoulders of Giants

  1. João de Barros, letter to the future King Manuel of Portugal, quoted in Eric Axelson, Dias and His Successors, Cape Town, 1988, p. 3.

  2. K.G. Jayne, Vasco da Gama and His Successors 1460–1580, Methuen, 1970, p. 36.

  3. João de Barros, letter to the King of Portugal, 1 May 1500, quoted in Jaime Batalha Reis, Estudios Géográficos y Históricos, Ministry of Colonial Affairs, Lisbon, 1941, p. 286.

  4. S.E. Morison, Portuguese Voyages to America in the Fifteenth Century, Harvard UP, Cambridge, Mass., 1940, p. 131.

  5. See chs 5 and 6, where these matters are considered in detail.

  6. As above, and ch. 8.

  7. Sebastian Alvarez, the King of Castile’s factor, quoted in Cdr A.W. Miller, RN, The Straits of Magellan, Griffin, Portsmouth, 1884, p. 7.

  8. The Journal of Columbus, trs. Cecil Jane, revised and annotated by L.A. Vigneras, Anthony Blond and Orion Press, 1960, pp. 12, 43 and 62.

  9. H. Vignaud, Toscanelli and Columbus, Sands, 1902, p. 323.

  10. Toscanelli, letter to the King of Spain, 1474, quoted in J.H. Parry, The Discovery of South America, Elek, 1979, p. 48.

  11. Note VII on the Piri Reis map, translated by G.C. McIntosh in The Piri Reis Map of 1513, University of Georgia Press, Athens, Georgia, 2000, p. 46.

  12. Arthur Davies, ‘Behain, Marcellus and Columbus’, Geographical Journal, Vol. 143, p. 454.

  13. A.O. Vietor, ‘A Pre-Columbian Map of the World circa 1489’, Imago Mundi xvii, 1963.

  14. Davies, op. cit., p. 458.

  15. Davies, op. cit.

  16. Lord Palliser, Captain Cook’s commander.

  17. K.G. McIntyre, Early European Exploration of Australia, unpublished paper, p. 12.

  Epilogue: The Chinese Legacy

  1. Barbar
a Pickersgill, ‘Origin and Evolution of Cultivated Plants in the New World’, Nature 268 (18), pp. 591–4.

  2. R.A. Whitehead, Evolution of Crop Plants, Longman, 1996, pp. 221–5.

  3. F. Braudel, A History of Civilisations, trs. R. Mayne, Penguin, 1994, pp. 158–9.

  4. Judith A. Carney, Professor of Geography at the University of California, Los Angeles, has written a fascinating book, Black Rice: The African Origins of Rice Cultivation in the Americas (Harvard UP, Cambridge, Mass., 2001), which tells the story of the true origins of rice in the Americas and argues that the standard belief that Europeans introduced rice to West Africa and then brought the knowledge of its cultivation to the Americas is a fundamental fallacy.

  5. Roderich Ptak, ‘China and Calicut in the Early Ming Period: Envoys and Tribute Emissaries’, in Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society, 1989, St 447, and private letters between Professor Ptak and the author.

  6. Cochin tablet, ‘Taizong Shi Lu’, ch. 183, quoted in Louise Levathes, When China Ruled the Seas, Oxford UP, Oxford, 1996, p. 145.

  7. Gaspar Correa, The Three Voyages of Vasco da Gama, trs. H.E.J. Stanley from Lendas da India, 1869.

  Postscript

  1. See Chapter 9.

  2. Leon Poutrin, ‘L’origine Chinois de Anciennes Civilisations de Mexico et du Peru’, in Journal de la Société des Américanistes de Paris, 1913.

  3. Francisco A. Loayza, Chins Ilegaron antes que Colon: Tesis arqueológica, transcendental, sustenada por 150 de los más famosos autores, antiguos y modernos, Lima, Peru, 1948, pp. 44–45.

  4. Journal de la Société des Américanistes de Paris 10 (1913), p. 303.

  5. Grant Keddie, ‘Contributions to Human History’, Royal British Columbian Museum Publication, No. 3, 19 March 1990, Victoria, B.C., Canada.

  6. Letter from Professor Hummel (an expert on medieval Chinese art), 29 August 1927, quoted in Keddie, op. cit.

  7. Professor Hummel, op. cit.

  8. Hugo Grotius, On the Law of War and Peace, London, 1884, p. 18.

  9. Lee Eldridge Huddleston, Origins of American Indians, University of Texas Press, Austin, 1967, p. 27.