What Is Zheng He Voyages

Zheng He, a Chinese explorer, was born in 1371 in the Yunan Province of southwestern China (background essay). When Zheng He was ten years old, his father was killed right in front of him by the Ming Dynasty’s army (background essay). He was then taken prisoner, castrated, and forced to become part of the eunuchs (background essay). As he grew older, Emperor Yongle began to trust him more and more (background essay). The Emperor trusted him to travel by ship and lead a crew down the coast of China and across the ocean to eventually land in India in 1405 (background essay). This was one of the seven voyages he would take (background essay). When asked if Zheng He’s voyages should be celebrated, three factors must be taken into account: skill, scale and significance. Skill is the measure of one’s ability to do something. Scale is the measure of actions taken to preform something. Significance is the meaning of an event. The voyages of Zheng He should not be celebrated because there was no new land discovered, the cost of the trips were expensive and wasteful, and the reasons for the voyages mainly purposed Zheng He himself and Emperor Yongle.

The author also mentions that China-based their economy on the exchange of silver. Another important thing in this chapter was the role of the Chinese voyages in the history of China and the entire world. The voyages that were created around the 1400s were used for three reasons,

Imagine you are walking around in Nanjing, China. As you are walking, you stop to take a look at stone pillars. The writing on them tells about the voyages of Zheng He, but you don’t know who he is. You ask a nearby person and they don’t know either. Who was Zheng He? What did he do? Why was he important to China’s history?

The first reason the voyages of Zheng He do deserve to be celebrated is because of his over the top ships. From an illustration of what his treasure ship might of looked like “it shows it at least being 400 feet” (Doc C). In Zheng He’s comparison chart to other navigators it shows how he had “255 ships when everyone else only had less than 5 ships” (Doc B). Clearly, one can observe that Zheng He only wanted to be the best at everything he did. And with his huge sailing technology he had managed to finally state that about himself. Therefore, Zheng He’s many advanced vessels are worth being celebrated.

Exploration has been an important action to take part of since the beginning of time. We have to explore to find out what’s out there right? We could potentially obtain so much knowledge, and so many resources. You can only obtain the maximum potential of something if your motives and ideology are correct. A great example of someone who had the potential to do so much good, and obtain so much greatness was a Chinese admiral by the name of Zheng He. Zheng He watched his father die at the hand of the Ming Dynasty, along with being castrated himself. Zheng He was forced to join thousands of eunuchs, and then rose quickly through the ranks of the military. The emperor basically assigned Zheng He the task of leading a fleet of exploration

The reason that we are reading, “When China Ruled the Seas” by Louise Levathes is in order to help us create a better understanding of the Chinese rule and how they became such a great dynasty. It helps us to see how China rose to become a great maritime power and also how it its navy disintegrated. “When China Ruled the Seas” shows us why the Chinese emperors decided to destroy its navy. It helps us learn more about China’s voyages of exploration, including how long they lasted, the reason for them, how far they extended and the impact they had on China itself and

Marco Polo- A sailor who told his tales of success in Asia, finding gold, silks, and spices which encouraged people to sail overseas in search for wealth.

Furthermore, this experience led to the discovery that the key to success is control over regions that produced valuable goods, since control over trade routes ultimately leads to their change.1 China with its warfare and seafaring technology never claimed to take control over the sea even after Zheng He’s voyages, since they had enough, if not more resources than everyone else, unlike Europe. The conclusive thought is that Europeans were poor, and in order for them to succeed in an otherwise rich world, force was the only option. The bias is therefore in the fact that Europeans had no

Emperor Yongle intended to awe the rulers of Southeast Asia and the Indian Ocean into sending tribute to China (Dreyer, p. 27). Zheng He and his fleets needed to establish Chinese presence and influences in those countries in order to enforce the tributary system. Although China had no interest in imperial expansion through oceanic exploration like the Europeans did, navy power was traditionally associated with the strength of a nation. Therefore, the gigantic treasure ships, the significant scale of Zheng He’s crew as well as the Chinese goods he brought to the foreign countries all served the political needs to display wealth and power of the Middle Kingdom.

The voyages of Zheng He were so remarkable because of their size. Everything about them was large, the distance, the ship and the fleet. About 40 - 300 ships sailed at a time including fighting ships, storage vessels and treasure ships. Everywhere he went he distributed gifts to show Chinas wealth. Also, during his voyages he completed his Muslim

Zheng He’s humongous fleet of hundreds of ships was recalled and burned in 1433. A new emperor took the throne and called this order possibly because he wanted to establish his power. He signalled the end of one era and the start of his. Making such a big order, made people respect his power as an emperor. Also it took millions of dollars in today's money to be able to built a fleet like the Chinese, but burning them all, symbolized how it didn’t affect China’s economy. It showed others that China had money everywhere and could burn something so expensive and not have a large aftermath. Another reason is that after Mongol rule many other empires tried attacking China, causing them to recall the ships and focus on their own recourses and borders

The first voyage that was from 1405 – 1407 was composed of 317 ships and nearly 28,000 men. In addition to thousands of sailors, builders and repairmen for the trip, there were soldiers, diplomatic specialists, medical personnel, astronomers, and scholars of foreign ways, especially Islam. The second voyage from 1407 - 1409 took 68 ships to attend the trip. Zheng He organized this voyage but did not actually lead it in person. The third voyage which is from 1409 - 1411 had 48 large ships and about 30,000 troops. When fighting broke out there between his forces and those of a small kingdom, Zheng put down the fighting, captured the king and brought him back to China. In addition to the fourth voyage of discovery 1413 - 1416, Zheng He commandeered

Zheng He, ever heard of him? No, because instead of celebrating the man who landed in North America first, we celebrate a whimpy man who came here 60 years after him. Zheng he was a man who was responsible for 85 times Christopher Columbus’s ships and was very hopeful that his 105,300 miles of sailing would work out in the end. Zheng He should be celebrated. I personally believe that we should celebrate Zheng he’s voyages because he found America first, he was a good trader, and he was compassionate about all of his passengers.

One of the most important reasons they decided to explore further was in result of the contination of growth Europeans were undergoing. With the help of maritime trade between the East and the West, they were able to expand their trading. Plenty of goods were brought over to the Europeans with the trading route of the Silk Road. These goods included silk, medicine, spices, animals, and much more as time carried on like perfume. Through this

Asia was the center of trade, business and craft. Many countries tried to find a direct route to Asia, in order to increase trade. Whereas, China decided to uphold isolationism. Its population was one hundred million people in four million miles of square land. China did not want more land, nor more subjects to govern. In fact, China had more people than it can govern. Yongle Emperor sent Zheng He to purchase various spices, goods and conduct trade. Zheng He was a Muslim Chinese eunuch trusted by the