Free China: Questioning Chinese Maritime History with One Voyage
Contents
- Summary
- The Free China
- Maritime History History
- Myths & Controversial Hypotheses
- Testing the hypothesis
- Select Web Site Bibliogrophy
- Interviews
- Crew & Staff
Summary
In 1955, an unlikely voyage began in Taiwan. Reno Chia-Lin Chen, Benny Chia-Cheng Hsu, Paul Chuan-Chun Chow, Marco Yu-Lin Chung, “Huloo" Loo-Chi Hu, and US Vice Consul Calvin Mehlert set sail from Keelung Harbor and traveled first to Yokohama and then to San Francisco by way of the Japan current. This vessel, thought to be constructed in Fujian Province, is mostly unknown prior to its purchase for this voyage. The passage opens up new questions for maritime history, including the technical and seafaring capabilities of the Chinese.
This documentary is focused on the examination of historic Chinese maritime capabilities, a discussion of the social and political climate from the Song through the Ming period, and a discussion of the plausibility of a Chinese pre-Colombian visitation to the Americas. In order to test these claims, the filmmakers recommend two avenues for possible verification: archaeological record and genetic analysis.
The Free China
The 24.4 meter long then-flat-bottomed vessel Free China was given its name and purchased by the Governor of Taiwan on hearing of the voyage it intended to make. While it did not make it to its intended yacht race in New York, it did reach San Francisco after a stop in Yokohama, Japan. Its crew were mostly fishermen but inexperienced at sailing at sea. Their relative inexperience is helpful in analyzing their voyage as their record includes details which might otherwise be taken for granted by more experienced seamen.
Sailing without a keel makes it impossible, without centerboards or leeboards, to sail into the wind. The Free China shows, through the use of its angled forward mast and the rigging of its rudder to double as its centerboard, that oceanic passage was possible. Using crew accounts, the exact sailing experience should direct how a possible earlier sailor may have been able to overcome the obstacles to transoceanic seafaring that have so long been associated with Chinese vessels.
Maritime History
The Vikings sailed west to Iceland, and then on to Greenland by 982 CE. Looking at the practice of Norse seamanship, they coasted. If this technique worked on one side of the ocean, following the currents and coasting, then it may be plausible that halfway around the world the same style of endeavor took place over the Japan Current. In the case of the Chinese, there were pressures in favor of emigration, including: crowding, escape from taxes, and possible new avenues of trade.
Perhaps the greatest known Chinese sailor in the West is Admiral Zheng He, who set sail during the early Ming Dynasty on a voyage of diplomacy and to escort tribute bearers back to China. At the end of every expedition, he was forced to recruit additional crew in part because of sailors, merchants and other passengers jumping ship and conducting their own business. The current consensus is that his voyages were along traditionally known routes and did that he did not travel north, nor sail around the Cape of Good Hope. What his voyages do have to teach is the technical skill and ability of the Chinese mariner of the early Ming dynasty, in spite of the loss of the official logs.
Myths and Controversial Hypotheses
Qin Shi Huangdi, the first Emperor of China, is chronicled in folklore as sending out ships in search of the legendary Penglai, an island in the middle of the sea that was home to immortal beings.
In addition, one hypothesis suggests a migration going back as far as the Shang dynasty, from which the Olmec emerge. This prospect remains, at present, quite uncertain as the archaeological community has found that while some similarities may exist, it does not prove dissimulation and “tend to be too generalized to be meaningful.[1]“
Gavin Menzies, in his book 1491: The Year China Discovered America, makes claims such as a Chinese circumnaviation of the world, and arrival on the Atlantic coast of the Americas. This documentary does not support this, or several other claims he has made, but does recognize the contribution he has made in reopening the discussion.
Testing the Hypothesis
Without being able to test the claims, this discussion can only remain speculative until it becomes possible to independently verify the conclusions. The filmmakers suggest two avenues for confirmation: archaeological and biological evidence.
The archeological record at this time shows no evidence of Chinese vessels arriving in the Americas. In over five centuries, the march of times has altered the coastline and courses of rivers. An examination of changes In the sea level and coastal geography may give clues to why there have not been a find so far as well as provide insight into possible routes once over the Japan Current.
More likely to provide more immediate results would be a comparison of DNA from known specimens in China contemporaneous with Song , Yuan, and Ming dynasties, and with that of indigenous populations in the Americas. If Chinese sailors did traverse the ocean and intermarry, then some trace should remain hidden in the genetic history of the native populations. The selection of Chinese samples from within known dynasties is to confirm patterns of intermarriage and migration following any Bearing Straight migrations.
Select Website Bibliography
- Olmec Origins and Transpacific Diffusion: Reply to Meggers
David C. Grove American Anthropologist, New Series, Vol. 78, No. 3 (Sep., 1976), pp. 634-637
Published by: Blackwell Publishing on behalf of the American Anthropological Association
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/674425
Interviews
- Pi-Ching Hsu, Assoc. Professor of History, San Francisco State University.
If you have someone to reccomend for interviewing about this project, please e-mail Will Fenton.
Crew and Staff
- Will Fenton: Personnel Coordinator, Researcher, Web Media.
- James Klein: Executive Producer and Director of the Proposed Institute for the Indies.
- David Perga: Director, Filming Chief.
- Brian Trief-Barrel: Assistant Director, Script Writer, Media Advisor.
- Robert Yongze Wei: Marketing Officer, Assoc. Producer.
- Zoe Yuan Zhang: China Liason, Researcher, Chinese-English Translator.
