LeonardoDaVinci
1st April 2003, 12:42
I have just finished reading this intriguing book, in which the author claims that the Chinese were the first to set foot in the New World, and that the Europeans were only following suit, equiped with maps which Columbus, Magellan and Cook used in their voyages.
According to him, the Ming Emperor Zhu Di, who embarked on several grandiose prjects during reign ordered the dispatching of the largest fleet the world had ever seen under the command of his loyal eunuch admirals. Their mission was 'to proceed all the way to the end of the earth to collect tribute from the barbarians beyond the seas' and unite the whole world in Confucian harmony. Their journey would last over two years and circle the globe.
When they returned Emperor Zhu Di lost his control of China was beginning its long, self-imposed isolation from the world it had so recently embraces. The great ships rotted at their moorings and the records of their journeys were destroyed. Lost was the knowledge that Chinese ships had reached America seventy years before Columbus and circumnavigated the globe a century before Magellan. They had also discovered Antarctica, reached Australia 350 years before Cook and solved the problem of longitude three hundred years before the Europeans.
Supported by a vast wealth of evidence and expert opinion, it is the story of a remarkable journey of discovery that if proven right, will rewrite our understanding of history and world exploration.
If you cannot obtain the book, then I recommend that you have a look on the website:
http://www.1421.tv/
According to him, the Ming Emperor Zhu Di, who embarked on several grandiose prjects during reign ordered the dispatching of the largest fleet the world had ever seen under the command of his loyal eunuch admirals. Their mission was 'to proceed all the way to the end of the earth to collect tribute from the barbarians beyond the seas' and unite the whole world in Confucian harmony. Their journey would last over two years and circle the globe.
When they returned Emperor Zhu Di lost his control of China was beginning its long, self-imposed isolation from the world it had so recently embraces. The great ships rotted at their moorings and the records of their journeys were destroyed. Lost was the knowledge that Chinese ships had reached America seventy years before Columbus and circumnavigated the globe a century before Magellan. They had also discovered Antarctica, reached Australia 350 years before Cook and solved the problem of longitude three hundred years before the Europeans.
Supported by a vast wealth of evidence and expert opinion, it is the story of a remarkable journey of discovery that if proven right, will rewrite our understanding of history and world exploration.
If you cannot obtain the book, then I recommend that you have a look on the website:
http://www.1421.tv/