Exploring Quanzhou Maritime Museum

Abstract

The sign in the foyer of Quanzhou’s UNESCO-sponsored maritime museum (China’s best!) well summarizes Quanzhou folks’ aspirations: “UNESCO, Peace and Friendship, Cultural Dialogue, Looking Back on the Past, Looking Forward to the Future”.

The sign in the foyer of Quanzhou’s UNESCO-sponsored maritime museum (China’s best!) well summarizes Quanzhou folks’ aspirations: “UNESCO, Peace and Friendship, Cultural Dialogue, Looking Back on the Past, Looking Forward to the Future”.

The more I review the past, the more I appreciate that the Chinese were a peaceful people (at least outside their own borders). Even Sun Tzu’s Art of War, the world’s best war manual, urges that violence be the last resort. And Lao Tzu wrote in the Tao Te Ching [31]:

Violence, even well-intentioned, always rebounds upon oneself. Weapons are tools of fear; a decent man will avoid them except in the direst necessity, and if compelled, will use them only with the utmost restraint. Peace is his highest value. If the peace has been shattered, how can he become content? His enemies are not demons but humans like himself. He doesn’t wish them personal harm. Nor does he rejoice in victory. How could he rejoice in victory and delight in the slaughter of men?

Had Chinese not been more philosophically inclined to commerce than conquering, they could have easily dominated our planet 1,000 years ago, and today the world would be wielding chopsticks at McRice outlets.

Art of War, Way of Peace

In 1861, Fuzhou’s American missionary Robert Samuel MacClay (1824–1907) explained in his insightful Life Among the Chinese exactly why Chinese since Confucius’ day prefer the pen over the sword:

The soldier occupies the lowest position in the Chinese classification of society, and this arrangement, we think, is in accordance with the true sentiment of the nation on this point. The Chinese do not regard it as at all derogatory to their character to be told that they are deficient in the elements of warlike strength. ‘We are not a military people,’ say they, ‘we are a literary nation. With us reason, and not force, defines rights and privileges; argument, and not the sword, decides controversies.’

A millennium ago, China had a vast navy armed to the teeth with weapons the West had never imagined. They had cannon, giant crossbows, and even land and sea mines.

Advanced shipbuilding features like watertight compartments weren’t used by Westerners until the mid-1800s! And even 2,000 years ago they had battleships with paddle wheels that could just about walk right up onto land. China’s shipbuilding greatness continued right into the nineteenth century…

February 1822, Captain Pearl, of the English ship Indiana, coming through Gaspar Strait, fell in with the cargo and crew of a wrecked junk, and saved 198 persons out of 1,600, with whom she had left Amoy, whom he landed at Pontianak.¹

Imagine a junk, almost 200 years ago, with 1,600 passengers. Yet even that ship was dwarfed by the treasure ships of Zheng Hé’s day, as you’ll learn in Quanzhou Maritime Museum. Famous Arab traveler Ibn Battuta described the magnificent “Zaytun Ships” (Fig. 3.1):

Fig. 3.1

Maritime Museum Shipbuilding Dioramas

The large ships have anything from twelve down to three sails, which are made of bamboo rods plaited like mats. A ship carries a complement of a thousand men, six hundred of whom are sailors and four hundred men-at-arms, including archers, men with shields and arbalists, who throw naphtha (flaming petroleum). These vessels are built only in the towns of Zaytun (Quanzhou) and Sin-Kalan (Guangzhou). The vessel has four decks and contains rooms, cabins, and saloons for merchants; a cabin has chambers and a lavatory, and can be locked by its occupant, who takes along with him slave girls and wives. Often a man will live in his cabin unknown to any of the others on board until they meet on reaching some town... Some of the Chinese own large numbers of ships on which their factors are sent to foreign countries.

—Ibn Battuta

A Sample of Chinese Military Inventions

Fourth Century BC: chemical warfare: ox-hide bellows pumped burning balls of dried mustard and other toxic matter—2,300 years before World War I’s mustard gas.

First Century AD: paddlewheel battleships to navigate very shallow rivers.

Ninth Century AD: grenades and bombs of gunpowder mixed with toxic substances, like human excrement, wolfsbane, aconite, croton oil, arsenious oxide, arsenic sulfide, ashes, tung oil, and soap-bean pods that produced black smoke to cover movement or disorient the enemy.

Tenth Century AD: flamethrowers, flares, fireworks, bombs, grenades, land mines and sea mines, rockets and multi-stage rockets.

Eleventh Century AD: watertight compartments on ships (not in the West until the mid-1800s).

Thirteenth Century AD: guns, cannons, mortars, and repeating guns.

China’s Secret Weapon Unlike their Western adversaries, Chinese did not conduct commerce at gunpoint because they had an even more powerful weapon to create truly sustainable win–win advantages. In 1861, Fuzhou missionary Maclay described this “weapon”:

The islands off the coast of China, and many of those in the East Indian Archipelago, have been colonized by the Chinese; and in early every kingdom of eastern peninsular Asia they are found in large and influential communities. It is a noticeable fact that whenever the Chinese colonize among a heathen people, their superior civilization gives them at once a decided advantage over the native population.

By their intelligence, industry and capacity for business they almost monopolize all the important and highly remunerative departments of labor; commerce passes into their hands, and they become the chief factors, the leading spirits in the native communities in which they live…

—Maclay 1861.²

Chinese’s ancient preoccupation with peaceful coexistence and win–win prosperity is precisely why I have dozens of times taken Chinese and foreigners alike to visit Quanzhou Maritime Museum, and you too will enjoy it—starting with “The World of China’s Ships” (on the second floor, to the right).

The World of China’s Ships The history of shipbuilding begins with a video of how the ancients went from flotation (hollow gourds tied to their waists) to bamboo rafts, dugout canoes, animal hide coracles, boats, and large ships. I was surprised to see a 2,000-year-old drawing of a dragon boat race. It is remarkably like the dragon boat races of today. And Fujianese, of all peoples, should excel at dragon boats because, as archaeology, linguistics and even DNA have shown, it was Fujianese who were the world’s first ocean-going explorers, settling the islands of the Pacific and Indian oceans up to 5,000 and 6,000 years ago—from Hawaii and the Easter Islands in the east to New Zealand in the south.

Tibetan Yak Skin Coracle. I’ve read accounts of selfless Xiamen University (XMU) alumni who braved freezing Tibetan rivers in these unwieldy craft to selflessly volunteer in Tibet in the 1950s and 1960s. I marveled at their courage and selflessness—characteristics of Chinese volunteers to this day everywhere from Inner Mongolia and the Gobi Desert to Tibet and Xinjiang in the west and Hainan Island in the south.

Beside the yak coracle was a beautifully painted canoe used by natives of a small island off Taiwan’s east coast; it reminded me of ceremonial Native American canoes.

Goatskin Rafts My friends thought I was kidding when I said Chinese made rafts from inflated goatskins. A photo on the wall behind the model shows a gigantic river raft made of over 700 goatskins! I paddled a smaller one on the Yangtze River and was, once again, awed at the bravery of Chinese boat people (many of whom never set foot on land in their entire lives until Xi Jinping intervened and provided them homes, jobs, medical career and education for their children.

Miniature Boat Models A vast array of intricately detailed boat models show the sheer diversity and sophistication of Chinese shipbuilding. Boats were designed according to use, climate, and water conditions (rough or smooth seas, hot or cold climes). My favorite is the crooked bow boat which I was told was designed this way to take better advantage of extremely strong currents—though I wonder how they handled the return trips.

Grand Houseboats, owned by foreigners and wealthy Chinese, used to ply Fujian’s rivers during the hot summers. As I write this in a sweltering Quanzhou summer, I wish I was on a Chinese houseboat.

Tying the Knot! The museum used to have an excellent knot-tying station but it was removed. Maybe too many lasses were tying the knot. Months later, someone made a half-hearted attempt to resurrect the exhibit by dangling a few frayed bits of rope on a pole, and hanging a few nicely framed knots on other walls, but unlike the previous exhibit, there were no instructions, so it proved to be a knotty problem for my friend Jim, who was soon at the end of his rope.

“South Pointing Needles” Unlike Westerners, Chinese insist that compasses point south, not north, but since they invented compasses (and almost everything else), I guess they’ve a right to say so. Westerners were so ignorant of compasses that when they finally came into use in Europe, captains forbade sailors from eating onions lest they interfere with the cunning device’s powers.

Koxinga, the pirate-cum-patriot born in Japan of a Japanese mother and Quanzhou Chinese father, was well represented with paintings, ship models, clips from the Koxinga TV series (I played the last Dutch governor of Taiwan), and a diorama with lights, sound and action of the great battle in which he wrested control of Taiwan from the “greedy grasp of the Dutch invaders”.

Flagging Exhibit For the record, however, the two Dutch ships’ flags are French, not Dutch. Both nations’ flags have red, white and blue stripes, but the Dutch flag’s stripes are horizontal, the French stripes are vertical. Though perhaps such details are too trivial to matter…

I mentioned the flag issue several times to the museum staff. One finally said: “Dutch, French—six of one and half dozen of the other. They’re both foreign.” She paused, and added for good measure: “Koxinga fought them 300 years ago. Maybe the Dutch and French have switched flags by now.”

Dioramas and Displays The east side of the museum’s upper floor has delightful dioramas detailing the construction of wooden ships, which hasn’t changed much in centuries. Dozens of models of fishing junks, treasure ships and warships help convey the complexity of ancient Chinese shipbuilding. The sails were so stable that during the past decade many designers have begun to adapt them to Western yachts and sailing ships.

Thanks to innovative ships, navigational techniques, mastery of mapmaking, and the compass, Chinese seafarers like Admiral Zheng Hé sailed pretty much around the globe. In fact, Gavin Menzie, former submarine commander in the British Navy, claims that Zheng Hé’s fleet, not Columbus, discovered America. While his claims seem to me a bit farfetched, his book, 1421—The Year China Discovered America,³ has at least gotten Westerners’ attention.

Admiral Zheng Hé, 1421

(Adapted from Amoy Magic, by William Brown, Xiamen University Press).

Zheng Hé, China’s most illustrious adventurer, was a Muslim descendant of the King of Bukhara (southern Uzbekistan), and the governor of Yunnan, who was the last Mongol to hold out against the Ming Dynasty. After the Ming defeated Yunnan in 1381, they castrated thousands of youths, including Zheng Hé—a cruel punishment for a Muslim boy dreaming of adulthood and four wives. But Zheng Hé proved to be an excellent scholar and linguist, and his skills in court (if not courting) got the attention of the prince who overthrew the emperor, his nephew, and made Zheng Hé an admiral.

Over his 28-year career, Zheng Hé commanded at least 317 ships and 37,000 men. He sailed from Korea to Antarctica and around Africa into the Atlantic. His navigational charts remained unsurpassed for centuries (though his geographical knowledge was not perfect; Zheng Hé wrote that both Christ and Mohammed were from Western India, which he assumed included all of the Middle East).

During his first voyage, in 1405, Zheng Hé commanded 62 ships and 27,800 men. The first voyage passed peaceably enough, but during the second voyage of 1409, Zheng Hé had differences with the King of Ceylon and hauled him back to China. Even today, a Sri Lankan prince’s home stands to the east of Quanzhou’s Ashab Mosque (adjoining the ancient temple).

Alas, Zheng Hé’s seventh voyage was his last. The emperor decided that the rest of the world had nothing China needed, and after Zheng Hé died, international trade declined as well. Decades later, all records of Zheng Hé’s exploits were destroyed, Chinese were forbidden to travel abroad, and the members of Zaytun’s Islamic community, facing increasing persecution, adopted Chinese surnames and melded right into Han society—so well, in fact, that in the 1990s some Hui people had no idea their ancestors were Middle Eastern Arabs until researchers informed them.

A UNESCO “World Museum of Religion” It is no wonder that UNESCO calls Quanzhou a “World Museum of Religion”. Today, tens of thousands of Quanzhou people are descended from Zaytun’s early foreign settlers, and they brought with them not only Islam but every other religion imaginable, as we shall see in the museum’s fascinating collection of foreign religious artifacts.

The foreigners who flocked to ancient Zaytun exchanged not just commodities but cultures, philosophies, and religions. The maritime museum’s hundreds of ancient religious relics help us realize that, at one time, Zaytun was indeed the “Jerusalem of Asia”, with representatives of most religions.

The ground floor hall to the left of the foyer displays many religious artifacts unearthed over recent decades. There are so many, in fact, that they are even scattered about the field behind the museum (hence the present construction of the large Islamic Heritage Center).

Over 150 Islamic tombstones and carved stone fragments were recovered during the dismantling of the city walls during the first part of the twentieth century. While most were from cities scattered across Persia, some were from Yemen, Hamdan, al Malf in Turkestan, and Khalat in Armenia.

The Arab Connection China’s rulers valued Muslims’ business skills so highly that they appointed them to high municipal- and provincial-level posts. Mr. Pu Chongqing (蒲重庆), who runs an incense factory in Yongchun (永春) and is a descendant of Muslims who came to Quanzhou around 1200, said one of his ancestors was Pu Shougen (蒲寿更), the Quanzhou Maritime Commissioner, and later assistant to the governor. Another ancestor of his was governor of Chongqing in Sichuan, in southwest China. But foreigners’ power went to their heads, and when they tried to take charge, the incensed Han Chinese put them in their place, and many hightailed it to some other place.

Muslim Chinese Muslims are still in Zaytun, but they’ve blended into the woodwork. After their failed coup, Zaytun’s “Laowai”, or foreigners, avoided trouble with increasingly xenophobic Chinese neighbors by adopting Chinese names. Baiqi Island now has over 10,000 descendants of Arabs, all surnamed Guo. They did not even know they had Arab blood until historians told them recently, and the Bu and Huang people of Yunlu Village learned that they were descendants of Pu Shougeng, the ancient Arab customs officer.

Triangles and Calculators Muslims also traded in knowledge. Much of Western science and mathematics we owe to Arab traders who sailed from ancient Zaytun with storehouses of mathematical and scientific knowledge more precious than their cargoes of silk, porcelain and pearls.

Pascal’s triangle, for instance, was not invented by the great French philosopher Blaise Pascal (1623–1662) but by Chinese centuries earlier. Pascal is also credited with inventing the adding machine, but centuries earlier Chinese had been ciphering with the abacus, which in the hands of a Chinese merchant or tax collector was deadly accurate. (I’ve never understood the devilish device, which some say was invented in ancient Persia. I’m not surprised. Who but Saddam’s ancestors would have dared?).

The museum’s barely legible Muslim relics are in Chinese and Arabic. The Arabic often has quotes from the Koran, or poetry, but the Chinese translation is much more straightforward—like “Dead Foreigner”.

A Yuan Dynasty stone quotes the Koran in Arabic but in Chinese it simply reads: “General Kang died on 1st day of the 4th month.”

My favorites include a stone found outside the southwest city gate in 1978. It reads: “The arrow of death has hit!” Another stone, excavated from the South Gate in 1946, has quotes from the Koran (9:21–22 and 55:26), and a Sufi poem: “Death is a cup from which all men drink.”

Christian Artifacts The museum has over 40 Christian relics, with nearly 1,000 lines of inscriptions—the largest collection of its kind. Many Yuan Dynasty headstones were unearthed from the wall foundation of the East Gate in 1947. The languages include Chinese, Latin, Syro-Turkic (Turkish written in Syriac script), and even the unusual Phags-pa script based on Tibetan and Chinese.

Quanzhou discovered that its heritage included Tibetan Buddhism when the outer layer of three “Buddhist” monks on Qingyuan Mountain was removed to discover that, underneath, they were Tibetan lamas. Perhaps Nestorians and Tibetans arrived together!

Nestorians were a millennium ahead of their time. Their advanced medical skills opened doors everywhere, and wherever they went they established language centers and translated their scriptures into the local tongues (Fig. 3.2).

Fig. 3.2

Nestorian Christian Tombstone

Nestorians had missions in Tibet, and some historians believe the Tibetans actually adapted their rites for worshiping the dead from Nestorian practices (who expanded upon ancestor worship to please an emperor anxious to please his extinguished forebears). Nestorian syncretism (which in the end proved their doom, not their salvation) is seen in the tombstones with a four-winged angel beneath the Christian cross in a Buddhist lotus position before a lotus.

At one time, hundreds of thousands of Nestorians were scattered throughout China, and a Nestorian metropolitan set up a center right here in Zaytun. And then the Nestorians vanished almost without a trace.

Some tombstones are of Franciscan Catholics, like Bishop Antonius, or Bishop Bar Solomon, who died in 1313. I was amazed at how far afield Franciscans roamed within a mere century of Francis’ death, and after reading so much about the 3rd Franciscan Bishop of Zaytun, Andrew of Perugia (who supervised construction of the Franciscan Cathedral outside of the East Gate), I was excited to see his headstone on display, though I did wonder where the bishop now rests his head.

Andrew’s headstone was unearthed in 1946 at the foundation of the city wall, near the Dragon Temple. The Latin inscription reads: “Here lies at rest the Catholic priest Andrew of Perugia, follower of Jesus Christ.”

Hindu Relics The maritime museum displays some of the more than 300 Hindu architectural and sculptural fragments discovered in Quanzhou. Many were found in the vicinity of the Tonghuai Gate, indicating there was probably a Hindu temple in the southeastern part of the city.

In 1933, an elephant presenting a lotus to Shiva lingam was discovered in a small temple on Xianlei Street. In 1934, workers at the drill grounds excavated the four-armed Protector of Hinduism, with upper two arms holding the chakra and sangra. Even the ancient Kaiyuan Buddhist temple has a couple of Hindu columns added during reconstruction. Hinduism was strong in Quanzhou because of the close ties between Quanzhou merchants and Tamil guilds in India.

Manichaean Relics The last section of the religious relics display is devoted to Persian’s Manichaeism. A legend beside some strange dog-like carvings say they resemble Assyrian art, so I’m guessing they are Manichaean. The carved granite Buddha-like Mani, by the way, is a reproduction. The real McCoy is in our planet’s last Mani temple (southeast of the city in Jinjiang).

Quanzhou’s Sole Jewish Relic? On October 10, 2001, Xinhua News Agency reported that workers had unearthed from beneath the ancient Deji Gate what some thought was the first archaeological proof of the ancient Jewish community. It is probably not Jewish. Jews weren’t the first to use a six-pointed star. Hindus also use it, with the Tamil “Om” in the center. But an excavated synagogue in Roman era Capernaum had a “Star of David” architectural motif, so the Quanzhou stone may prove to be of Jewish origin as well—if it survives the elements. After months of searching, I finally found it lying unprotected in the open courtyard of the Goddess Mazu Tianfei Temple.

That Zaytun had a large Jewish community is confirmed by many sources, from Arab traders to Bishop Andrew of Perugia, who in January 1326, lamented in a letter that Zaytun’s Jews obstinately refused to undergo Christian baptism.

In the controversial book City of Light, which purports to be a translation of the journal of a Jewish traveler who reached Zaytun before Marco Polo, Jacob d’Ancona wrote that Zaytun had 2,000 Jews, and many tens of thousands were scattered around the rest of China, their ancestors having arrived during the days of the patriarchs. Some say that the Lost Tribes of Israel are in China. And given the maps they use here, I can see how they got lost.

In the next chapter we’ll visit sites in the UNESCO award-winning downtown area—and I’ll even give you a map so you don’t end up with the Lost Tribes.

Zaytun’s Openness to Foreign Religions

As for the doctrine of the Occident which exalts I’ien Chiu (天主, Lord of Heaven—Christian God), it is ... contrary to the orthodoxy (of China’s Classics), and it is only because Christians are thoroughly versed in mathematical sciences that the state uses them. Beware, lest you forget that.

—Emperor Kangxi.⁴

Passing through many cities and towns, I came to a certain noble city which is called Zaytun, where we Friars Minor have two Houses... The city is twice as great as Bologna, and in it are many monasteries of devotees, idol-worshipers every man of them. In one of those monasteries which I visited there were 3,000 monks. The place is one of the best in the world.

—Friar Odoric⁵ (in China from 1323–1327).

All but one of Zaytun’s seven mosques has vanished, and Ashab is but a shell of its former grandeur—but Christians don’t even have a shell left standing. Not a trace is left of the great Franciscan Cathedral that Bishop Andrew built with the emperor’s funding, or of the other Catholic churches and monasteries, or of the Nestorian churches. All that remains today are a few dozen tombstones (which survived thanks to the efforts of local historian, Wu Linliang). But we also have Bishop Andrew’s letter home.

Third Bishop of Zaytun Andrew of Perugia, 3^rd Bishop of Zaytun presided over one of Zaytun Franciscan convents (while Peter of Florence supervised the other. Andrew also supervised construction of the east gate of the Catholic Cathedral, which the emperor not only allowed but actually financed. Following are excerpts from Andrew’s fascinating letter home (written in 1326) in which he shed much light on the size of the foreign community, the vast wealth of his Chinese hosts, and the openness of Chinese to foreign trade, philosophy and religion.

Bishop Andrew’s Letter Home ⁶

Friar Andrew of Perugia, of the Order of Minor Friars, by Divine permission to the Bishop, to the revered father the Friar Warden of the Convent of Perugia, health and peace in the Lord forever!

...through much fatigue and sickness and want, through sundry grievous sufferings and perils by land and sea, plundered even of our habits and tunics, we got at last by God’s grace to the city of Camballech, which is the seat of the Emperor the Great Chan, in the year of our Lord’s incarnation 1308, as well as I can reckon.

There, after the archbishop was consecrated...we obtained an Alafa from the emperor for our food and clothing. An Alafa is an allowance for expenses which the emperor grants to the envoys of princes, to orators, warriors, different kinds of artists, jongleurs, paupers, and all sorts of people of all sorts of conditions. And the sum total of these allowances surpasses the revenue and expenditure of several of the kings of the Latin countries.

As to the wealth, splendor, and glory of this great emperor, the vastness of his dominion, the multitudes of people subject to him, the number and greatness of his cities, and the constitution of the empire, within which no man dares to draw a sword against his neighbor, I will say nothing, because it would be a long matter to write, and would seem incredible to those who heard it. Even I who am here in the country do hear things averred of it that I can scarcely believe...

There is a great city on the shores of the Ocean Sea, which is called in the Persian tongue Zaytun; and in this city a rich Armenian lady did build a large and fine enough church, which was erected into a cathedral by the archbishop himself of his own free will. The lady assigned it, with a competent endowment which she provided during her life and secured by her will at her death, to Friar Gerard the Bishop, and the friars who were with him, and he became accordingly the first occupant of the cathedral.

The cathedral was taken over by Friar and Bishop Peregrine, who died on July 7, 1322, and was succeeded by Andrew, who continues:

I caused a convenient and handsome church to be built in a certain grove, quarter of a mile outside the city, with all the offices sufficient for twenty-two friars, and with four apartments such that any one of them is good enough for a church dignitary of any rank. In this place I continue to dwell, living upon the imperial dole before-mentioned... Of this allowance I have spent the greatest part in the construction of the church; and I know none among all the convents of our province to be compared to it in elegance and all other amenities...

Tis a fact that in this vast empire there are people of every nation under heaven, and every sect, and all and sundry are allowed to live freely according to their creed. For they hold this opinion, or rather this erroneous view, that everyone can find salvation in their own religion. Howbeit we are at liberty to preach without let or hindrance. Of the Jews and Saracens there are indeed no converts, but many of the idolaters are baptized; though in sooth many of the baptized walk not rightly in the path of Christianity...

Farewell in the Lord, father, now and ever. Dated at Zaytun, A.D. 1326, in the month of January.

For Whom the Bells Toll Of course, the many religions occasionally had their squabbles. One of the most amusing weapons that the Catholics wielded against.

Muslims was bells.

For some reason, Muslims abhorred bells. Even intrepid Arab traveler Ibn Battuta, who seemingly feared nothing, recounted his “terror and dismay” at the clangor of bells in Caffa. So of course our Saintly Marignollǐ delighted in letting the Saracens know for whom the bells tolled. He wrote in his Recollections of Eastern Travel:

There is Zaytun also, a wondrous fine seaport and a city of incredible size, where our Minors Friars have three very fine churches, passing rich and elegant; and they have a bath also...

John Marignolli proudly wrote of the Franciscan’s “fine bells of the best quality, two of which were made to my order, and set up with all due form in the very middle of the Muslim community”.⁷

Maybe the Catholics used the bells to call the Muslims on the prayer carpet for waking them at dawn with the Muslim call to prayer?

The Catholics’, Nestorians’ and Muslims’ keen interest in Chinese souls is not surprising, given that ancient Western tradition claims Chinese are descendants of Noah’s son Shem, ancestor of Abraham, patriarch Islam, Judaism, and Christianity. John Marignolli wrote:

Shem was anxious to maintain the worship of the true God, and his history we shall now follow. In the second year after the flood he begat Arfaxat, who ... at the age of thirty-five begat Sela or Sale, by whom India was peopled and divided into three kingdoms. The first of these is called Manzi, the greatest and noblest province in the world, having no paragon in beauty, pleasantness, and extent. In it is that noble city of Campsay, besides Zaytun, Cynkalan (Canton), Janci, and many other cities.^8,9

FormalPara Notes

• 1. 1. Williams, in Chinese Repository, VI. 149, quote in The Travels of Marco Polo, V. II. P. 252.

• 2. MacClay, Hastings (1861) “Life among the Chinese,” Carlton and Porter, New York.

• 3. Menzie, Gavin (2008) “1421: The Year China Discovered America, William Morrow Paperbacks.

• 4. Clark, Anthony, (2008), “Early modern Chinese reactions to Western missionary iconography,” Southeast Review of Asia Studies (Vol. 30), Southeast Conference of the Association for Asian Studies.

• 5. Friar Odoric arrived in Canton in 1322 with Friar James (Ireland) and traveled on foot to Zaytun. Legend has it that he brought the bones of four missionaries martyred in India to Zaytun, where he buried them. During the voyage, he stilled a storm by tossing one of the bones into the sea. Evidently the martyr didn’t complain of such ill treatment; if he had, he would not have had a leg to stand on. He landed in Canton and traveled overland on foot to Zaytun.

• 6. Yule, Sir Henry (1866), “Cathay and the Way Thither Being a Collection of Medieval Notices of China,” Hakluyt Society.

• 7. Ibid.

• 8. Ibid.

• 9. John Marignolli: Giovanni di Marignolli, Franciscan missionary in China from 1342 to 1346, Giovanni di Marignolli. Born in Florence, Italy, 1290, became a Franciscan and held the chair of theology in the University of Bologna. Because of a Chinese embassy that arrived in Avignon in 1338, Pope Benedict XII sent Marignolli and other Franciscans to China. At the end of 1341, he crossed the Gobi Desert and was received with honors in the court at Peking. After three years in Peking, he traveled through southern China, and Southeast Asian countries, and arrived back in Italy 15 years after his departure. Years later he wrote of his Eastern travels in his Chronicon Bohemiae.