Page 79 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol V

1856 berkshire encyclopedia of world history

long-distance voyages were ever undertaken by Chinese bulky goods in a north-south direction. Second, the
mariners, and the Chinese never “ruled” any of the major China Seas are the arena in which regional trade between
oceanic waterways. However, a coastline of about China, Japan, and the countries of Southeast Asia
14,000 kilometers (within today’s borders of the Peo- unfolds. No other function is more important than this
ple’s Republic of China) makes maritime defense a one.The China Seas gave rise to and still support a dense
major portion of any government’s security policies. network of commerce connecting different economic sys-
Even more importantly, port towns developed along the tems which in many ways complement one another.
coast, many of them in the river estuaries of South and Third, access to the oceans necessarily leads through the
central China. The main economic function of these China Seas. In the long run, the China Seas’ transit func-
towns and cities was to organize exchange with com- tion is probably their least important aspect, assuming
mercial communities across the China Seas. major importance only with the rise of the Canton trade
in the early eighteenth century. But at least for modern
The Triple Function times, it forms part of the complete picture. By definition,
of the China Seas the predominant emporia are those that combine all
China Seas is a summary term coined by European nav- three of these functional tasks. These major ports are
igators and geographers, rarely used in China. Chinese simultaneously pivots of coastal, regional, and long-
maps and geographic manuals distinguish between five distance traffic and commerce.
different expanses of water adjacent to the Chinese coast:
the Gulf of Zhili, called in Chinese Bohai, south of Fourteenth Century Trade
Manchuria; the Yellow Sea, called Huanghai, between in the South China Sea
North China and the Korean peninsula; the East China The great achievements of Chinese nautical engineering
Sea, called Donghai, into which the Chang (Yangzi) have been reconstructed by modern scholars for epochs
River discharges its waters; the Strait of Taiwan, called even earlier than the establishment of the empire in 221
the Taiwan Haixia, separating that island from Fujian BCE. Only with the Ming dynasty (1368–1644), however,
Province; and, finally, the South China Sea, called Nan- does a comprehensive picture of maritime trade emerge.
hai, which is the maritime “foreland” of the southernmost The basic type of ship, in use for many centuries, had
Chinese province, Guangdong. already been developed during the tenth century. This
These maritime spaces are clearly separated from the “Fujian ship” (fuchuan), a safe, spacious, and fast vessel,
high seas of the Pacific Ocean and the Indian Ocean.Yet, proved admirably suited to the trading conditions in the
in an important way, they form a connection between China Seas. It later evolved into the cheap and popular
both: For centuries after the arrival of European shipping “shallow-water ship” (shachuan), an even more advanta-
in East Asia, the principal route from India into Pacific geous type of flat-bottomed watercraft. Southeast Asian
waters led through the Strait of Malacca and the South shipbuilders also provided technical innovation.The out-
China Sea and then round the northern tip of the Philip- come was the ubiquitous junk (a word probably origi-
pine archipelago. nating in Javanese, but later applied mainly to Chinese
This fact points to the triple function of the China ships) that shaped European perceptions of the Asian
Seas, considered in terms of economic geography. In the maritime world.
first instance, they serve as an avenue for China’s coastal Extended trading networks covering the South China
trade. Coastal trade has always been vital for the inte- Sea came into being as a result of two developments
gration not only of the various seaboard districts, but also occurring in the fifteenth century. First, the Chinese gov-
of all the eastern provinces of China. Before the advent ernment dispatched several huge fleets under Admiral
of the railroad it was indispensable for transporting Zheng He (c. 1371–1435) to establish contact with