Africa and the Indian Ocean in Chinese maps of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries

Abstract

From the other side, the Arabs undoubtedly possessed considerable advantages which enabled them to venture across the dry lands and beyond. A unified religion and a simple code of ethics, the high regard for long distance travel and the making of new converts in distant lands, and the use of camels to cross the deserts and maneuverable sails in unfavorable winds, were factors commonly credited for their success in maintaining the busy traffic from the shores of the Mediterranean to the Guinea Coast and from the Hadramaut to the Mozambique. From the eighth century onward, Arab vessels dominated the high seas from the East African shores to the South China coast. During the heyday of Arab settlement in southern China, Canton alone accounted for no less than one hundred thousand Arab residents.1 Through the long period of Sino-Arab trade and intellectual exchange, the Chinese on their part were able to accumulate a good deal of valuable information on the Indian Ocean and Africa. This knowledge not only manifested itself in the emerging world concept of Chinese cartography, but also served to facilitate the spurt of maritime activities in the Indian Ocean and along the coast of East Africa in the early Ming dynasty. In order to bring the matter into focus, I have chosen to examine three of the oldest Chinese maps relating to Africa and the Indian Ocean and to assess their significance in the large perspective of the history of geographical thought and cartography. While numerous places in North Africa were mentioned by Chinese authors of the eighth and ninth centuries, it is rather difficult to establish a clear milestone in the advance of China's knowledge concerning tropical Africa.2 Chou Ch'ii-fei, author of Ling-wai-tai-ta written in 1178 A.D., first mentioned Ts'engch'i-k'un-lun or the 'Land of the Black' and the slave trade in its off-shore islands.3 His statement on the 'Giant Birds' there which could swallow camels, appears almost identical with that of Marco Polo's a century later.4 Chao Ju-kuo, Commissioner of the Maritime Trade Office at Ch'iian-chou (Marco Polo's Zaitun) with extensive contact with the Arab merchants, and author of Chu-fan-chih written in 1226, provided the first account of the products on the East African coast from Somalia to Zanzibar including an elaborate description of the ostrich and the giraffe.5