Encyclopedia of India–China Cultural Contacts v2.c13.47

v2.c13.47

This policy of active engagement with the maritime states to the south of China and further west on the Indian subcontinent continued after the Yuan Dynasty was overthrown and the Ming Dynasty was founded in 1368 under the first two rulers, the Hongwu emperor and the Yongle emperor. It culminated in the spectacular voyages sponsored by the Yongle emperor and led by the admiral Zheng He between 1405 and 1433. Chinese accounts state that each expedition consisted of 200 two 300 ships, with the large “treasure ships” capable of carrying 500 men each. While there has been much scholarly debate on what the motives behind despatching such huge expeditions were, there can be no doubt about the impact their arrival would have had on the ports at which they called. Zheng He’s voyages followed the routes already established by merchant networks and diplomatic ventures in the Song and Yuan periods. These voyages touched down at several points on the Indian coast. In fact, the terminus of the first two of the voyages was Kozhikode which had by this time superseded Kollam as the pre-eminent port of the Malabar coast. By the later part of the Zheng He expeditions, however, Kochi had emerged as a rival to Kozhikode on the Malabar coast. There