Summary Of When China Ruled The Seas: The Dragon Throne

The Chinese Dynasties are some of the most well-known empires in history. The topic of this report is on the book, ‘When China Ruled the Seas: The Treasure Fleet of The Dragon Throne’ by Louise Levathes. This book was written to narrate the history of China’s gigantic treasure fleet and the policies and events that changed the Ming Dynasty and eventually reached a global influence. Unfortunately, this book also gives a plethora of historical tidbits which the author could’ve explained all at the beginning at the book so she didn’t have to constantly look back at another event for reference and explain why she bought it up. Additionally, there were several topics which made me want to skip over, because it didn’t pertain to the treasure fleet.

This was unprecedented and China had never before been assembled a force like this and soon every province was absorbed. Levathes said, “In the brief period from 1405 to 1433, the treasure fleet, under the command of the eunuch admiral Zheng He, made seven epic voyages throughout the China Seas and Indian Ocean,”(20). This was significant because the Emperor and society put so much emphasis on following the teachings of Confucius, as Levathes said, “Confucius thought foreign travel interfered with important familial obligations and believed that trade was inherently mean and debasing,”(33). At this point in time it is evident that China was starting to become relatively progressive and forward-moving, because they initially went great measures in order to keep the traditional ways. Levathes further supplements this claim on page 33 saying, “from the second Century B.C., with the rise if the Han Dynasty, Confucianism became the moral code for the upper classes of Chinese society and the foundation of the emerging feudal bureaucracy.” This moral code was like their social laws, when if broken it is dishonorable. The thing is, these people put grave emphasis on honor, with a history of many people who would rather commit suicide than tarnish their

They were long time companions so they had a great amount of trust in each other. The interesting thing was that, “it was the first time in Chinese history that a eunuch had been appointed to such an important military command,”(87). Then, in 1405 the treasure fleet was ready to set sail, “In Autumn…the fleet of 317 brightly painted junks with a total crew of more than 27,000 men was ready to depart from Nanjing,”(87) They traveled several places, one of which was India, where they traded, “cloves, nutmeg, and other island spices, along with seed pearl, bird plumes, and batiks were exchanged here for Indian textiles,”(108). Unfortunately, Zhu Di’s health began to decline, much like his ruling grasp on the Chinese. Di’s successor was Zhu Zhanji, who unfortunately caused China to plunge into a political crisis, where instability plagued in the back and forth clash of the imperial officers and Confucian advisers. Along with the death of Zhu Zhanji, the treasure fleet was eventually