Zheng He: The Eunuch Who Commanded the World’s Biggest Treasure Fleet

Zheng He: The Eunuch Who Commanded the World’s Biggest Treasure Fleet

Decades before Christopher Columbus and Europe’s “Age of Exploration”, a strapping Chinese admiral named Zheng He commanded the biggest fleet of ships the world had ever seen – treasure ships so enormous that nothing comparable sailed the oceans for another 400 years. Born into a Muslim family and orphaned at a young age, Zheng He was castrated around the age of 10 and forced to work as a servant for Ming Dynasty prince Zhu Di. But this young eunuch soon outgrew his role – literally and figuratively – and when his master became the emperor, found himself entrusted with an imperial expedition that would turn him into one of history’s greatest travellers. So great, in fact, that some – including 1421 author Gavin Menzies – believe that China discovered America before Columbus. Across seven voyages spanning around 30 years, Zheng sailed south and west to Vietnam, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, India, the Persian Gulf, the Arabian Peninsula, and the east coast of Africa. He captured a Sri Lankan king, saw off the most feared pirate in the Strait of Malacca, and collected exotic animals to present to the Yongle emperor, from giraffes and ostriches to zebras. So, did this roving eunuch ambassador really reach America first? And why, when the fleet was so impressive, did it suddenly just… disappear? What would have happened if Zheng He, his hundreds of enormous boats and tens of thousands of crewmen had reached European shores? What if he’d continued to be an imposing presence? Might Europe’s destructive colonial expeditions in Asia never have happened? Join Sarah and Jeremiah as they separate fact from fiction, discuss what an alternative history might have looked like, and follow in Zheng He’s footsteps today in Java, Indonesia, Malacca in Malaysia, and Galle in Sri Lanka. Topics: Zheng He, Chinese treasure fleet, Ming Dynasty, eunuch admiral, Age of Exploration, maritime history, Indian Ocean trade, Strait of Malacca, did China discover America, 1421 Gavin Menzies, Christopher Columbus, Yongle Emperor, piracy, Sri Lanka history, Malacca, Malaysia, Java, Indonesia, Sam Po Kong temple, Southeast Asia travel This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit bytheirowncompass.substack.com/subscribe [https://bytheirowncompass.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

The Dark Side of the Compass: When Travellers Become the Problem

British travel writer and podcaster Jamie Fullerton [https://fullertonjamie.journoportfolio.com/] has spent his career documenting communities and places that the average guidebook doesn’t cover – from the Dance of the Little Devils ritual in Boruca, Costa Rica, to overnight hikes on Guatemala’s Fuego Volcano and obscure bagpipe festivals in the Rhodope Mountains of Bulgaria. His work bears witness to traditions in the midst of being revived, and cultures at risk of dying out – often asking what effect tourism has on local communities caught somewhere between preservation and exploitation. In this episode of By Their Own Compass, Jamie discusses his new podcast series, Keep Going: An Unexpected Travel Podcast, and the controversial trips that tourists make in Central America and elsewhere that do little for the local people they’re meant to help or celebrate. Sarah and Jamie examine cases ranging from Mexico’s Tren Maya railway displacing indigenous communities, to volcano guides risking their lives for tourist dollars, and ask whether the modern traveller is part of the problem. How do you know whether your presence in a foreign country is benefitting the community? Should we all travel with a journalist’s curiosity to ensure we’re doing less harm than good? And is the act of being a travel writer part of the problem – or is there an insidious new force in the content ecosystem causing even greater damage? Sarah also quizzes Jamie Fullerton on his writing inspirations, the most dramatic hike he’s ever done, and why a visit to an Albanian film archive changed his view of how we record – and preserve – history. Topics: ethical travel, responsible tourism, indigenous communities, overtourism, vanishing cultures, Central America travel, Guatemala volcano hiking, Costa Rica traditions, Mexico Tren Maya, travel writing, Keep Going podcast, Jamie Fullerton Follow By Their Own Compass: 📩 Substack: https://bytheirowncompass.substack.com/ 📸 Instagram: By Their Own Compass [https://substack.com/profile/306886506-by-their-own-compass] Listen to By Keep Going: An Unexpected Travel Podcast: Keep Going: An Unexpected Travel Podcast: https://linktr.ee/keepgoingtravelpodcast [https://linktr.ee/keepgoingtravelpodcast] Jamie Fullerton on Instagram: @jamie_w_fullerton [https://www.instagram.com/jamie_w_fullerton/] This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit bytheirowncompass.substack.com/subscribe [https://bytheirowncompass.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Emily Hahn in China: War, Romance, and Opium

Seeking the perfect travel companion: Must like adventure, dodgy neighborhoods, good gin joints, handsome and interesting men (a spy or a poet, if you please), gibbons (which are NOT monkeys), and opium. Not in that particular order. Meet Emily “Mickey” Hahn, a writer, an adventurer, and a professional rule-breaker whose wanderlust took her from the American Midwest to Europe and Africa, and finally to China, all before she turned 30. By the time she got to China, she had already established herself as an up-and-coming literary voice and one of the New Yorker’s earliest star writers. In her career, she published 54 books and over 200 articles, but her most famous book is China to Me, a memoir of the years that we’re going to talk about in this episode. She partied with poets (and her pet gibbon) at Shanghai soirees. Wrote biographies while dodging bombs in wartime Chongqing, and did her best to keep herself and her family alive in Japanese-occupied Hong Kong. Along the way, she became famous (some might add “notorious”) for her affairs, including with Chinese writer Sinmay Zau (Shao Xunmei 邵洵美) and the head of British intelligence in Hong Kong, Charles Boxer. Mickey lived through some of China’s most tumultuous moments. While many foreigners experienced these events, Mickey gave her readers an unvarnished look at what was happening, with a style all her own. We’ll explore Mickey’s life, travels, and adventures, and we’ll also discuss how to follow in her footsteps today through the modern cities of Chongqing, Hong Kong, and especially Shanghai. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit bytheirowncompass.substack.com/subscribe [https://bytheirowncompass.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

History’s Funniest Diplomatic Fails: the US in Guam, Louis XIV’s Fake Persian Ambassador and China’s Unluckiest Envoy

In diplomatic history, some missions don’t always go off with a bang, but with a cringe. During the Spanish-American War in 1898, the US Navy attacked Guam and waited for return fire that never came. Turns out the Spanish-run island had no idea they were enemies and sent an army officer and port commander out in a rowboat to go say a cheerful hello instead. In 1715, Louis XIV donned his finest diamond encrusted outfit to welcome a Persian “ambassador” in his spectacular Hall of Mirrors at the Palace of Versailles only to be told his translator was no good; and in 1870, Chinese diplomat Chonghou went all the way to France to say sorry for the murder of some nuns during the Tianjin Massacre, only to wait around for a year to find someone to apologize to. In this episode, Jeremiah and Sarah take turns to tell the stories of three of history’s most embarrassing diplomatic incidents and attempt to put themselves in the shoes of those who were there. Jeremiah balks at Sarah’s lack of Beatles song recognition, and Sarah reveals her favourite modern diplomatic fail: when Emmanuel Macron surprised Donald Trump with a Daft Punk medley performed by the [https://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2017/jul/14/french-army-band-medleys-daft-punk-bastille-day-parade-macron-trump-video]Garde Républicaine [https://www.theguardian.com/world/video/2017/jul/14/french-army-band-medleys-daft-punk-bastille-day-parade-macron-trump-video]. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit bytheirowncompass.substack.com/subscribe [https://bytheirowncompass.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]

Leo Africanus: Pirates, Popes, and the Moor Who Knew Too Much

Captured by a Spanish pirate? A gift to Pope Leo X? Europe’s expert on Africa for nearly three centuries? Leo Africanus lived many lives. Born al-Hasan ibn Muhammad al-Wazzan around 1488 in Granada, Spain, he was trained in the madrasas of Fez to be a diplomat. He travelled across the Sahara Desert and North Africa, sailed the Red Sea, and called on courts from Tunis to Timbuktu, Cairo to Constantinople. Then he became a prisoner of Rome, a convert (possibly) to Christianity, and one of the most celebrated scholars of his era, writing the Cosmography and Geography of Africa in 1526 (published in 1550). Then he disappeared. In this episode of By Their Own Compass, we tell the story of how a roving ambassador from Fez ended up a prisoner in the Castel Sant’Angelo, the dungeons and luxury apartments rolled into a single fortress on the Tiber. We follow his capture at sea in 1518, his fifteen months in the papal cells, his baptism by the Medici pope who gave him his own names, and the nine years he spent in Rome as a convert, a scholar, and a curiosity. We also follow him out, because when the city was sacked by mutinous Imperial troops in May 1527, Leo Africanus used the chaos to disappear, most likely back to Tunis, where he becomes untraceable in the historical record. Become a member of the By Their Own Compass Club on Substack for research notes on Leo Africanus, extended travel tips for Fez and Rome, a full episode transcript, and an original parody song we’re not entirely sorry about. The gratitude is real. Along the way, we talk about what it meant to be a Muslim diplomat captured in Renaissance Europe, the family history that starts with the fall of Granada in 1492, and the Venetian editor Giovanni Battista Ramusio, who published Leo’s manuscript and, in the process, smoothed over the Islam and sharpened the Christianity for his European readers. We also ask the same question we asked of Marco Polo. How much of Leo’s Africa did he actually see, and how much did he hear about in the markets of Fez and write down as if he’d been there? Our guide through the tangle is the historian Natalie Zemon Davis, whose Trickster Travels is the most thorough reconstruction of who this man was. An updated edition of Cosmography and Geography of Africa is out from Penguin Classics, the first new English translation of the book in over four hundred years. Sarah and Jeremiah take you through the Rome and Fez of Leo’s life too, from the Castel Sant’Angelo and the Passetto di Borgo (the corridor the Pope fled down in 1527) through the May 6 swearing-in ceremony of the Swiss Guard, and across the Mediterranean to the medina of Fez and the Chouara tanneries, where the smell still hits you on the terrace. Share this episode with a friend who thinks Kashmir is part of Morocco simply because Robert Plant used to buy the really good drugs there back in 1973. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit bytheirowncompass.substack.com/subscribe [https://bytheirowncompass.substack.com/subscribe?utm_medium=podcast&utm_campaign=CTA_2]