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A Chinese-Drawn World Map Depicts Europe Between 1157 and 1166, and Reveals Sino-Europe Maritime Routes Already Existing in the Millennia Before Christ

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A Chinese-Drawn World Map Depicts Europe Between 1157 and 1166, and Reveals Sino-Europe Maritime Routes Already Existing in the Millennia Before Christ 1 A Chinese-drawn world map depicts Europe between 1157 and 1166, and reveals Sino-Europe maritime routes already existing in the millennia before Christ By Sheng-Wei Wang* 28 May 2021 Abstract This paper reports that a Chinese-based world map ‒ the Kunyu Wanguo Quantu《坤舆 万国全图》or Complete Geographical Map of All the Kingdoms of the World published by Matteo Ricci in 1602 in China ‒ depicts Europe in the period between 1157 and 1166, during the Southern Song Dynasty (南宋; 1127-1279), and that a network of trade routes ‒ the Maritime Silk Road routes connecting China and Europe ‒ existed already before Christ. The findings are based on: 1) a comparison of key geographical features in the European portion of the Kunyu Wanguo Quantu with major European and Arabic maps from antiquity to the late sixteenth century; 2) a comprehensive examination of the geographical and historical information of each named European kingdom, principality, duchy, republic, state, confederation, province, county, region, autonomous or semi- autonomous region, city/town, peninsula, island, ocean, sea, lake and river depicted on the Kunyu Wanguo Quantu; 3) a historical record of China-Byzantine interactions during the rule of the Emperor Shenzong (神宗; 1048-1085) of the Northern Song Dynasty (北 宋; 960-1127); 4) archaeological findings from the “Nanhai One (南海一号)” shipwreck dated around the 1160s of the Southern Song Dynasty and discovered in the South China Sea in 1987; and 5) the latest archaeological surveys made by T. C. Bell in Ireland and the United Kingdom, revealing that the Chinese had actually operated in Western Europe as early as 2850 B. C., and suggesting the existence of the Sino-Europe maritime routes almost 5000 years ago. Keywords: China, Europe, Kunyu Wanguo Quantu, Nanhai One, Maritime Silk Road, Song Dynasty 1. Introduction For over four hundred years, the world map ‒ Kunyu Wanguo Quantu《坤舆万国全 图》, abbreviated here as KWQ 1 ‒ with Chinese characters and latitudinal and longitudinal lines, has been generally regarded as a map drawn in 1602 by Matteo Ricci (an Italian Jesuit priest and one of the founding figures of the Jesuit China missions) and his Chinese collaborators, based on the European maps which Ricci brought with him to China in 1582.2 Recently, researchers have provided analysis and evidence3 to show that most of KWQ was actually based on the knowledge obtained by the Ming (明代; 1388- 1644) mariners before the seventh voyage of Admiral Zheng He (郑和) to the Western Ocean in the 1430s. Hence, KWQ used Chinese maps as source maps (these no longer exist) and KWQ is not a direct or adapted copy of other contemporary European maps. However, these analyses have not thoroughly been extended to the European part of 2 KWQ, abbreviated here as Europe-KWQ. Hence, it is important to re-examine the Europe-KWQ to determine the era of Europe which this map depicts, to see whether the Europe-KWQ is also based on the knowledge of the Ming mariners. 2. The Europe-KWQ is not a direct or adapted copy of the two major European maps in the sixteenth century Fig. 1 shows the Europe-KWQ extracted from the KWQ (a collection item at the United States Library of Congress's Geography & Map Division);4 Fig. 2 shows the map of Europe extracted from the 1569 World Map by Gerardus Mercator;5 and Fig. 3 shows the map of Europe extracted from the 1570 World Map by Abraham Ortelius.6 Both Figs. 2 and 3 were thought by some scholars to be the source maps of the Europe-KWQ. Fig. 1 The Europe-KWQ extracted from the 1602 KWQ (public domain).7 The “toe” and “heel” of “Italy’s boot” of the Italian Peninsula are poorly represented. We can see very clearly that the “toe” and “heel” of “Italy’s boot” of the Italian Peninsula are poorly depicted on the Europe-KWQ in Fig. 1, in comparison with the two European maps in Figs. 2-3. It seems that the Europe-KWQ is an older and less accurate map and not a direct or adapted copy of these two sixteenth-century European maps. In the Appendix of this paper, I list all the geographical terms shown on the Europe- KWQ in Fig. 1, and specifically denote those not appearing on the 1569 World Map by Gerardus Mercator or the 1570 World Map by Abraham Ortelius. The denotation is based on the Chinese book entitled Li Ma Dou Shi Jie Di Tu Yan Jiu《利玛窦世界地图研究》 or Research on Matteo Ricci's World Map, written by Huang Shijian (黄时鉴) and Gong Yingyan (龚缨晏). Of the 117 geographical terms analysed in this paper, 30 (about 26 percent) do not appear on these two European maps. 3 Moreover, among the geographical terms depicted on the Europe-KWQ, “黃魚島” (Yellow Fish Island) is a Chinese-based name (Item 97 in the Appendix). The name is used to describe a kind of fish which lives around the island of Sardinia. This Chinese name has no connection with the island name’s pre-Latin roots. “太海” (Tai Hai; Big Ocean; today’s Black Sea) is also a Chinese-based name (Item 104 in the Appendix). “Black Sea” today is the name of the sea in Turkish during the Ottoman Empire (1299- 1922) era. The name "Black Sea" does not appear on the Europe-KWQ, indicating that the map originated earlier than 1299 A. D. and also implying that Matteo Ricci has nothing to do with the name of this inland sea. Fig. 2 The map of Europe extracted from the 1569 World Map by Gerardus Mercator (public domain);8 the “toe” and “heel” of “Italy’s boot” of the Italian Peninsula near the figure’s bottom can be clearly identified. 4 From the above analysis and simple comparisons, we can conclude that the Europe-KWQ cannot be a copy or adapted copy of the two prominent European maps in the sixteenth century in Figs. 2-3. Since the Europe-KWQ seems to be an older and less accurate map in comparison with the sixteenth century European maps, I decided to examine major European and Arabic maps earlier than the sixteenth century to make further comparisons with the Europe- KWQ. The purpose is to see whether any different conclusion can be reached. This is done in the following section. Fig. 3 The map of Europe extracted from the 1570 World Map by Abraham Ortelius (public domain);9 again, the “toe” and “heel” of “Italy’s boot” can be clearly identified near the bottom of this figure. 3. The Europe-KWQ is also very different from the major European and Arabic maps of the twelfth to fifteenth centuries I next compare the Europe-KWQ with major European maps drawn before the sixteenth century in reverse chronological order. The left panel in Fig. 4 shows the map of Europe extracted from the 1459 Fra Mauro map,10 while the right panel is extracted from a modern reproduction of the 1375 Catalan Atlas.11 Fig. 5 shows the 1258-1291 map called Carta Pisane.12 It appears that on all the maps of the thirteenth to fifteenth centuries, the European cartographers knew how to draw the “toe” and “heel” of “Italy’s boot”. Hence, there remains a puzzle: why did Matteo Ricci not know how to correctly draw the shape of the Italian Peninsula on the Europe-KWQ in 1602? It is also interesting to ask why and how the Europeans could already draw the Mediterranean region so well in the thirteenth century as shown in Fig. 5. 5 Fig. 4 At left is the map of Europe extracted from the 1459 Fra Mauro map (shown upside-down as the original had South at the top; public domain).13 At right is the map of Europe extracted from the modern production of the 1375 Catalan Atlas (public domain).14 Both show good depictions of the “toe” and “heel” of “Italy’s boot”. Fig. 5 A picture of the Carta Pisane (public domain),15 which was probably made around 1258-1291. We can recognize the “toe” and “heel” of “Italy’s boot”. History books record that Chinese developed navigational compasses as early as the eleventh or twelfth century (during the Song Dynasty; 960-1279), and that later, during the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, the compass arrived in Europe. After they learned how to use the compass, the Europeans developed the Portolan charts which are nautical charts related to harbours. On these charts, “compass roses”, also called “wind roses” or 6 “roses of the wind” are drawn at various significant geographical locations with a network of rhumb lines that focused on the coasts and islands.16 Sailing along any of these lines can lead ships to a harbour; hence, the maps were important guides for the sailors. A drawback of the Portolan charts is that they did not take into account the spherical shape of the Earth; instead, they regarded the sea as a flat surface over which sailors could sail in a straight-line direction to reach their destination. As a result, the Portolan charts cannot provide effective sailing directions on a curved surface such as a vast ocean. But in the small and nearly flat Mediterranean Sea, the charts were very useful. 17 The Carta Pisana (a Portolan chart) shows high accuracy in presenting the Mediterranean and is regarded as the cumulative work of the local fishermen and coastal merchants over the years. However, when stepping back to the twelfth century, we notice that the Arabic cartographers were doing much better in their overall depiction of the world than the European cartographers.
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