The era of Western navigation is actually a very cruel era, but in this cruel era, the cruel sea contains a lot of temptations in people's eyes, so why is the Western great navigation so dangerous, and Zheng He's going to the West gives people a very smooth and peaceful feeling? According to the time, it is clear that Zheng He's voyage to the West was earlier, so why is it more stable and smooth than the Development of Navigation Technology in the West?
Many people often associate Zheng He's voyage to the West with the Western voyage, and even hypothesize that Zheng He discovered the American continent first when he went to the West, but in the existing historical data, there is a very significant and unimaginable gap between the Western voyage and Zheng He's voyage to the West. So back to the point, Xiaobian will take you to specifically and systematically analyze the difference between the two sides of the navigation.
First, food allocation and staffing
In the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries of the Western Age of Discovery, the adventurers of western European countries have been ruthlessly toyed with by the sea, and the famous Magellan took out two hundred people that year, only eighteen came back alive, and George Anson took out 1854 people and only returned 188.
Whether it is adventurous voyages or normal maritime exchange trade, the average mortality rate of the European sailor profession during the great voyage period is more than forty percent, and these adventurers and sailors who "dare to open up" at sea are treated very low, basically equal to consumables, and the treatment is unimaginably low, until the eighteenth century, the staple food of sailors on the official warships of Europe is only the brick bread bitten by the weevil, and at the end of the eighteenth century, the British Royal Navy also mutinied because the treatment was too low. The low treatment and inferior food configuration of sailors are undoubtedly not at all the same level as Zheng He's voyage to the West. On the other hand, on the side of Zheng He's fleet, the diet is extremely rich, the meat is mainly eaten in a variety of chicken, mutton, pork, rabbit meat, camel meat, venison, etc., vegetables are gourds, cucumbers, small melons, eggplant, winter melons, etc., to the tropics there are coconuts, durians, mangoes, etc., food conditions are extremely rich can also be raised on the ship, compared to the lack of vegetables and fruits at sea to supplement vitamin C to get scurvy European sailors do not know how many levels higher.
In terms of staffing, most of the people in the Fleet led by Zheng He on the Chinese side are officers and soldiers, civil servants, and different technicians in different seas: East and Southeast Asia are helmed by Chinese who are familiar with sea routes, while in West Asia and the Indian Ocean, experienced Arabs and Persians at sea can be at the helm. On the other hand, the Fleet and Sailors of Europe, the composition of the team and the allocation of personnel are so messy that they are incomprehensible, the so-called great navigation at that time is to say that it is speculation at sea, it is completely gambling money with life, even taking life for money, all kinds of lost or bankrupt nobles, indebted civilians, criminal and even pirates who do not enter the stream, all became sailors who opened up the new world in that era, the navigation experience was extremely low and the personnel organization was extremely poor, and this kind of team basically went to sea for nothing.
Second, the nature of the sea on both sides
From the nature of the two sides to the sea, Zheng He went to the West to publicize the national prestige, and there is also a saying that Zhu Di let Zheng He find the Missing and Absconded Overseas Jianwen Emperor by the way to publicize the national prestige, in any case belongs to the large-scale navigation movement supported by the official certification of Daming, and the Western European navigation is not as imagined as it is dedicated to geographical scholarship and geographical discovery, its original intention is entirely to make money and speculate on the sea, basically it is a spontaneous navigation movement of speculators, the official support is very little, and the official does not have much ability to support much. These have led to a particularly high number of tribal conflicts and sea robberies encountered by the Great Western Navigation Movement, resulting in a completely different navigation situation on both sides.
On Columbus's first voyage had three ships of 87 men, and the stronghold was crushed by the Indians; Magellan had five ships with 270 men, resulting in Magellan being hacked to death by the natives; Derek, who was chased by the Spanish colonists with only one ship; and Da Gama's four ships were almost wiped out by a storm. Although Zheng He's side has also encountered various sea robberies, sea conflicts, and tribal conflicts, because the nature of Zheng He's voyage to the West is completely different from the Western voyages, the people and things he carries are completely another concept. One of the main purposes of Zheng He's voyage to the West is to publicize the prestige of the country, to put it bluntly, it is to scare all kinds of tribal small countries, the number of people is as high as 27800 or more, all kinds of weapons are very complete, basically destroying one or two tribes or threatening several small countries is a matter of minutes, pirates, tribes, small countries have a few dare not provoke, when the Javanese country accidentally killed Zheng He 140 people, the king learned of it and directly surrendered to the subjects to ask for forgiveness, and began to lick all kinds of kneeling, expressing willingness to pay tribute every year And if any unobtrusive pirate provoked Zheng He's fleet, he would either be completely wiped out in one pot, or he would be directly arrested and sent to the capital for questioning like the pirate leader Chen Ism.
Third, the huge gap in the route
Simply put, Zheng He knew where he was going, while the western voyages such as Columbus and Magellan were completely unaware. The route of Zheng He's fleet is the Indian Ocean route that the Arabs have spent hundreds of years studying and recording, and it is a coastal voyage, ready to be replenished, and all kinds of supply points in Southeast Asia are available, even if something needs to be rectified, Hainan and Taiwan are also welcome at any time.
And for the people of the Great Voyage of the West, sailing on the Atlantic Ocean is really a very sad thing, the Atlantic route has no reliable supply station at all, whether it is Diaz discovering the Cape of Good Hope or Da Gama crossing the Cape of Good Hope, whether it is Columbus discovering the New World or Magellan's circumnavigation of the world, it is the kind of pioneering voyage that needs to be slowly groped for months without seeing the land, and it is not known where to go and even the road does not know how to go, even if it occasionally encounters a wild island, but it is very difficult to make reliable supplies. Coupled with the fact that Europeans could not find vegetables and fruits at sea, scurvy caused by the lack of vitamin C was not uncommon, and scurvy alone killed more than a million sailors in Europe in three hundred years, and how many people were there in Europe at that time?
4. Summary
In addition to the above three main reasons, some other factors such as plague, equipment configuration and other factors are also affecting the actual situation of Zheng He's voyage to the West and the West, which will not be repeated here, in short, Zheng He's fleet's critical land, mountains and seafood, clear division of labor, many people, well-equipped, and small countries around it dare not follow, while the Western great navigation side is cross-sea navigation, brick bread, lack of experience, loose discipline, small boat people crowded, enclosure, so it is completely reasonable to say that Zheng He's smooth sailing in the Western Ocean is completely reasonable. And the Great Voyage of the West is not strange if it dies for a lifetime.
References: "History of Ming", "Ming Shilu", "Zheng He's Navigation Chart", "Monument to the Buddhist Temple of Mount Ceylon", "Former Wen ji and lower Western Ocean", "The Record of The Spiritual Experience of Tianfei", "Journey to the Western Ocean", "Western FanguoZhi"