Is the era of great geographical discovery of the Han Dynasty about to begin?
The answer is: it's long over.This is the feeling that Ren Hong returned to Hepu County and came to the coast of the South China Sea after completing his royal order.At his request, the local Taishou really found a few Yue sailors who went to sea with Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty "Huangmen Translator".One of the old men who spoke more slippery Chinese was named "Ye Zishi", this person was sixty years old, short in stature and dark skin, and said that his ancestors were members of the southern expeditionary army in the Qin period, and he stayed in the local area as an official with Zhao Tuo.Ye Zishi Dynasty Ren Hongzuo: "Dare to tell Da Sima, we set off from this Xu Wengang back then." ”Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty sent Fu Bo General Lu Bode and Lou Chuan General Yang Fu to pacify the Nanyue Kingdom in 111 years ago, and set it up as nine counties, and in the following year, it controlled all the territory of Nanyue, and arrived at the southernmost part of the mainland "Xu Wen", that is, where Ren Hong was located, located on the Leizhou Peninsula, the shore is full of mangroves and palm trees, surrounded by white sandy beaches, is a busy harbor.If the weather is clear, standing on the beach and looking south, you can still see the faint coastline, which is Hainan Island.In 110 years before the first year of Yuanfeng, Emperor Wu sent troops to cross the sea from Xu Wen and set up Dan'er and Zhuya Counties.Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty, who was full of desire to explore the world, was not satisfied with Hainan Island, but continued to send Huangmen envoys to the south by boat along the coastline of Jiaozhi, Jiuzhen and Rinan, with the purpose of seeking immortals, and opened the Maritime Silk Road.As an eyewitness of that period of history, Ye Zishi still remembers every stop he has walked through: "Xu Wen sailed southward, never leaving the coast, his folk customs are slightly similar to the Pearl Cliff, naked foot tattoos, Yue language, and the language is not comprehensible when he turns to the west, but there are also small chieftains in the coastal jungle, hunting rice, and exchanging copper, pottery and other things for food and tortoiseshell ivory." ”It was probably the area of Cambodia and Malaya in Southeast Asia, and Southeast Asia was almost blank at this time, and the Ming of China and India had not yet touched this hot land, and it was still waiting to open up a new continent.But the Han Dynasty even Hainan Island is a little unable to control, the Yue people on the island rebelled, Emperor Zhao first five years BC 82 summer abolished Dan'er County, incorporated into the Pearl Cliff, if according to the original history to go, after more than ten years, the Pearl Cliff will also give up.Jiuzhen Rinan also only stationed Han officials in the county capital, and the local area still relied on the chieftains of the Jiaozhi and Linyi people, and the empire did not even consolidate these places, but only half-pushed and half-absorbed the inheritance of the Nanyue Kingdom, and was simply not interested in the more wild and hot hinterland of Southeast Asia.But this did not prevent exploration, Ye Zishi continued to talk about their experience of that voyage: "In short, from Xu Wen to the south, the weather is getting hotter and hotter in May.One day the wind suddenly stopped, and the current in the sea became calm, and at a fork in the road, the coast was facing west, and we saw that there was a coast in the south, so we tried to sail, but for some reason, the sun suddenly ran to the north, "I am afraid that this is the equator, which obviously frightened the people of the northern hemisphere, who were accustomed to the south of the sun, and the fleet did not dare to go further south, so they turned to the northwest, and after passing through the narrow sea channel, they arrived at the capital of the capital.Ye Zishi said, the capital of the Yuan country mountains are high, the fields are down, the people are full of food, the spring is rainy, the climate is hot, the customs are still strange, men and women are naked and spindle, carved wood for the gods, killing blood and rice wine sacrifices.Ren Hong guessed that Nadu Yuan was estimated to be a small state in Malacca or Sumatra.Next, it is still along the coastline: "Another boat can travel in April, there is a country without Yilu, and there can be more than 20 days by boat, there is Chen leaving the country, there can be more than ten days on foot, and there is a country of Fu Gandulu." ”It is estimated that it is Thailand, Burma area, and then west into the subcontinent, the Yellow Gate translator of the Han Dynasty arrived at the "Huangzhi Country", which is a big country, the land is vast, the household registration is numerous, and the pearls, wall displacements, strange stones and foreign objects, green elephants, big rhinoceros, etc., the climate is hot and hot, and the customs are irritable.This so-called "Yellow Branch" may be the ancient country of Kalinga in the East Indies, of course, it may not be, Ren Hong can't say, and he can't remember what countries in India were in this era.The Yellow Gate translator stayed there for a long time, and then sent a boat to continue south, to the "Journey to the Country", which according to Ye Zishi was a large island, similar to Qiongya, and perhaps Sri Lanka, the southernmost point of the subcontinent.That was the first year of the Taichu years, when the Han envoys arrived at the farthest place, after which the empire declined, and there were often drowned people in storms, and the exploration of the sea was stopped.Ren Hong's disciple Liu Gengsheng is already seventeen years old, this time he went south, he accompanied him as a chariot, and asked Ye Zishi after this calculation: "It takes five months from Xu Wen to Duyuan, and it takes six or seven months from Duyuan to Huangzhiguo, nearly a year, doesn't it mean that the speed of sea travel is extremely fast?"
Why is it taking so long. ”Previously, Jiaodong sent 80,000 displaced people to the southern part of Liaodong and Lelang County in batches through the ships left behind in the era of Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty to conquer Korea, directly across the Bohai Bay, and saved several months compared with the land route.Ye Zishi said with a smile: "Little gentleman, this trip to sea is not a trip for carriages and horses, it depends on the weather, wait for the direction of the wind, but our itinerary will be counted in the days when the wind is waiting for the wind at the port." ”The oceanic monsoon has its own fixed pattern, with northeasterly winds blowing from the mainland to the west and south in autumn and winter, and vice versa in summer.If you go with the wind, you can get there faster, but if you are leeward, you will not be able to move an inch, and even the ship will be destroyed.This is also the reason why the departure place is not selected in Panyu, Nanhai County, but in Xuwen or Hepu Port in the west, the shipbuilding technology of the Han Dynasty is still backward, although there are also pointed bottom sea ships that inherit the technology of South Vietnam, and they can afford to sail next door with watertightness, but they can only go along the coastline.But with such rudimentary technology, the Han envoy has already run to Sri Lanka, which is really not easy.The ancestors more than forty years ago, indeed, with infinite curiosity and courage, refreshed the Chinese's understanding of the world, and the northern boundary of the empire was Beihai, and Su Wu went there to shepherd sheep decades earlier.When Ren Hong was in the Western Regions, he sent envoys as far as Tai Xifeng, the capital of the Anxi Empire, and did not exceed the distance of the envoys when Emperor Wu of the Han Dynasty.However, there has been progress in the East, and the Han envoy has already fled to the Japanese island of Yamatai.The most humiliating thing is the south, not only did not make the slightest progress, but greatly regressed, after the Han Dynasty, the Han ship did not go out of the south of Japan for more than 20 years.Ren Hong has now decided to restart the Maritime Silk Road, and began to look for the old sailors who participated in the Taichu Voyage, and through their descriptions and memories, according to what he had seen and heard in his previous life, he redrew the chart.In the name of "traveling by sea to find a poisonous country", he paid a lot of money to recruit Huiji, Ouyue warriors, fishermen and businessmen who begged for a living by the sea, and invested in shipbuilding in Nanhai County and Hepu County, hoping to produce a big man Columbus.The Son of Heaven supports this matter in principle, Liu Xun has a "Body Poison Treasure Mirror" that Shi Liangdi tied to his arm, and he has protected Liu Xun since he was imprisoned when he was young, so Liu Xun is quite interested in body poison, and he is also tossed by Ren Hong.Money can make ghosts grind, and ordinary people are naturally reluctant to venture overseas, but Ren Hong has given too much, and now he has raised several boats of people, just waiting for the autumn and winter to set off from Xu Wen and start sailing along the monsoon.But Ren Hong's disciple, the curious baby Liu Gengsheng, has doubts about Ren Hussar's motives."
Emperor Xiaowu sent the Huangmen translator to the sea to seek immortals and summon overseas countries to pay tribute, and what was the hussar general for?"
Seeking immortals?
According to Liu Gengsheng's knowledge, Ren Hussar does not believe in immortals, although his body is slightly blessed, but his spirit is still good and rarely sick, and he can still run to the hot south, and it is still too early to seek immortality.Or is it for trade?
Ren Hussar has always been very interested in the Silk Road trade.But as far as Liu Gengsheng can see, this Xuwengang is already very prosperous, and it is all driven by domestic trade.Southern rhino horn, ivory, tortoiseshell, pearl, cherished fruit longan lychee, cotton cloth, Chinese businessmen take more wealth.And from Duyuan to Huangzhiguo, there are only these overseas specialties, nothing new.The risk of going to sea trade is far greater than the harvest, and it is better to transport Lingnan products to Huiji Jiangdong, which is enough to run four or five times.The conquest is even more of a joke, Liu Gengsheng has seen it with his own eyes, and the building ship that the Han is proud of can't last more than half an hour at sea before it is overturned by the wind and waves.It is also possible to open up in the Bohai Bay, relying on a few small broken boats that can carry 100 people, and wanting to go overseas to open up is tantamount to a fool's dream.Ren Hong didn't tell him that a few small broken ships could really conquer a country, but after groaning, he pointed to the blue South China Sea and said with a smile: "Why do you want to go to sea?"
Because the sea is there!"
The map is shrouded in fog, isn't it uncomfortable not to explore Qingming?
The world island is connected by the sea, if you don't go, others will come, Ren Hong is talking about Rome.As far as he knew, now Egypt was under the rule of the Ptolemaic dynasty, which had long since opened the Red Sea Indian route and mastered the law of the monsoon.The Eritrean Sea was well explored by Greek and Egyptian merchants, and in the near future, this inheritance will be inherited by the Romans.The thirst for silk would prompt the Romans to join the search for shipping routes, desperate to find China.In history, although the Han Dynasty and Rome were blocked by the Anxi Empire on the land route and never came into contact, but at the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, there was a caravan called the "Great Qin King Andun" envoy, who landed in Rinan County, offering ivory, rhino horn, and tortoiseshell.Whether it was an envoy or a merchant, this was the first time in the history of the East and the West, and the old route was opened, as opposed to the new route 1,500 years later.In Ren Hong's view, the overseas transportation of BC is like the exploration of outer space in later generations, although there is no short-term benefit at all, but it must not be left unattended, the emperor and courtiers are not aware of its significance, and he, as a later generation, has to take a long-term view.He hoped that this time, it would be the Han ships that arrived at the Red Sea first, not the Roman merchants who came to the Han Dynasty first.The connection between the East and the West, in fact, is only separated by a short west coast of India, Ren Hong has made people try to make a compass, improve the shape of the ship, still along the coast, Ren Hong hopes that within five years, the exploration fleet sent by the Han Dynasty can go to the Persian Gulf where Gan Ying was prevented by the rest of the people in the Eastern Han Dynasty.Ten years later, I was able to ride the monsoon and visit the port of Ptolemaic Egypt on the Red Sea coast.If it goes well, Ren Hong will even have the opportunity to realize that purely personal obscenity: more than ten years later, he will meet Caesar in Egypt!
At this moment, an edict from the DPRK made Ren Hong, who was full of longing and expectations for the sea, feel plummeted.Liu Gengsheng found that after reading the edict, Ren Hong's mood immediately fell, and he replied to the letter in his hand, only looking at the blue sea and blue sky outside the window for a long time, and then sighed after a while: "Zhongjie Hou Su Gongxue, Your Majesty summoned me to return to the north." ”PS: Chapter 2 is before 0:00.