Chinese sources on Africa

Don J. Wyatt, Middlebury College

Tribute giraffe by Shen Du (沈度, 1357–1434)

Africa was the last frontier with which Chinese of the imperial period came into direct contact, owing to its geographical remoteness at the limits of what was then the known navigational world. Moreover, in contrast to its actual size, the “Africa” with which these Chinese travelers initially familiarized themselves was itself of fairly limited expanse, being no more than the littoral regions mainly north of the equator that form the East African coastline, the seaward-rimming lands that bound the Indian Ocean—then called by Chinese the “Western Sea” (Xiyang 西洋)—and that together form the most northerly portion of its westernmost bank. From the time that Chinese knowledge of it as a place was first acquired, no region represented more of an extreme to reach than did Africa. Consequently, even after they made actual landfall there, the Chinese would penetrate few other foreign territories with which they had dealings as tentatively and shallowly as those of Africa.

Tang to Song

The first certifiable reference in any Chinese source to an identifiably African land is datable to the Tang dynasty (618–907) and, moreover, quite specifically to a source produced during the ninth century. This Chinese work that first references Africa is the Youyang zazu 酉陽雑俎 [Youyang Mountain Miscellanies], which was authored by the unconventional scholar Duan Chengshi 段成式 (d. 863). From Duan’s singular reference and ensuing description of a kingdom called Bobali 撥拔力, in the region incorporated by what is now the northeastern “horn” of the Africa, we immediately learn two things. First, we learn that during the Tang, Africa was conceived as constituting neither a unitary geographical entity nor a continent but instead a mélange of geographically discrete but culturally amorphous or indistinguishable “countries” (guo 國). Such was the conceptualization of Africa that would persist among Chinese for much of the succeeding Song dynasty (960–1279), or at least through early or Northern Song (960–1127) times. Second and just as important, however, we learn that, almost from the first, an expanding trade in goods—in this first instance of Bobali, in ivory and ambergris—was the overriding impetus for Chinese interest in any African locale. Interestingly, while representing a curiosity, the inhabitants of Africa—typified by their very different, distinctively dark complexions—intrigued the Chinese who first encountered them—and who were almost assuredly merchants—far less than what native commodities its lands might yield for commerce.

If it actually occurred at all before the much later era of the Ming dynasty (1368–1644), we cannot determine precisely when Chinese first set foot on African soil. Still, there is an extant collection of unique sources from the late or Southern Song (1127–1279) and the intervening Yuan dynasty (1279–1368) periods—consisting preponderantly of nonofficial writings, mostly under the literary classification of “geographies” or “travelogues” (dili 地理)—that compellingly ascribes this event to pre-Ming times. Outstanding among the Southern Song sources of this type in their highly descriptive referencing of African sites are the works Lingwai daida 嶺外代答 [Notes on Lands beyond the Mountains] by Zhou Qufei 周去非 (jinshi, 1163) and Zhufan zhi 諸蕃志 [Description of Foreign Peoples] by Zhao Rugua 趙汝适 (1170–1231), which were authored in reputedly 1178 and 1226, respectively. The most salient of the Yuan-period works of this type is Daoyi zhilue 島夷志略 [Annals of Island Barbarians] by Wang Dayuan 汪大淵 (fl. 1340s), which was completed no later than 1349. Each of these works offers detailed descriptions of the peoples and products of multiple coastal African “countries” that are putatively based on firsthand observation.

Ming

Subsequent sources indicate that by Ming times, and surely after 1405, the territories of northeast coastal Africa had become known, if not altogether familiar, landmarks for Chinese navigators. This certifiable visitation of the littoral kingdoms of the East African shoreline is closely associated with the noteworthy seagoing expeditions of the famous eunuch-commander Zheng He 鄭和 (1371–1435), and it is datable to the fifth of the seven voyages, from 1417 (actually, December 1416) to 1419. Thus, taking the time required to transverse the extreme navigational distance from South China to East Africa, it is most likely sometime during the year of 1418 that we can conclude with surety that detachments from the immense Ming flotilla must have touched such ports of call as Mogadishu (Mugudushu 木骨都束); Brawa, now more typically Barawa or Brava (Bulawaguo 卜剌哇國); and Malindi or formerly Melinde (Molin 磨鄰).

Thus, significantly, with the advent of the Ming dynasty and especially in the wake of the watershed naval missions of Zheng He, we no longer find such East African locations as the foregoing ones confined exclusively to the nonofficial travelogue literature. On the contrary, we find these and other African sites referenced for the first time in official sources, such as Ming shi 明史 [History of the Ming Dynasty]. Interestingly, therein, the products of these African lands—mostly raw materials and exotic animals but also some highly prized goods that we may consider either cured or finished—are described with greater detail than any aspect—whether cultural or ethnographical features—of the native inhabitants. We may take such a development as indicative of the level of familiarity that Chinese visitors had achieved with the geography of east coastal Africa by the commencement of the fifteenth century. Following the last of Zheng He’s visits in 1433, to be sure, there would be a hiatus in maritime contact between China and Africa of several centuries. Nonetheless, we must see the knowledge gained from this earliest Chinese direct engagement with Africa—a brief flourishing of interchange restricted entirely to the crucial epoch spanning from the late 1410s to the early 1430s—as presaging vital aspects of the largely transoceanic commercial relationship that we are witnessing the emergence and expansion of between China and the nation-states of Africa in our own times.

Source list

Title (pinyin)	Title (hanzi)	Title (English)	Author (pinyin)	Author (hanzi)	Date
Weilüe	魏略	Brief History of Wei	Yu Huan	魚豢	265, after
Youyang zazu	酉陽雑俎	Youyang Mountain miscellanies	Duan Chengshi	段成式	855, ca.
Xin Tang shu	新唐書	New History of Tang	Ouyang Xiu, Song Qi, et al.	歐陽修, 宋祁	1060
Zhufan zhi	諸蕃志	Description of foreign peoples	Zhao Rugua	趙汝适	1225, ca.
Yiyu zhi	異域志		Zhou Zhizhong	周至中	1297-1329
Daoyi zhilue	島夷誌略	A brief account of island barbarians	Wang Dayuan	汪大淵	1349
Xingcha shenglan	星槎勝覽	Captivating views from a star raft	Bi Xin	費信	1436
Shuyuan zaji	菽園雑記		Lu Rong	陸容	1493, after
Mingshi	明史	History of the Ming	Zhang Tingyu, et al.	張廷玉	1739 [1789]