Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
While it is very possible that the compass idea found its way from China to Europe, it seems just as
likely that the European world made the discovery on its own, only a bit later. One legendary account gives
credit for the mariner's compass to an anonymous Italian sailor of the early fourteenth century.
The point is that somebody got the notion of attaching a pivoting, magnetized needle over a “compass
card,” a circle divided into the principal points of direction. At first the sailor's compass card was circular
and was kept lying flat on a table. In a dish beside it, a bare magnetic needle was floated on a piece of cork
or straw. As the needle pointed north, the card was adjusted to indicate direction.
Before the introduction and widespread use of the magnetic compass, navigators had to rely on an an-
cient technique called dead reckoning. Basically, the sailor used his experience, instincts, and whatever
local knowledge there might be in combination with astronomical sightings. Unfortunately, with dead reck-
oning the emphasis too often was on “dead.” It was a dangerous and unreliable method that presented an
enormous obstacle to long seagoing voyages into vast, uncharted expanses of ocean. Certainly, without the
compass, Columbus could not even have considered attempting his ambitious dream of reaching the Orient
by sailing west.
Why Didn't the Chinese, the Africans, or the Arabs “Discover” America?
As the exploits of Zheng He, the Chinese “Christopher Columbus,” and the Chinese invention of the com-
pass demonstrate, Europe was far from alone in making navigational progress and other geographic ad-
vances. Seafarers from the Orient and Arabic countries were roaming vast expanses of the eastern oceans
while Europe was still in the midst of the Dark Ages.
In fact, Europe's Dark Ages were a period of extraordinary mathematical and scientific advancement
in non-European societies. While the medieval church either burned or buried the classics of antiquity and
scholars fixed their sights on locating paradise, the Arabic world was adopting Greek notions and embark-
ing on its own golden age of scientific and mathematical advancement. While Ptolemy was neglected by
the European world, the Arabs were perpetuating the study of astronomy and mathematics and rapidly ex-
panding their empire in the intellectual vacuum created by the demise of Rome.
But the question remains why these societies, for all their skill and scholarship, and certainly possessed
of technical abilities, failed to embark on the type of oceangoing exploration and colonization that would
alter the course of history in the late fifteenth century—the European “age of discovery.”
Presuming that none of these cultures did in fact reach the Americas first, this question gets to the heart
of the relationship between geography and destiny. What geographic or cultural factors kept the Arabs and
Chinese (in particular) from reaching out across the oceans to discover the New World?
For the Chinese, it may simply have been the reluctance of a civilization content with what they had
to make the enormous effort and sacrifices that discovery and exploration demanded. Daniel Boorstin has
labeled this civilization “an empire without wants.” Tradition also played a role. This was a people whose
cultural and historical tradition had been to oppose or at least limit contact with foreigners. After all, they
were the heirs to the people who began to build the Great Wall in 214
BC
to keep out foreign marauders.
But there is another, controversial side of the story. In 2002, Gavin Menzies, a retired British submar-
iner, published a topic called
1421: The Year China Discovered America
, which became an international
bestseller. In it, he claimed that the Chinese admiral Zheng He had sailed to America and produced maps,
which were later used by Europeans. Largely dismissed by scholars as an interesting fiction, and lacking
archeological evidence of such an astonishing event, the topic still enjoyed international success. In 2010,
National Geographic
announced that the so-called Chinese Columbus map was likely a fake.
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