Sailing from China - Map of China: Decoding the Secrets of a Vanished Cartographer - page 112

southern end of Fujian province, as we have already noted. His account of the de-
parture route is precise and unmistakable: You go out on an ebb tide to Gui Island,
which you will recognise with its lighthouse and its shrine to Mazu, for whom the
pilots kept their lamps lit. Another half-tide gets you to the coastguard station on
Xiamen, which in the nineteenth century would replace Moon Harbour as Fujian's
treaty port. Keep going, and in less than five hours you reach the Duster Islands.
TheseformanaturalbreakwaterprotectingtheouterestuaryofNineDragonRiver
flowingdownfromZhangzhoutothecoast.'CleartheDusters,'Zhangwrites,'and
this is where the Eastern and Western Sea routes divide.'
The Laud rutter does not launch its network of routes from Moon Harbour. In-
steaditstartsattheharbourforQuanzhou,thenextprefecturalcity,100kilometres
to the north. 'Embark through Five Tiger Gate', the anonymous author explains,
then take an yizhen [115°] bearing as far as Officials' Seawall. After passing three
shoalsthatwillsurfaceontheportsideathalf-tide,putyourboatona bingwu [175°]
bearing until you have cleared East Sandhill on your starboard side. Once you are
sounding six or seven fathoms, set your course on an yi [105°] bearing for three
watches and you reach Clearwater Islet.
From there you are on open water.
The difference between the two take-off points - Gui Island and the Dusters
versus Five Tiger Mouth and Clearwater Islet - reflects the passage of time. The
fourteenth century was Quanzhou's heyday as China's main maritime entrepot -
that is, until the new Ming dynasty shut down foreign trade in 1374. The only map
from that century that shows a sea route leading from China towards the Indian
Ocean starts there. Quanzhou regained that reputation in1403,when the newly en-
throned Yongle emperor reinstituted foreign trade and ordered his eunuch Zheng
He to lead diplomatic voyages to all states owing tribute to his dynasty, and so the
Laud rutter starts there too. During the sixteenth century, however, Quanzhou was
eclipsed by its upstart rival, Zhangzhou. Not completely, of course, for this is the
homeportoftheLibrothersinHiradowhoservedascompradorsfortheEastIndia
Company. But Zhang Xie came from Zhangzhou, and, as he sees the world, Moon
Harbour anchored the maritime network that stretched away from China.
Zhang admits that he is using 'the old name' when he calls it Moon Harbour.
When the harbour was re-opened for legal maritime trade in 1567, it was given the
new, politically correct name of Haicheng, Sea at Rest. On top of this, by Zhang's
day the harbour no longer had its distinctive crescent shape. That had been oblit-