Ma Huan Joins Zheng He's Fleet

1405

A Chinese Muslim scholar signed on as translator for the third treasure voyage. His later book, the Yingya Shenglan, described everything from Calicut's spice markets to the brothels of Mogadishu. It is the closest thing we have to a ship's purser's diary from the age of Chinese global reach. His meticulous observations provide the only surviving Chinese-language account of the medieval Indian Ocean world at its commercial peak.