In a message dated 1/14/03 9:08:36 AM US Mountain Standard Time, [EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
<< Gavin Menzies claims that a massive Chinese fleet of huge junks and support ships made a two-year circumnavigation of the globe, with extensive exploration of the Americas, nearly a century before Magellan and Columbus. >> The Chinese did for a time make bigger ships than what was being made in Europe at the same time. [Just as in the Japanese, for a short time, made better guns than the Europeans.] But all Chinese exploration was done by the eunuchs. And the emperor would never have given them the power that would come from colonization. The giant junks were left to rot and exploration was abandoned. So it really doesn't matter. Pity they didn't bump into any Vikings. William Taylor ------------------- Read any W. H. McNiel lately? _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
