Digging for truth

Archaeologists tracking the expeditions of a famed Chinese explorer unearth evidence of Sino-African ties that challenges old views about the connection between continents

Recent archaeological research into Chinese Admiral Zheng He's expeditions to East Africa is challenging long-held views that the continent played a negligible part in early globalization.

According to anthropologists and historians working on the island of Manda, off the northern coast of Kenya, the Chinese explorer's massive fleet made not one but three voyages to the country's coastal areas in the early 15th century and traded with an advanced civilization. Commerce between the Chinese travelers and Swahili traders thrived before being disrupted by Europeans in the 16th century.

It is believed that Zheng sailed the Indian and Pacific oceans long before European explorers such as Christopher Columbus and Vasco da Gama made their famous voyages. Interestingly, while retracing the celebrated admiral's achievements, which exemplify China's model of open and diplomatic dealings with governments and people, researchers have stumbled on information believed to not only reveal China's unmatched global standing in the 15th century but also to support Africa's efforts to reclaim its history of global trading.

"Evidence of Sino-Kenya activities dismantles the long-held narrative that Africa was isolated from Eurasia and, with the exception of North Africa, made little contribution to early globalization," says Chapurukha Kusimba, an anthropologist at American University in Washington DC, in the United States, who has led several projects on economic anthropology and the history of the Indian Ocean.

Well-known in Kenya, Kusimba has worked in the US for more than 23 years. He recently co-organized an international conference themed "Ancient and Contemporary Relations Between China and East Africa" that brought together more than 30 researchers from China and Africa on Manda island.

"The objective was to illuminate our understanding of early networks of interaction along the ancient Silk Road during the first and second millennia AD and how these interactions impacted, and continue to influence, Sino-African relations," he says.

While agreeing that the number of scholarly works linking early Indian Ocean maritime connections is on an upswing, Kusimba says research work needs to be expanded to breathe new life into China-Africa studies.

Funded by China, research in the last five years included at least two major joint archaeological projects carried out by Chinese and Kenyan scientists revolving around Admiral Zheng's expeditions to the coastal regions. The projects, which have included maritime and underwater explorations, have included searching for a shipwreck, evidence of commercial activities with natives and the eventual settlement of Chinese sailors in the area.

Research has more recently moved farther inland to profile the traders who consumed Chinese goods, revealing robust trade between the Chinese and hinterland communities. Evidence found at archaeological sites in Kenya and Tanzania indicates that the coastal natives bought porcelain of exquisite high quality, of a type reserved for leaders and affluent households.

It is on Manda island that Kusimba discovered some Swahili settlements with layered, structural developments of a civilized community dating back to the Tang Dynasty (618-907). It is also here that his team unearthed a 600-year-old Chinese coin, evidence that trade existed between China and East Africa before the arrival of Portuguese mariners.

The coin, a copper and silver disk with a square hole in the center, is called Yongle Tongbao and was issued by Emperor Yongle, who reigned from 1403-1425 during the Ming Dynasty. It is believed that he sent Admiral Zheng to explore the shores around the Indian Ocean.

"This coin was only carried by special envoys of the emperor. East Africa is therefore positioned as a very important destination during the ancient Silk Road era in the 13th to 15th centuries. However, trade started earlier, perhaps around the seventh century," says Herman Kiriama, an associate professor of Archaeology at Kisii University in Kenya.

"There is a growing narrative claiming that the stories of the admiral's achievements in eastern Africa are a hoax. This is far from the truth. Historians widely accept that the coins we have found so far were handled by special envoys," says Kiriama, who has also had brief stints at Peking University as a guest lecturer.

He says the new information strongly challenges secondary literature that has been developed over time.

"The new narrative definitely challenges research that has for a long time been closely guarded and controlled. But evidence on the ground is irrefutable and opens the door for a new research field that puts China and Africa at the center," Kiriama says.

"New studies show East Africa was not just a recipient port of foreign goods but an active participant in global trade, the researcher says. Africans were able to buy Chinese ceramics, which came from all over China, not from one particular kiln, meaning that there must have been an extensive trade relationship between the two regions," says the scholar, who also participated in the Sino-Kenyan Cooperative Archaeological Project in Kenya in 2012.

According to Kiriama, trade between the two regions increased considerably during the Song Dynasty (960-1279). It is, however, during the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) that direct contact was initiated for the first time, and in 1418 Zheng commanded fleets of up to 300 huge ships that traveled to the coastal areas of Kenya. More expeditions followed in 1421(2) and 1431 (3).

It was the start of globalization as we know it, Kiriama says. "However, unlike the present globalization that is characterized by cutthroat competition, this incipient globalization was heavily laden with friendship and fair trade at an equal level."

According to Zhu Tiequan, an associate professor of archaeology at the School of Sociology and Anthropology at Sun Yat-sen University, in Guangzhou, China, rigorous scientific testing on porcelain samples from sites near Lamu have proved the origin of the relics.

"There was Qinghua from Jingdezhen, Tianbai from Jingdezhen, Celadon from Longquan of Zhejiang and Celadon from Guangdong (in imitation of Longquan), among others," he says.

Zhu argues that the discoveries have helped retrace trade routes of exported Chinese porcelain that left factories in the late Ming and early Qing Dynasty.

"We still need to find out not about only the cultural communication between China and eastern Africa but also the influence of Chinese porcelain and the society whose people were the consumers," says Zhu, who co-organized the international conference with Kusimba.

Ceramics found in the hinterlands are evidence of the global connections that existed at that time says Jothan Walz, a researcher working in Tanzania for the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago, in the US. He notes that Chinese items have been found in fields around the area south of the Eastern Arc Mountains in northeastern Tanzania.

"History puts Africans as receivers who only traded raw materials while playing little part in globalization. But research shows that the hinterland had developed linkages with the coastal residents, and communities developed specialized skills to meet global needs - in ivory, for hunters, while others had become iron smelters. This is a very complex technological process, when you take iron and turn it into finished products. Land snail shells were being manufactured into fine beads. Africans were manufacturers," Zhu says, calling for more archaeological research in the hinterlands.

What this proves, according to Kusimba, is that China and eastern Africa have had a long and productive relationship, developing connections that have intertwined with their political, economic and cultural interests.

"It therefore forms a foundation for future partnerships," he says.

The archaeologists are calling for more funding and bigger archaeological projects to shed light on Sino-Africa relations in eastern and southern Africa. This area of scholarly research needs immediate attention, they say, not only to counter the emerging wave of anti-globalism but also to strengthen cultural ties shared by the two regions.

The call comes at a time when the world is reeling from the destruction of heritage sites by extremists and rapid population growth. Kenyan coastal areas, including Lamu - part of which is listed by UNESCO as a heritage site - are undergoing rapid transformation, with a modern $5 billion deep-water port and a $20 million coal plant earmarked for construction.

"Looking at China's rapid development, we want to glean lessons to help Kenya balance development and cultural conservation," says Mzalendo Kibunja, director general of the National Museums of Kenya.

Acknowledging the mounting pressure, he says cooperation on promoting and preserving relics gathered at archaeological sites would go a long way. "We want to build cultural centers and museums, spaces that are neutral, where people can access this information and allow them to realize how China has shaped African history," he says.

Moreover, there should be surveys to map cultural sites. "Currently, we are playing catch-up. So what we want is to be ahead of everything and guide environmental surveys. Kenya is building a port in Lamu, which will definitely touch on immovable archaeological assets. What we want is to be pre-emptive."

Zhang Changfa, a senior researcher and secretary-general of the China Cultural Heritage Foundation in Beijing, says preservation and restoration of relics is expensive.

"There are not enough funds for conservation, and that is why communities need to be involved," he says.

He says that, over the years, China has developed its scientific and technical capacity in this area. For Sino-African archaeological projects to continue, innovative strategies of fundraising are needed. Loans for exhibitions represent one such strategy, where a country lends items from its collections for display abroad. This may attract funding for other projects.

He says that China is keen on preserving cultural heritage along the Belt and Road routes. There are more than 400 cultural heritage sites and more than 80 sunken ships that need to be preserved.

"But we are facing insurmountable challenges including natural disasters, urbanization and natural elements," Zhang says.

Zhu, of Sun Yat-sen University, concurs on both the importance of preservation and high cost of projects. For these invaluable projects to continue, especially outside China, cooperation needs to be bigger and stronger. Projects also have to be expanded, Zhu says.

"Most Chinese have good knowledge of their culture and history, but they have scanty knowledge about Africa. We need bigger projects, involving relevant professionals, to reconstruct the admiral's expeditions in East Africa. We need to look at how the Chinese sailors who swam ashore after being shipwrecked - DNA and skeletons prove their existence - adapted to local cultures," he says.

In a rejoinder, Kathryn Coney-Ali, a lecturer in the department of Art at Howard University in Washington, DC, says research would clear up any doubts about the issues:

"A lot of secondary literature has been generated by researchers who have hardly visited the continent, thereby regurgitating old information without adding to intellectual repositories. Moreover, forums have seen researchers talking to themselves and not leaving their enclaves. I think more needs to be done."

lucymorangi@chinadaily.com.cn

(China Daily Africa Weekly 09/15/2017 page1)