352 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, lUOO. 



qui iravaient pas trouve a ecouler leurs marchandises a Aden dans de 

 bonnes conditions. On les y reyiit avec empressement dans Tespoir 

 que leur visitc serait le debut d'un traffic avec la Chine." The expe- 

 dition was evidently a large one, and one of its objects was commercial 

 intercourse, porcelain being specially mentioned among the articles 

 with which the vessels were freighted. Porcelain had, however, reached 

 these countries at a far earlier date. Marco Polo, traveling in 1280, 

 mentions the trade in this ware from Quinsai, the present Hangchou, 

 and from Zaitun, a port on the Fukien coast, which has been identified 

 with Ch'tianchou (better known as Chinchew) by Klaproth and other 

 writers, whose view has been adopted bj^ Colonel Yule in his magnifi- 

 cent edition of that famous traveler's voyages, and with Changchou 

 and its port, Geh-Kong (a short distance south from Chinchew, and 

 inland), by Mr. George Philips, of Her British Majesty's consular 

 service in China. And Ibn Batuta, an Arabian traveler, who wrote 

 in 1310, states distinctly that "porcelain in China is worth no more 

 than pottery is with us; it is exported to India and other countries, 

 from which it is carried even to our own land Maghreh^^ that is, the 

 sunset, the name given by the Arabs to all that part of Africa which 

 lies to the west of Egypt. 



ROUTE FOLLOWED. 



Chinese history fully confirms the above statement, and, indeed, shows 

 that this commerce had already long existed at the time Ibn Batuta 

 wrote. In a gigantic compilation of the works of earlier authors under- 

 taken during the reign of Yunglo (hence termed the Yung-lo-ta-tien)^ 

 the manuscript of which was presented to the throne in 1407, is pre- 

 served "an account of the countries fringing the Chinese border" 

 [Chu-fan-chih)^ written by Chao Ju-kua, who was inspector of foreign 

 trade in Fukien during the Sung dynasty. As the author speaks of 

 the time of Mohammed "as twenty-nine generations, or six or seven 

 hundred years ago," his work would seem to have ])een written during 

 the first half of the thirteenth century; but as he mentions a tribute 

 mission sent by the Arabs to China in the K'aihsi period (1205 to 1208), 

 probably later than the latter date. The compilation was, however, 

 considered too extensive and the printing was never completed, though 

 the more important works relating to periods preceding the Yiian 

 dynasty were reedited and published by the Emperor Chienlung. One 

 of these was Chao Ju-kua's work. It contains much valuable infor- 

 mation regarding the Arab trade of the twelfth century, and, >as it 

 takes Chii'anchou (Chinchew) as the starting point from which all 

 voyages start and distances are computed, it appears to support Klap- 

 roth's identification of Marco Polo's Zaitun with that town. From this 

 work it is evident that a large and valuable trade was carried on 

 between China and Brni in Borneo, with Chanch''eng, comprising a 



