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| {{short description|British naval officer and author of pseudohistory}} | |||
| {{Use British English|date=August 2015}} | |||
| {{Use dmy dates|date=October 2020}} | |||
| {{Infobox writer | |||
| | name = Gavin Menzies | |||
| | image = | |||
| | caption = | |||
| | birth_name = Rowan Gavin Paton Menzies | |||
| | birth_date = {{birth date|df=yes|1937|8|14}} | |||
| | birth_place = London | |||
| | death_date = {{death date and age|df=yes|2020|4|12|1937|8|14}} | |||
| | death_place = | |||
| | nationality = English | |||
| | occupation = Author, retired naval officer | |||
| | spouse = Marcella Menzies | |||
| | relations = | |||
| | genre = ] | |||
| | notableworks = *''1421: The Year China Discovered the World'' (2002) | |||
| *''1434: The Year a Magnificent Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance'' (2008) | |||
| *''The Lost Empire of Atlantis: History's Greatest Mystery Revealed'' (2011) | |||
| *''Who Discovered America?: The Untold Story of the Peopling of the Americas'' (2013) | |||
| }} | |||
| '''Rowan Gavin Paton Menzies''' (14 August 1937 – 12 April 2020)<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G2-3481200238.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121105191444/http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G2-3481200238.html |url-status=dead |archive-date=5 November 2012 |title=Contemporary Authors: Gavin Menzies |publisher=Highbeam Research |year=2006 |access-date=24 March 2011}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news | title=Lt Cdr Gavin Menzies, submariner turned author of far-fetched oceanic histories – obituary | url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/obituaries/2020/05/14/lt-cdr-gavin-menzies-submariner-turned-author-far-fetched-oceanic/ | newspaper=The Daily Telegraph| date=14 May 2020 }}</ref><ref>{{Cite web | title=Gavin Menzies: August 14th 1937– April 12th, 2020 | url=https://www.gavinmenzies.net/gavin-menzies-august-14th-1937-april-12th-2020/ | date=18 April 2020 | access-date=14 May 2020}}</ref> was a British ] ] who authored books claiming that the Chinese sailed to America before Columbus. Historians have rejected Menzies' theories and assertions<ref name="1421exposed.com">{{Cite web |url=http://www.1421exposed.com/ |title=The 1421 myth exposed |publisher=1421exposed.com |access-date=2 October 2009 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070328094913/http://www.1421exposed.com/ |archive-date=28 March 2007 |url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{Citation|title=Zheng He in the Americas and Other Unlikely Tales of Exploration and Discovery |url=http://www.csicop.org/sb/2004-09/tales.html |access-date=22 March 2007 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070317044419/http://www.csicop.org/sb/2004-09/tales.html |archive-date=17 March 2007 |url-status=dead}}</ref><ref>{{Citation | title = 1421: The Year China Discovered the World by Gavin Menzies | url = http://www.asianreviewofbooks.com/arb/article.php?article=201 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20030705160338/http://www.asianreviewofbooks.com/arb/article.php?article=201 | url-status = dead | archive-date = 5 July 2003 | access-date = 22 March 2007 }}</ref><ref name=finlay2004>{{harvnb|Finlay|2004}}</ref><ref>Goodman, David S. G. (2006): "Mao and The Da Vinci Code: Conspiracy, Narrative and History", ''The Pacific Review'', Vol. 19, No. 3, pp. 359–384 (367–372)</ref> and have categorised his work as ].<ref>{{cite book|last=Fritze|first=Ronald H.|title=Invented Knowledge: False History, Fake Science and Pseudo-religions|year=2011|edition=Reprint|publisher=Reaktion Books|isbn=978-1861898173|pages=12, 19|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=l2BrqdFg5AkC&q=Gavin+menzies+pseudohistory+Fritze}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Melleuish|first=Greg|author2=Sheiko, Konstantin |author3=Brown, Stephen |title=Pseudo History/Weird History: Nationalism and the Internet|journal=History Compass|date=1 November 2009|volume=7|issue=6|pages=1484–1495|doi=10.1111/j.1478-0542.2009.00649.x|author-link=Gregory Melleuish}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Henige|first=David|title=The Alchemy of Turning Fiction into Truth|journal=Journal of Scholarly Publishing|date=July 2008|volume=39|issue=4|pages=354–372|url=http://muse.jhu.edu/login?auth=0&type=summary&url=/journals/journal_of_scholarly_publishing/v039/39.4.henige.pdf|access-date=10 October 2013|author-link=David Henige|doi=10.3138/jsp.39.4.354}}</ref> | |||
| He was best known for his controversial book ''1421: The Year China Discovered the World'', in which he asserts that the fleets of Chinese Admiral ] ] prior to European explorer ] in 1492, and that the same fleet circumnavigated the globe a century before the expedition of ]. Menzies' second book, ''1434: The Year a Magnificent Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance'', extended his discovery hypothesis to the European continent. In his third book, ''The Lost Empire of Atlantis'', Menzies claims that ] did exist, in the form of the ], and that it maintained a global seaborne empire extending to the shores of America and India, millennia before actual contact in the ]. | |||
| ==Biography== | |||
| ] | |||
| Menzies was born in London, England, and his family moved to China when he was three weeks old.<ref name=4corners>{{Citation |title = Interview with Gavin Menzies| url = http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/content/2006/s1702333.htm | access-date = 22 March 2007 |publisher = ]}}</ref> He was educated at ] in ], and ].<ref name="Times Guide">"The Times Guide to the House of Commons, 1970", Times Newspapers Ltd, 1970, p. 231.</ref> Menzies dropped out of school when he was fifteen years old<ref name="Fritze">{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=l2BrqdFg5AkC&q=Pseudohistorylocation%3D|title=Invented Knowledge: False History, Fake Science and Pseudo-Religions|last=Fritze|first=Ronald H.|date=2009|publisher=Reaktion Books|isbn=978-1-86189-430-4|location=London, England|pages=96–103}}</ref> and joined the ] in 1953.<ref name="Houterman">{{cite web|url= http://www.unithistories.com/officers/RN_officers_nonWW2.html#M |title=Naval Officers (RN, RNR & RNVR) 20th Century (non-World War II) |first1=Hans |last1=Houterman |first2=Jeroen |last2=Koppes |work=unithistories.com |year=2011 |quote=1968–1970, Commanding Officer, HMS ''Rorqual'' |access-date=23 June 2011}}</ref> He never attended university<ref name="Fritze"/> and had no formal training in historical studies.<ref name="Fritze"/> From 1959 to 1970, Menzies served on British submarines.<ref name="Houterman"/> Menzies claims he sailed the routes sailed by ] and ] while he was commanding officer of the ] {{HMS|Rorqual|S02|6}} between 1968 and 1970,<ref name="Houterman"/> a contention questioned by some of his critics.<ref name="challenges">{{Citation | title = Challenges to Menzies' nautical experience | url = http://www.1421exposed.com/html/library_of_congress.html | access-date = 22 March 2007 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070610100537/http://1421exposed.com/html/library_of_congress.html | archive-date = 10 June 2007 | url-status = dead}}; see esp. note 5 of the Appendix.</ref> He often refers back to his sea-faring days to support claims made in ''1421''. | |||
| In 1959, by his own account, Menzies was an officer on {{HMS|Newfoundland|59|6}} on a voyage from Singapore to Africa, around the ], and on to ] and back to England. Menzies claimed that the knowledge of the winds, currents, and sea conditions that he gained on this voyage was essential to reconstructing the 1421 Chinese voyage that he discusses in his first book.<ref name="Menziesp113">{{cite book |first=Gavin |last=Menzies |title=1421: The Year China Discovered America |edition=2008 |page=113}}</ref> Critics have challenged the depth of his nautical knowledge.<ref name="challenges" /> In 1969, Menzies was involved in an incident in the ], when ''Rorqual'' rammed a ] ], {{USS|Endurance|AM-435|6}}, which was moored at a pier. This collision punched a hole in ''Endurance'' but did not damage ''Rorqual''. The ensuing enquiry found Menzies and one of his subordinates responsible for a combination of factors that led to the accident, including the absence of the ] (who usually takes the helm in port) who had been replaced by a less experienced crew member, and technical issues with the boat's telegraph.<ref name=4corners /> | |||
| Menzies retired the following year, and stood unsuccessfully as an ] candidate in ] during the ], where—standing against ]—he called for unrestricted immigration to Great Britain, drawing 0.2% of the vote.<ref>{{Cite newspaper The Times|title=Immigrant girl will vote in despair – Powellism |first=Peter |last=Evans |department=News |date=5 June 1970 |page=9 |issue=57888 |column=C }}</ref> In 1990, Menzies began researching Chinese maritime history.<ref>{{cite web |first=Gavin |last=Menzies |url=https://infocus.credit-suisse.com/app/article/index.cfm?fuseaction=OpenArticle&aoid=203705&coid=120&lang=en |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120320054717/https://infocus.credit-suisse.com/app/article/index.cfm?fuseaction=OpenArticle&aoid=203705&coid=120&lang=en |url-status=dead |archive-date=20 March 2012 |title=When the East Discovered the West |date=11 May 2007 |access-date=22 March 2011}}</ref><ref>{{cite news |url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/books/3557568/Gavin-Menzies-mad-as-a-snake-or-a-visionary.html |title=Gavin Menzies: Mad as a Snake or a Visionary? |newspaper=The Daily Telegraph|date=1 August 2008 |access-date=22 March 2011}}</ref><ref> {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120317025300/http://www.theasiamag.com/patterns/did-the-chinese-discover-america |date=17 March 2012 }} 29 December 2008. Retrieved 22 March 2011.</ref> He had, however, no academic training and no command of the ], which his critics argue prevented him from understanding original source material relevant to his thesis.<ref>{{Citation | |||
| | last1 = Ptak | |||
| | first1 = Roderich | |||
| | last2 = Salmon | |||
| | first2 = Claudine | |||
| | year = 2005 | |||
| | contribution = Zheng He: Geschichte und Fiktion | |||
| | editor-last = Ptak | |||
| | editor-first = Roderich | |||
| | editor2-last = Höllmann | |||
| | editor2-first = Thomas O. | |||
| | title = Zheng He. Images & Perceptions | |||
| | series = South China and Maritime Asia | |||
| | location = Wiesbaden | |||
| | publisher = Harrassowitz Verlag | |||
| | volume = 15 | |||
| | pages = 9–35 (12) | |||
| }}</ref> Menzies trained as a barrister, but in 1996 he was declared a ] by ] which prohibited him from taking legal action in England and Wales without prior judicial permission.<ref>{{Citation |last=Goodman |first=David S. G. |year=2006 |title=Mao and The Da Vinci Code: Conspiracy, Narrative and History |journal=The Pacific Review |volume=19 |pages=359–84 (371 ff.) |issue=3 |doi=10.1080/09512740600875135 |s2cid=144521610 |postscript=.}}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.justice.gov.uk/guidance/courts-and-tribunals/courts/vexatious-litigants/index.htm |title=Vexatious litigants |publisher=HM Courts & Tribunals Service |date=15 December 2014 |access-date=16 June 2019}}</ref> Menzies was made an honorary professor at ] in China. | |||
| ==''1421: The Year China Discovered the World''== | |||
| ===Writing and research=== | |||
| ] in ], China with his wife Marcella for their twenty-fifth wedding anniversary.<ref name="Fritze"/>]] | |||
| Gavin Menzies had the idea to write his first book after he and his wife Marcella visited the ] for their ]. Menzies noticed that they kept encountering the year 1421 and, concluding that it must have been an extraordinary year in world history, decided to write a book about everything that happened in the world in 1421. Menzies spent years working on the book and, by the time it was finished, it was a massive volume spanning 1,500 pages. Menzies sent the manuscript to an agent named Luigi Bonomi, who told him it was unpublishable, but was intrigued by a brief section of the book in which Menzies speculated about the voyages of Chinese admiral ] and recommended that he rewrite the book, focusing it on Zheng He's voyages. Menzies agreed to rewrite it, but admitted that he was "not a natural writer" and requested Bonomi to rewrite the first three chapters for him.<ref name="Fritze"/> | |||
| Bonomi contacted the firm Midas Public Relations to persuade a major newspaper to run a promotional article for Menzies's book. Menzies hired a room at the ], which convinced '']'' to publish an article about his speculations. Publishers immediately began courting Menzies for the publishing rights to his book. ], a division of ], offered him £500,000 for the world publishing rights to it. At this point, Menzies's rewritten manuscript was only 190 pages. Bantam Press stated that the book possessed enormous marketing potential, but considered it to be poorly written and sloppily presented. According to Menzies, they told him, "You know, if you want to get your story over, you've got to make it readable, and you can't write, basically." During the revision process that followed, over 130 different people worked on the manuscript, with a large part being written by a ] named Neil Hanson. The authors relied entirely on Menzies for factual information and never brought in any ] or reputable historians to make sure that the information in the book was accurate. After the rewriting process was complete, the book was at a publishable length of 500 pages.<ref name="Fritze"/> | |||
| ===Publication, claims, and commercial success=== | |||
| ] accepted by mainstream historians. In ''1421'', Gavin Menzies challenged these routes, claiming that Zheng He's fleet actually travelled all over the world, visiting the ], the ], ], the ], and ], establishing colonies, and eventually ].<ref name="Fritze"/>]] | |||
| The finished copy of the book was published in 2002 as ''1421: The Year China Discovered the World'' (published as ''1421: The Year China Discovered America'' in the United States).<ref name="Fritze"/> The book is written informally, as a series of vignettes of Menzies' travels around the globe examining what he claims is evidence for his "1421 hypothesis", interspersed with speculation regarding the achievements of Admiral ]'s fleet.<ref name=finlay2004/><ref name="Fritze"/> Menzies states in the introduction that the book is an attempt to answer the question: "On some early European world maps, it appears that someone had charted and surveyed lands supposedly unknown to the Europeans. Who could have charted and surveyed these lands before they were 'discovered'?" | |||
| {{external media| float = left | video1 = , ]}} | |||
| In the book, Menzies concludes that only China had the time, money, manpower, and leadership to send such expeditions and then sets out to prove that the Chinese visited lands unknown in either China or Europe.<ref name="Fritze"/> He claims that from 1421 to 1423, during the ] of China under the ], the fleets of Admiral Zheng He, commanded by the ] ], ], ], and ], discovered Australia, New Zealand, the Americas, Antarctica, and the ]; circumnavigated ], tried to reach the North and South Poles, and circumnavigated the world before ]. ''1421'' instantly became an international success;<ref name="Fritze"/> it was translated into dozens of different languages<ref>{{cite news |url= https://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/05/magazine/05MENZIES.html |title=Goodbye, Columbus! |first=Jack |last=Hitt |work=] |date=5 January 2003 |issn=0362-4331 |quote=rights |access-date=12 March 2011}}</ref> and sold over a million copies.<ref name="Fritze"/> It was listed as a '']'' best seller for several weeks in 2003.<ref>{{cite news |url= https://www.nytimes.com/2003/01/26/books/best-sellers-january-26-2003.html?pagewanted=2&src=pm |title=BEST SELLERS: January 26, 2003 – Page 2 |work=] |date=26 January 2003 |issn=0362-4331 |access-date=12 March 2011}}</ref> | |||
| Although the book contains numerous footnotes, references and acknowledgments, critics point out that it lacks supporting references for Chinese voyages beyond East Africa, the location acknowledged by professional historians as the limit of the ].<ref name="1421expLoC"/> Menzies bases his main theory on original interpretations and extrapolations of academic studies of minority population DNA, archaeological finds, and ancient maps. Many of these extrapolations draw on his personal nautical background without supporting evidence. Menzies claims that knowledge of Zheng He's discoveries was subsequently lost because the ] bureaucrats of the Ming imperial court feared that the costs of further voyages would ruin the Chinese economy. He conjectures that when the ] died in 1424 and the new ] forbade further expeditions, the mandarins hid or destroyed the records of previous exploration to discourage further voyages. | |||
| ===Criticism=== | |||
| Mainstream ] and professional historians have universally rejected ''1421'' and the alternative history of Chinese exploration described in it as pseudohistory.<ref name="1421exposed.com" /><ref name="csicop.org">{{Citation | volume = 14 | issue = 3 | url = http://www.csicop.org/sb/show/zheng_he_in_the_americas_and_other_unlikely_tales_of_exploration_and_discov/ | title = Zheng He in the Americas and Other Unlikely Tales of Exploration and Discovery | journal = ] | last = Newbrook | first = M | year = 2004 | access-date = 10 October 2009 | postscript = .}}</ref><ref name="Gordon">{{Cite web | url = http://www.asianreviewofbooks.com/arb/article.php?article=201 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20030705160338/http://www.asianreviewofbooks.com/arb/article.php?article=201 | url-status = dead | archive-date = 5 July 2003 | title = 1421: The Year China Discovered the World | publisher = The Asian Review of Books | last = Gordon | first = P | date = 30 January 2003 | access-date = 9 October 2009 }}</ref><ref name="Fritze"/> A particular point of objection is Menzies' use of maps to argue that the Chinese mapped both the Eastern and Western hemispheres as they circumnavigated the world in the 15th century.<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Wade|first=Geoff|date=Autumn 2007|title=The "Liu/Menzies" World Map: A Critique|url=http://www.e-perimetron.org/vol_2_4/wade.pdf|journal=E-Perimetron|volume=2|pages=270}}</ref> The widely respected British historian of exploration ] dismissed Menzies as "either a charlatan or a cretin". Sally Gaminara, the publisher for Transworld, the company which publishes Menzies's book, dismissed Fernández-Armesto as merely jealous, commenting, "Well, maybe he'd like to have the same commercial success himself." On 21 July 2004, the ] (PBS) broadcast a two-hour-long documentary debunking all of Menzies's major claims, featuring professional Chinese historians.<ref name="Fritze"/> In 2004, historian Robert Finlay severely criticized Menzies in the '']'' for his "reckless manner of dealing with evidence" that led him to propose hypotheses "without a shred of proof".<ref name=finlay2004/> Finlay wrote: | |||
| <blockquote>Unfortunately, this reckless manner of dealing with evidence is typical of ''1421'', vitiating all its extraordinary claims: the voyages it describes never took place, Chinese information never reached Prince Henry and Columbus, and there is no evidence of the Ming fleets in newly discovered lands. The fundamental assumption of the book—that the Yongle Emperor dispatched the Ming fleets because he had a "grand plan", a vision of charting the world and creating a maritime empire spanning the oceans—is simply asserted by Menzies without a shred of proof ... The reasoning of ''1421'' is inexorably circular, its evidence spurious, its research derisory, its borrowings unacknowledged, its citations slipshod, and its assertions preposterous ... Examination of the book's central claims reveals they are uniformly without substance.<ref>{{harvnb|Finlay|2004|pp=241f.}}</ref></blockquote> | |||
| Tan Ta Sen, president of the International Zheng He Society, has acknowledged the book's popular appeal as well as its scholarly failings, remarking, "The book is very interesting, but you still need more evidence. We don't regard it as an historical book, but as a narrative one. I want to see more proof. But at least Menzies has started something, and people could find more evidence."<ref>{{Citation | |||
| | last = Kolesnikov-Jessop | |||
| | first = Sonia | |||
| | title = Did Chinese beat out Columbus? | |||
| | journal = The New York Times | |||
| | date = 25 June 2005 | |||
| | url = https://www.nytimes.com/2005/06/24/arts/24iht-chinam.html?_r=1&pagewanted=2 | |||
| | access-date = 8 June 2010 | |||
| | postscript = .}}</ref> | |||
| A group of scholars and navigators—Su Ming Yang of the United States, Jin Guo-Ping and ] of Portugal, Philip Rivers of Malaysia, Geoff Wade of Singapore—questioned Menzies' methods and findings in a joint message:<ref name="1421expLoC">{{Cite web | last = Guo-Ping | first = J | author2 = Pereira, M | author3 = Rivers PJ | author4 = Ming-Yang S | author5 = Wade G | url = http://www.1421exposed.com/html/library_of_congress.html | title = Joint Statement on the Claims by Gavin Menzies Regarding the Zheng He Voyages | year = 2006 | access-date = 10 October 2009 | publisher = 1421exposed.com | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20070610100537/http://1421exposed.com/html/library_of_congress.html | archive-date = 10 June 2007 | url-status = dead}}</ref> | |||
| <blockquote>His book ''1421: The Year China Discovered the World'', is a work of sheer fiction presented as revisionist history. Not a single document or artifact has been found to support his new claims on the supposed Ming naval expeditions beyond Africa...Menzies' numerous claims and the hundreds of pieces of "evidence" he has assembled have been thoroughly and entirely discredited by historians, maritime experts and oceanographers from China, the U.S., Europe and elsewhere.<ref name="1421expLoC"/></blockquote> | |||
| Menzies created a website for his readers to send him any information they could find that might support his hypothesis.<ref name="Fritze"/> Menzies said that his website was "a focal point for ongoing research into pre-Columbian exploration of the world."<ref name="menzies">{{Cite web|url=http://www.gavinmenzies.net/|title=Official website |publisher=Gavin Menzies |access-date=16 June 2019}}</ref> In response, his devoted fans sent him thousands of pieces of purported evidence, which they claimed serve as proof that Menzies's ideas are correct.<ref name="Fritze"/> Menzies also said that he used information his fans send to improve his hypotheses.<ref name="menzies" /> Academics have emphatically rejected all of this "evidence" as worthless and have criticized what American history professor ] calls the "almost cult-like" manner in which Menzies drummed up support for his hypothesis.<ref name="Fritze"/> In reaction to this criticism, Menzies dismissed the experts' opinions as irrelevant, stating, "The public are on my side, and they are the people who count."<ref name="Fritze"/> | |||
| A poll of ] readers ranked ''1421'' as the third-least credible history book in print.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Walsh |first1=David Austin |title=What is the Least Credible History Book in Print? |url=http://historynewsnetwork.org/article/147149 |website=] |access-date=7 May 2020 |date=16 July 2012}}</ref><ref name=JenniferSchuessler>{{cite news|url=http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/07/04/history-news-network-celebrates-bad-history-books/?_php=true&_type=blogs&_r=0|title=History News Network Celebrates Bad History Books |date=4 July 2012 |newspaper=]|access-date=17 January 2015}}</ref> | |||
| ==''1434: The Year a Magnificent Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance''== | |||
| In 2008 Menzies released a second book entitled ''1434: The Year a Magnificent Chinese Fleet Sailed to Italy and Ignited the Renaissance''. In it Menzies claims that in 1434 ] reached Italy and brought books and globes that, to a great extent, launched the ]. He claims that a letter written in 1474 by ] and found amongst the private papers of Columbus indicates that an earlier Chinese ambassador had direct correspondence with ] in Rome. | |||
| Menzies then claims that materials from the Chinese ''Book of Agriculture'', the '']'', published in 1313 by the ] scholar-official ] (fl. 1290–1333), were copied by European scholars and provided direct inspiration for the illustrations of mechanical devices which are attributed to the ] polymaths ] (1382–1453) and ] (1452–1519). | |||
| ], a professor of history at ] in the United States and at ], examined Menzies' claim that private papers of Columbus indicate a Chinese ambassador in correspondence with the Pope and called this claim "drivel." He states that no reputable scholar supports the view that Toscanelli's letter refers to a Chinese ambassador.<ref name="reuters columbus">{{cite news|title=Columbus debunker sets sights on Leonardo da Vinci |first=Tim |last=Castle |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSL242804420080729 |work=Reuters |location=London |date=29 July 2008 |access-date=26 January 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081223074119/http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSL242804420080729 |archive-date=23 December 2008 |url-status=dead}}</ref> ], Professor of the History of Art at ], questions the rigor of Menzies' application of the ], and in regard to European illustrations purporting to be copied from the Chinese ''Nong Shu'', writes that Menzies "says something is a copy just because they look similar. He says two things are almost identical when they are not."<ref name="reuters columbus"/> | |||
| In regard to Menzies' theory that Taccola's sketches are based on Chinese information, Captain P.J. Rivers writes that Menzies contradicts himself by saying elsewhere in his book that Taccola had started his work on his technical sketches in 1431, when Zheng He's fleet was still assembled in China, and that the Italian engineer finished his technical sketches in 1433—one year before the purported arrival of the Chinese fleet.<ref>The 1421 myth exposed: . Retrieved 13 June 2012.</ref> Geoff Wade, a senior research fellow at the Asia Research Institute of the ], acknowledges that there was a cross exchange of technological ideas between Europe and China, but ultimately classifies Menzies' book as ] and asserts that there is "absolutely no Chinese evidence" for a maritime venture to Italy in 1434.<ref name="reuters columbus"/> | |||
| Albrecht Heeffer investigated Menzies' claim that ] based his solution to the ] on the Chinese work '']'' from 1247. He arrived at the conclusion that the solution method does not depend on this text but on the earlier ] as does the treatment of a similar problem by ] which predates the ''Mathematical Treatise in Nine Sections''. Furthermore, Regiomontanus could rely on practices with remainder tables from the abacus tradition.<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Heeffer |first1=Albrecht |year=2008 |title=Regiomontanus and Chinese Mathematics |journal=Philosophica |volume=82 |pages=87–114 |doi=10.21825/philosophica.82169 |s2cid=170479588 |url=http://www.doaj.org/doaj?func=abstract&id=846503 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20091217134954/http://www.doaj.org/doaj?func=abstract |archive-date=17 December 2009}}</ref> | |||
| ==References== | |||
| {{Reflist|30em}} | |||
| ==External links== | |||
| * | |||
| * | |||
| ; Criticism | |||
| * – Website set up by an international group of academics and researchers | |||
| *{{Citation | last = Finlay | first = Robert | url = http://www.michaelsheiser.com/PaleoBabble/1421.pdf | title = How Not to (Re)Write World History: Gavin Menzies and the Chinese Discovery of America | doi = 10.1353/jwh.2004.0018 | journal = ] | volume = 15 | issue = 2 | page = 229 | year = 2004 | s2cid = 144478854 | url-status = dead | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20131109021554/http://www.michaelsheiser.com/PaleoBabble/1421.pdf | archive-date = 9 November 2013}} | |||
| * {{Citation | last=Wade | first=Geoff | year=2007 |url=http://www.e-perimetron.org/Vol_2_4/Wade.pdf| title=The "Liu/Menzies" World Map: A Critique |journal=E-Perimetron |pages=273–80| issn=1790-3769 |volume=2 |issue=4}} | |||
| * Hartz, Bill. In the Hall of Ma'at. Weighing the Evidence for Alternative History: | |||
| *{{cite web |last= Esler |first= Lloyd |author-link= Lloyd Esler |url=https://www.stuff.co.nz/southland-times/news/features/114807066/a-chinese-whopper--the-catlins-city-that-wasnt |title= A Chinese whopper – no evidence of a Chinese city in New Zealand |work= ] |date= 7 August 2019}} | |||
| {{Authority control}} | |||
| {{DEFAULTSORT:Menzies, Gavin}} | |||
| ] | |||
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Revision as of 04:08, 23 January 2023
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