Guide to Traveling through the Northern Song Dynasty.

Chapter 1046 [China in the Eyes of the Eastern Romans]

"The official name of Taohuashi at this time was the Ming Dynasty (Daeming in Latin). The dynasty was established not long ago, and it was less than 20 years since I was ordered to go on the mission."

"Even the Venetians who sailed the Mediterranean are familiar with all the rumors about the two founders of the dynasty. But I traveled with six descendants of Ming nobles on the sea and rivers for several months, and learned from them that many of the rumors were false."

"Some people say that the founding monarch of the Ming Dynasty was an oriental pagan clergyman. This rumor came from Fatimid scholars (Egyptian Green Caliphate), who had exchanged ideas in the capital of the Ming Dynasty for a year. But they were obviously spreading rumors. The founding monarch was only appointed by the Song emperor as the administrator of an oriental church in the previous dynasty. Moreover, he was worshipped as a saint by his own people - a saint from Confucianism."

"Religion is not my forte."

"But I need a brief introduction. There are three polytheistic religions in the Land of Peach Blossom Stone, namely Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism."

"Confucianism is their state religion, and Confucius is recognized as a Confucian prophet. There are many such prophets, such as Mencius, Xunzi, and so on. The emperor of Taohuashi is the son of the supreme god here - the Son of Heaven. And every emperor automatically serves as the patriarch of Confucianism."

"Taoism is another religion of Taohuashi, and Laozi is recognized as a prophet and a deity in Taoism."

"Buddhism originated in India, and I heard it has been introduced to Taohuashi for thousands of years."

"The three major religions are mainly Confucianism, with Taoism and Buddhism as supplementary. They sometimes exclude each other, but more often they cooperate. A descendant of a noble named Fan Chengda told me that there is a practice method here called the Three Religions in One. That is, a believer can believe in three religions at the same time, and they are very tolerant of this."

"Let's talk about the Ming Dynasty again. Let's call the father and son who founded the Ming Dynasty Old Zhu and Little Zhu."

"Old Zhu is hailed as a Confucian saint because he became emperor but took the initiative to give up the throne to his son, Little Zhu. This is in line with the principles of those Confucian saint emperors thousands of years ago, that is, to let people with more ability and moral character become emperors."

"There is no conspiracy theory behind this change of imperial power. The abdicated emperor can walk freely anywhere and often returns to the capital to celebrate festivals with his son. There was even one time when the young Emperor Zhu led his troops to war, and the abdicated Emperor Zhu was entrusted with the role of regent."

"Yes, this is Confucianism. Compared with Confucian gods, Confucians believe in virtue, wisdom and order more, and summarize them as 'Li' (directly transliterated as Li). Whether it is the emperor, officials or people, if they do not conform to 'Li', it is equivalent to violating the teachings of Confucianism and will be spurned by believers in the land of Peach Blossom Stone."

“Therefore, Confucianism can also be seen as a religion of virtue, a religion of wisdom, and a religion of order.”

"The Taohuashi Emperor, who is both the son of a god and the great patriarch of the world, encourages all Confucian believers to learn knowledge. And every Confucian believer, even a commoner or a slave, can become an official through learning. Every official here, including the generals who fight in the battlefield, are all Confucianists. But they may also believe in Taoism and Buddhism, which is openly allowed."

"There is an examination system here called the imperial examination, which is used to select Confucian officials. Any official or scholar who cheats in the imperial examination will be executed by order of the emperor. This is because it blasphemes the Confucian gods, violates Confucian teachings, and is not in line with Confucian 'ritual'."

"..."

"The Ming Dynasty was vast. I changed ships from a large island called Ceylon in southern India and sailed all the way to the southern province of the empire thousands of miles away. Along the way, there were vassal states of the Ming Dynasty. There were dozens of such vassal states, large and small. Some were Buddhist countries, some were Hindu countries, and of course there were Confucian countries."

"Xia (Yuqing), the governor of Ceylon appointed by the Ming Emperor, is a very enthusiastic and generous general. He helped the Prince of Ceylon to restore his country and recently killed the regicide. Therefore, he was retained by the prince of Ceylon who restored his country and was granted territory and became a noble. The wise and generous Ming Emperor allowed this behavior and let Xia stay in Ceylon as the governor to protect Ceylon, a vassal state of the Ming Dynasty, forever."

"Such a thing also happened in Srivijaya. The king's treacherous nephew killed the king and established himself as king. The Ming emperor immediately sent troops to fight against him and seek justice for the dead king of his vassal state. Unfortunately, the royal bloodline of Srivijaya was cut off, and the entire country was divided into more than a dozen states. But due to the kindness and justice of the Ming emperor, all these split states are still willing to obey the Ming as their suzerain."

"Perhaps this is the benefit of Confucianism. Virtue always makes people submit from the bottom of their hearts."

"Of course, a strong military is also necessary."

"The Ming Dynasty's navy is very powerful. In last year's Battle of Malacca, more than a dozen Ming warships defeated hundreds of Srivijaya rebel fleets. Such a strong fighting force makes all coastal countries tremble with fear."

"But the descendants of the Ming nobles told me that every warrior was a devout Confucian. They advocated virtue and order, so they never relied on force to plunder coastal countries. I think the teachings of Confucianism are only one of the factors. The more important one is that the Ming Dynasty was too wealthy. It relied on farming and trade to become the richest in the East." "If you were a rich man, would you rob beggars on the street? If you have a kind heart, not only would you not rob, but you would give alms to beggars. The Ming Navy never plundered, perhaps because of a rich man's mentality."

"This is definitely not an exaggeration. We came to the embassy in Tokyo, the capital of the Ming Dynasty. The toilets here are made of porcelain. Feces and urine are excreted into a white porcelain chamber pot, and there is also an automatic flushing porcelain water tank. They are all exquisite white porcelain, so smooth and shiny that they can reflect people's shadows."

"If this kind of porcelain were shipped to the West, it would easily sell for hundreds of gold coins, but the peach blossom stone figurines are only used as toilet items. I say it can sell for hundreds of gold coins because these porcelain chamber pots and water tanks are particularly large, not ordinary small porcelain items."

"I asked the Ming officials and learned that this type of porcelain toilet is now popular in the capital and vice capital of Taohuashi. And it is spreading to other cities. Because there are too many porcelains here to sell, they have to find new uses to sell them."

"Clocks, which were treasured by the Fatimid (Egyptian) kings, are actually very common in Taohuashi. Every city has a clock tower, and those clocks can tell time automatically. I heard that every rich person in and outside the city also has a small clock in their home."

"The Taohuashi people divide the day into twelve major periods, twenty-four hours, carefully allocate all the time, and complete the daily work according to the plan."

"They were very hardworking and even dug canals that spanned thousands of miles. I traveled from the sea to Tokyo by boat, and most of the way was along the canal. I heard that there are dozens of such canals in the Ming Dynasty. I followed the late emperor to fight in wars when I was a teenager, and I know the importance of canals. With these canals, the Ming emperor could quickly dispatch troops to any corner of the empire."

"An official took us to visit Tokyo. The city was called Kaifeng, and it was the capital of a dynasty on Taohuashi. I walked along the city wall for half a day, but only walked half of it, or maybe a little more. I heard that the city had a population of nearly a million, it was too crowded, and the imperial palace seemed too small, so the Ming emperor moved the capital to Luoyang, which is further west."

"Kaifeng has many legends about the Ming emperor. The barbarians who destroyed Zhongtaohuashi once came to Kaifeng. The Ming emperor Xiao Zhu led his army to eliminate the barbarians and recapture Zhongtaohuashi, reuniting Shangtaohuashi and Zhongtaohuashi."

"As a soldier, I am very interested in the emperor's wars. Unfortunately, the descendants of the nobles can't explain it clearly, as they have never really been on the battlefield. Judging from the defenders of the cities along the way, they are indeed very confident. Perhaps because there are no enemies, the defenders are even confident to the point of laziness."

"At present, there is only one thing that can be confirmed. The Ming Navy is the most powerful in the world. Any fleet can sweep across the Mediterranean."

"Today we set out from Kaifeng and continued westward. I saw a large number of soldiers and farmers resting in a small town halfway along the way. I asked the Ming official accompanying us, and he said that the army in front of us came from Shandong - Shandong might be a governor's district."

"Not only the Shandong Governorate, but also several other Governorates of the Ming Empire are gathering their forces. The war is about to break out, and the Ming Emperor has decided to retake the Lower Peach Blossom Land. Their target this time is none other than Jurghan, who once defeated the Seljuk army."

"Countless ships transporting military supplies almost blocked the wide river. The troops marched in the territory without wearing armor or even carrying main battle weapons. But they were very disciplined. There were rules for walking, sitting and lying down, and they even wore uniform daily clothes."

"This will be an unprecedented war. I heard that the Ming Dynasty will send 500,000 troops to a battlefield more than a thousand miles away from Rome. The Ming Dynasty is extremely wealthy, enough to support an expedition of 500,000 troops thousands of miles away. God, this is terrible!"

"After I meet the emperor, I will ask the Emperor of the Ming Dynasty to allow me to go with the army to watch the battle and witness this great war with my own eyes."

"I finally arrived at the capital of the Ming Dynasty. The city is called Luoyang. The embassy is located in the newly built Xicheng District. It is larger than Kaifeng, and the imperial city is more magnificent."

"This great city is comparable to Constantinople and demonstrates the infinite glory of the Eastern emperor."

"It's a pity that they didn't allow me to climb the city wall, otherwise I would have carefully checked Luoyang's city defense system."

"In Kaifeng and Luoyang, there are so many people wearing silk, as if silk is just worthless linen!"

"The only pity is that I haven't found any public baths in any city in Daming. People here take baths at home, and socialize in teahouses or taverns. Drinking tea is very interesting. Tea is a peculiar oriental drink..."

——"Records of Peach Blossom Stone" · Eastern Roman Empire · Aksukh.

(End of this chapter)