Zoo Station

Back in July of last year, I had written a post about the great Chinese admiral, Zheng He and his epic journeys with the Ming imperial armada. As I was reading BBC News today, I came across this interesting story about an ancient Chinese map, that seems to imply that General Zheng may have discovered the Americas before Columbus did. This is quite a jump from the accepted wisdom that the imperial navy actually visited large parts of S.E.Asia, India and Africa.

The map, which shows North and South America, apparently states that it is a 1763 copy of another map made in 1418.
...
The map, which is being dated to check it was made in 1763, faces a lot of scepticism from experts. Chinese characters written beside the map say it was drawn by Mo Yi Tong and copied from a map made in the 16th year of the Emperor Yongle, or 1418. It clearly shows Africa and Australia. The British Isles, however, are not marked.
...
The map was bought for about $500 from a Shanghai dealer in 2001 by a Chinese lawyer and collector, Liu Gang. According to the Economist magazine, Mr Liu only became aware of the map's potential significance after he read a book by British author Gavin Menzies. The book, 1421: The Year China discovered America, made the controversial claim that a Chinese admiral and eunuch, Zheng He, sailed around the world and discovered America on the way.

There's still the small matter of a certain Leif Ericson, but we'll deal with that later.