Hailu (; "Records of the Seas") is a Chinese description of the world published in 1820 during the Qing dynasty. The Chinese travelogue about Asia, Europe, and America was recorded by Yang Bingnan 杨炳南 based on the accounts of Xie Qinggao 谢清高 (1765–1821).
Content
The geographical work was orally recounted by Xie Qinggao and written down by Yang Bingnan. The book was carved for printing and published in 1820. The work introduces ninety-five countries around the world and is an important source for the study of the history of contacts between China and the West in the late eighteenth century as well as the history of overseas Chinese communities in Southeast Asia. During his campaign to suppress opium in Guangdong, Lin Zexu read the book and praised it, saying that its accounts of foreign countries were “quite precise and carefully recorded” (“”)
Both Wei Yuan's Haiguo tuzhi (Illustrated Treatise on the Maritime Kingdoms) and Xu Jiyu’s Yinghuan zhilüe (A Brief Account of the Oceans and the World) quote material from this work. The original book was not divided into volumes. Later, the Chinese historian and historical geographer Feng Chengjun (1887–1946), added annotations and divided it into three volumes.
Li Zhaoluo (1769–1841), a Chinese geographer and contemporary of Xie Qinggao, recognized the value of the records in 1821. He wrote in his preface to the Haiguo jiwen (Accounts Heard of the Maritime Countries):Chinese text cited after ostasien-verlag.de (cf. Hailu zhu ). (roughly translated:)
What is recorded is orderly and coherent; amidst the vast, tumultuous waves stretching tens of thousands of miles, the points are indicated as clearly as if viewing the innermost halls. Moreover, regarding the foreign powers such as the ‘Red Hair’ [the English] and the Dutch, the small coastal states along bays and strategic passes, where troops are stationed to defend key positions, he is able to describe each one in detail, grasping especially the essential points.
The work Hailu contains very detailed records of matters related to the Portuguese; in some cases, it explicitly states that the information came from the mouths of the Portuguese themselves. The book describes how the Portuguese, on the island of Java in the mountains of the Kingdom of Bantam, encountered “cannibals”:Hailu 海錄 - Wikisource
(roughly translated:)
The Western foreigners say: "In this country, ships frequently come here. People on board climb the mountains to explore, scaling dangerous and risky terrain. From a distance, they see the mountain natives in their caves eating raw fish. When the natives realize they are being watched, they make a commotion and pursue each other, with many fleeing. Those who are caught are killed and eaten alive. By the time the ship returns, only sixteen people remain. They quickly hoist the sails and escape. Since then, no one has dared to come here again."
The Hanyu da zidian f.e. is using the edition of the Haishan xianguan congshancf. Haishanxianguan congshu - chinaknowledge.de , together with the commentary by Feng Chengjun (Hailu zhu . Zhonghua shuju , 1955).cf. Hanyu da zidian, bibliography, no. 2691. - See also Shidi xiao congshu 史地小丛书.
See also Wei Yuan : Haiguo tuzhi cf. Haiguo tuzhi - chinaknowledge.de Xu Jiyu : Yinghuan zhilüe cf. Yinghuan zhilüe - chinaknowledge.de
References and notes
Bibliography Feng Chengjun : Hailu zhu . Zhonghua shuju , 1955 Aufzeichnungen über die Meere (Hai-lu ). Niedergeschrieben von Yang Bingnan nach dem mündlichen Bericht von Xie Qinggao . Deutsch von Rainer Schwarz. Mit Nachwort und Register herausgegeben von H. Walravens. Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin 2011. 97 pp. (full German translation of the Hailu, first published by Yang Bingnan in 1820). - Also: Gossenberg : OSTASIEN Verlag 2020 (Reihe Phönixfeder ; 36)
Further reading Ricardo K. S. Mak : The 'Middle Kingdom' Struggles to Survive: The Chinese Worldview in the Nineteenth Century in Benedikt Stuchtey und Eckhardt Fuchs (eds.), Writing World History: 1800–2000 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003) pp. 291–308,
External links
Hailu - Chinese Text Project Introduction by the German translator (in German) Xie Qinggao and Portugal - Zhang Wenqin (Translated from a Portuguese version of the Chinese original by: Paula Sousa) [https://www.icm.gov.mo/rc/viewer/10023/375 Qie Qinggao yu Putaoya (in Chinese) Jiaying zhou zhi Maritime countries in the Far West: Western Europe in Xie Qinggao's Records of the Sea (c.1783–93) - Ronald Chung-yam Po