Found a good documentary series on ancient chinese warships and mines. It includes an mock-up experiment on the ancient chinese water-mines. I find it interesting.

To watch the documentary online, go to
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1tjSiB1pbUw

It's my first time learning a "ancient chinese floating fortress" (i.e. a fortress-like ship that can travel on river/sea). I wonder how historically accurate this is.

Anyone care to comment and provide more information on ancient chinese floating fortress.

What is your view on this documentary?

Unfortunately, I can't open this site from my office (there is a caption saying: this video is no longer available).

I am sure that Liang Jieming whom you should meet soon will be a mine of useful information.

As a General, you must be an expert on all military matters. Do you know where I could find a (some) valid Chinese/English dictionnarie(s) of military words (ancient and modern)?

The only one I know is the ROC on-line 中英詞彙對照 available on [email="http://www.mnd.gov.tw/%20"]http://www.mnd.gov.tw/ [/email] which is rather limited.

Thanks in advance for your ever-victorious help.

GZ, that fortress thing is the Jin dynasty Louchuan used to force Wu into submission...I think we've actually talked about that and louchuan a bit on CHF.

Yep, I saw this on the discovery channel. I didn't like that a disproportionate amount was devoted to the 1421 hypothesis, and one guy I believe had a mistaken opinion on Chinese naval warfare (he cited boarding action as a big thing, whereas it was the opposite...) and it suffered from a lot of sensationalism but I suppose it's good enough for a layman.




GZ, that fortress thing is the Jin dynasty Louchuan used to force Wu into submission...I think we've actually talked about that and louchuan a bit on CHF.

Yep, I saw this on the discovery channel. I didn't like that a disproportionate amount was devoted to the 1421 hypothesis, and one guy I believe had a mistaken opinion on Chinese naval warfare (he cited boarding action as a big thing, whereas it was the opposite...) and it suffered from a lot of sensationalism but I suppose it's good enough for a layman.

From what I knew, that Tower Ship first appeared in Han dynasty. I forgot what period in Han dynasty that type of ship was built. But it must be in West Han Dynasty, because I vividly remembered it was for sea battles, not for cruising on the rivers. The Tower Ships used the arrows as the means to attack. It wasn’t a ship using for boarding parties.

As for the Fortress Ship, I can’t comment on it. It is because the book I read before was too far away from me; 18 years ago. I couldn’t make for sure I saw it or not. I probably did, but it wasn’t as gigantic as the History Channel portrayed. Mmmm…. Maybe I didn’t saw it. Anyway, Chinese did have the Fortress Ships, but they weren’t that enormous like in Youtube. The Fortress Ships were a little smaller than the Tower Ships, if not much smaller.

About the Paddle Ships, I believed they were invented in Song Dynasty; (as for the water mines.) But some people said the Paddle Ships started in Han Dynasty.

Nope, Tower ships were actually for river battles. Too top heavy for the seas, I think I've heard. I don't think I've seen evidence for Han paddlewheel ships. I might see if I can find some relevant quotes on Jin's floating fortresses from Medieval Chinese Warfare later tonight.

I read it from somewhere, when Sui Dynasty attacked Korea, Sui went two ways. One way was of course land route, which was army. The other way was sea route, the Tower Ships were in action.

PS. Not a fiction book, it was academic account.

The sea route...that's Lai Hu'er's command, right? I haven't read anything about the use of towerships during the Goguryeo campaign, but Graff does not go into detail on that. I assumed that most of the warships were actually transports. May I see your source? Just out of curiosity, I thought it'd be interesting to have detailed accounts of the types of ships used, particularly

Also, in the documentary, I found it funny how the last third was about finding a treasure ship that supposedly washed up onto Oregon because of a tidal wave and in the end, they struck wood, but not enough to make definite sample and in the end could not hit it again. I thought it was...convincing (not). Just like the rest of 1421.

O sorry to disappoint you, the book is no longer with me. I don’t even remember what was the book about. I only remember it does talk about Sui went two routes for conquering Gougolyia. And the picture of the Tower Ship was next to the texts. The underneath sub-title for the picture of Tower Ship reads “Sui Dynasty Battleship(........)”.

The book was in Chinese.

Hi Jean, I just saw the video. This is the episode where they made a replica of the seamine. I've not seen it myself as the producers have yet to send this DVD to me. Not bad if I don't say so myself. Richard did a fantastic job on it although he did say that he didn't exactly use goat's guts for the air tubes and bladders. hehe

Happy Birthday Jean.

Cheers,
Jieming