Lands of Red and Gold #49: What Becomes of Boldness
“Japanese ships are strictly forbidden to leave for foreign countries.
No Japanese is permitted to go abroad. If there is anyone who attempts to do so secretly, he must be executed. The ship so involved must be impounded and its owner arrested, and the matter must be reported to the higher authority.
If any Japanese returns from overseas after residing there, he must be put to death.”
- Tokugawa Iemitsu (r. 1623-1650), Edicts 1, 2 and 3, 1645 [1].
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From: “The Century: History’s 100 Most Important People”
By Appian Harris
82. Kumgatu (Nangu explorer and founding father of the Nuttana)
The reputation of Kumgatu is, if anything, greater than that of the man’s achievements. Known and celebrated as a cultural hero on three continents, his deeds have inevitably become mythologised to a degree which the man himself likely would not recognise. Yet even stripping out the fiction, what remains is impressive enough.
He was born Werringi Wolalta on the Island, one of many adventuresome Nangu youths who took up life as a sailor and trader. He died known as Kumgatu, first citizen of Wujal [Cooktown, Queensland], leading man of the Nuttana, a man with wealth and glory unparalleled amongst his people...
Kumgatu’s significance in global history stems from his three great voyages of exploration and trade, and from his role in setting up the pact of cooperation between the first four Nangu bloodlines (later expanded to six) in the association which would become known as the Nuttana.
To his contemporaries, Kumgatu’s main achievement was his first great voyage, his circumnavigation of Aururia in 1630-1631. This voyage was the one which earned him the sobriquet which means ‘the Bold’, which in time he adopted as his proper name. His first voyage was revered as a true voyage into the unknown, for he lacked any proper knowledge of what he would find. Kumgatu’s two later voyages, while celebrated, were conducted with at least some guidance from Dutch and English sources, and so were not viewed as requiring the same courage.
History, though, judges Kumgatu’s achievements differently. His circumnavigation of Aururia was a significant feat, but it was his later voyages into Asia which would have more lasting significance...
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In the year which Europeans call the Year of Our Lord 1644, or the year which in the most widespread native calendar is called the 405th Year of Harmony, a new town is emerging. A thriving town, near the mouth of a river where ten years before the only buildings were the animal-hide shelters of the hunters who had wandered this land since time immemorial.
Here, near the northernmost extremity of a land which a visiting English explorer has recently christened Aururia, is an outpost which the Islanders have named Wujal. The town was founded as a ship repair port and victualling station, intended as a mere outpost worked by a handful of Islanders and a larger number of contracted Kiyungu farmers. In a mere decade, Wujal has grown into something much larger.
Wujal nestles on the southern bank of the River Bidgee [Endeavour River], near the mouth of the river. Here is a safe harbour for those who have learned to navigate the sandbar at the river’s mouth, and here it is that the Islanders have come. A few of them, at first, to create a place where ships can resupply or seek shelter at need. Many more have come, though, fleeing the Island and all its problems.
The buildings here have the impermanence of anything which has been constructed on the coast of a cyclone-prone region, balanced against a sense of purpose which shows that those who live here now intend far more than simply to grow kumara [sweet potato] and repair sails on passing ships.
Houses here are built solidly and decorated ostentatiously, marking an attitude which is common to both the Nangu and Kiyungu who make up the large majority of Wujal’s inhabitants. The two most ostentatious houses of all are those of the elders of the Tjula and Wolalta bloodlines, who have made Wujal their permanent home.
Here, too, are buildings which show why Wujal is growing. The dockyard is not just used to repair visiting ships, but for shipbuilding. Warehouses nearby hold goods brought from both further south in Aururia, and from the Old World. The buildings of other craftsmen cluster near the dockyard: scribes, weavers, potters, and, most prized of all, blacksmiths.
Wujal hosts four blacksmiths, plus a growing number of apprentices. These are the first iron-workers to dwell among the Kiyungu; none of the master smiths are born on the east coast of the continent. Three of them are master ironsmiths from the Atjuntja, discreetly recruited by the Tjula bloodline, and the fourth is a famously foul-mouthed Gunnagal.
Since the Nangu dwell here, the town of course holds a Plirite temple, built atop a grassy hill overlooking the city. The temple is still small, by Nangu standards, but built of stone, by masons recruited from the Kiyungu. It hosts two priests only, but both of them are kept extremely busy performing the daily ceremonies attended by many of the Nangu and a growing number of Kiyungu converts.
Despite the thriving town, counting the population is not an easy feat. Neither the Nangu nor Kiyungu have any strong tradition of conducting a census. Still, something well over a thousand people live in Wujal or in the farmlands and timber camps further up the river.
Whether the exact numbers are known or not, even the most casual visitor to Wujal would see that the population is growing. The sound of construction seems to be everywhere; new buildings are raised through every dry season.
More than that, children seem to run everywhere. Their laughs and cries are spoken in Kiyungu or Nangu in almost equal measure, or sometimes a curious mixture of both languages. The children’s heritage is similarly mixed; many of them have one Nangu and one Kiyungu parent. The pairing is much more often a Nangu man and a Kiyungu woman than the reverse. Many of the Nangu who have fled the Island are, not surprisingly, sailors, and they have sought brides among the Kiyungu.
Still, Wujal has many Kiyungu who dwell there for other reasons. The initial pact between the Nuttana [trading association] and the Kiyungu cities called for labourers who would farm on five-year terms. Many of those farmers have chosen to stay for longer, though, and other Kiyungu have started to migrate north, too.
The Kiyungu who dwell around Wujal are not the majority in the town itself, but they are the most numerous people in the surrounding lands. The town could not survive without the food and timber they supply. In the fields above Wujal are kumara, lesser yams, taro, wealth-trees [wattles], jeeree [lemon tea], and several lesser crops, including mung beans which Nangu ships have brought from Batavia.
Further up the river, the Kiyungu have a few timber camps where they log tropical trees and float down the river for construction of ships or buildings. With so much construction, the loggers are ever busier, and more of them are needed every year. Word is spreading further south among the Kiyungu: come north, where opportunity awaits!
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From: “The Century: History’s 100 Most Important People”
By Appian Harris
Kumgatu’s second great voyage in 1635-1636 took his ships from the Island to Java and back again; the first Aururian ships to visit the Old World. During the voyage, he established a trade agreement with the Dutch East India Company, and consolidated his trading association’s pact with the Kiyungu.
On the return leg of his voyage, he met the first English ships to explore Aururia under the command of William Baffin. While neither party made any firm agreements, contact with the English offered Kumgatu and his fellow Nangu the opportunity to bypass the Dutch monopoly on European trade with Aururia. He would put this opportunity to good use...
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“Our world is out of balance. The Raw Men can sail to our homeland as they wish, but we cannot sail to theirs. Only when we can voyage as far as them will the balance be restored.”
- Attributed to Kumgatu
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Nangu shipbuilding techniques had been evolving for centuries. Isolated on their Island, sailing for fish and other produce of the seas such as dyes, they became the best native seafarers in Aururia. Their techniques were only improved after contact with the Maori gave them access to Polynesian navigation techniques and knowledge of lateen sails.
The standard Nangu ship design from the late fourteenth century onward was a twin-hulled, lateen-rigged, shallow-drafted vessel whose Nangu name is best translated simply as “ship” [2]. These agile vessels were capable of navigating reliably even into the wind, and became the mainstay of Nangu commerce for nearly two centuries.
Although manoeuvrable, such shallow-drafted ships had severe limits in terms of cargo space. By the late sixteenth century, more ambitious Nangu shipbuilders had begun to create larger vessels, preserving the triangular lateen sails, but with larger hulls and more decks. These vessels, called great-ships, became the premier Nangu trading vessels on the westward run to the Atjuntja lands, and for other long-range sailing.
Nangu ship design did not end with the construction of great-ships. Members of several bloodlines had considered making even larger ships. These plans were given more urgency when word came of the Raw Men from out of the west, and of the massive single-hulled ships which they used.
The Nangu shipwrights gave little regard to single-hulled ships, viewing them as too limited in sailing against the wind. Yet the volumes of cargo which the Raw Men’s ship could deliver were something to be admired, as were the reports that their large square sails and twin masts could sail faster with the wind behind them.
Frantic experimentation began among the Nangu, both with ship design and with the the compass which the Raw Men used. The first twin-masted, enlargened great-ships were built by the Manyilti bloodline in 1631, and others quickly followed.
The Nyugal and Wolalta bloodlines supported the push for larger ships, but gave more consideration to how to gain more speed when sailing with the wind. More masts were an obvious part of the answer, but with lateen sails, even twin masts did not give as much sail area as comparable Raw Men vessels.
The two bloodlines were loathe to forgo the manoeuvrability of lateen sails, and in any case switching to square-rigged sails would have required learning entirely new sailing techniques. Reports of some of the Raw Men ships gave them another solution: add a second sail (headsail) in front of the foremast, attached to a bowsprit, to be used when sailing with the wind.
The Nyugal had experimented with headsails on smaller vessels even before the Manyilti built the first twin-masted ship, and found them satisfactory. In partnership with the Wolalta, they began to include them on twin-masted ships.
The first ship to incorporate both of these innovations was built in Wujal, away from prying eyes of other Nangu bloodlines. Completed in 1640, its makers called it the Barrbay (swiftness). The new swift-ship displaced nearly 50 tonnes, with twin lateen sails that manoeuvred well into the wind, while a headsail could be run up to add to speed when sailing with the wind.
This new design was, in fact, seaworthy enough to be capable of sailing around the world. Whether it would be permitted to undertake such a voyage, in competition with the seagoing powers of Europe was, of course, a much more difficult question to answer...
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From: “The Century: History’s 100 Most Important People”
By Appian Harris
Due to the accomplishments of Kumgatu’s second great voyage, the Nuttana had permission to trade with the Dutch East India Company at Batavia. This trading concession, while valuable, became ever more difficult to exercise given the ongoing state of war between the Netherlands and Spain-Portugal, and the undeclared war between the Dutch East India Company and their English counterparts.
Due to the problems of war, and resentment of Dutch attempts to monopolise trade with Aururia, Kumgatu organised his third great voyage. His aim was to venture further into Asia, to reach the source of at least some of the goods which Europeans were bringing to Aururian ports.
Previous Nangu ships had used Dutch charts to venture through parts of the East Indies, and glimpsed the southernmost islands of the Philippines, but Kumgatu decided to venture much further into the northern hemisphere. Despite having spent several years in profitable comfort overseeing efforts from Wujal rather than sailing himself, his third voyage demonstrated that he still maintained the courage that was his name.
In 1643, Kumgatu took personal command of the Garoo, one of the newest class of Nangu ships, and together with two other vessels, set out for Asia...
Surviving records do not reveal whether Kumgatu was just extremely fortunate in his timing and choice of stops, or whether he had obtained insight from Europeans who had visited Japan. In any case, in his third voyage he bypassed war-torn Taiwan and avoided Cathay proper, and after leaving the Philippines, he explored the Ryukyu islands, eventually docking at Naha, the capital of Okinawa.
The Ryukyu kingdom was then a vassal of Japan, although it still preserved relations with Cathay. Previously a nexus for trade between Japan, Cathay, Southeast Asia and the East Indies, its commerce had declined in the last few decades. Nevertheless, Kumgatu viewed it as a good place to establish trade connexions independent of European authority, and here he offered the goods which he had brought...
Having learned from the preferences of Old Worlders in Batavia, Kumgatu had brought with him supplies of kunduri, lemon verbena, sweet peppers and other spices, and gold and silver. All of these were positively received, but the trade good which made the greatest impression was jeeree. Some visiting Japanese samurai who sampled the new beverage were extremely enthusiastic in its praises.
In exchange, Kumgatu secured samples of trade goods brought from elsewhere in Asia or India: Japanese lacquerware and fans; Chinese porcelain and textiles; Indian ivory; and Southeast Asian sugar and ambergris. Of all the new goods, he rated Japanese muskets and gunpowder as the most important...
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Taken from Intellipedia.
Kaikin (“maritime restrictions”) was the Japanese foreign relations policy whereby no outlander could enter nor could any Japanese leave the country, backed by the death penalty. The policy was enacted by the Tokugawa shogunate under Tokugawa Iemitsu and Tokugawa Ietsuna [3] through several edits and policies from 1645-52, and remained in effect for nearly 200 years.
The term Kaikin (meaning restrictions on sea activity) was a contemporaneous term derived from the similar Cathayan concept of hai jin [citation needed].
Japan did not isolate itself completely during the Kaikin era. The system saw the shogunate apply strict regulations to foreign relations and commerce, but never completely severed outside contact. Under Kaikin, direct European contact was permitted only via the Dutch trading outpost in Nagasaki. Trade with Cathay was also conducted at Nagasaki. Commerce with Corea was restricted to the Tsushima domain, while trade with the Ezo [Ainu] was limited to the Matsumae domain. Trade with the Ryukyu kingdom, and thus indirect trade with the Coral states, took place in Satsuma domain...
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[1] Historically, Tokugawa Iemitsu ruled a year longer (until 1651), and the equivalent edicts were issued ten years earlier (ie 1635). The disruptions of the Aururian plagues within Japan, and flow-on effects of reduced European contact, has delayed the advent of the restrictions on foreign contact.
[2] The smaller Nangu vessels names would usually be translated as “boat”.
[3] Tokugawa Ietsuna (b.1642) is an allohistorical ‘brother’ of the historical Tokugawa Ietsuna; being born so far after the divergence means that he is not the same person.
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Thoughts?
