Challenge:If China discovers america instead of europe

According to Cook and Borah, the major population declines in OTL Mexico with European contact were complete in roughly 50 years (from 25.2 million to 2.7). After that Mexico only lost 3/4ths of its population. Now assuming that the Chinese spread disease by roughly 1430-1440, by the time Cortez arrives the population will probably be on the upswing, but there won't be nearly as many people as in OTL. Of course its unclear how many deaths arose from the Spanish conquest and occupation so this Mexico will have more people then our Mexico the same years after conquest.

Besides gold, chocolate is also a possible trade good back to China.

Didn't the Chinese population go way up after the introduction of American crops ? I'm not sure of the exact numbers, but I'm fairly certain it was significant. In fact this could be the second most important difference in this TL, that China's population boomed first.
 
Didn't the Chinese population go way up after the introduction of American crops ? I'm not sure of the exact numbers, but I'm fairly certain it was significant. In fact this could be the second most important difference in this TL, that China's population boomed first.
Absolutely. The population under the Qing dynasty rose from 100 million to 400 million largely due to new world crops like corn, potato, sweet potato, tomato, eggplant, peanut, various squash and peppers. It transformed the Chinese diet and allowed food to be grown on land previously unusable. This in turn led to the down fall of the dynasty in part because its political institutions could not cope with a population of this size considering they were viewed as foreign occupiers. The youth bulge led to extreme violence like the Taiping Rebellion.

If Ming China established trade with the New World, it would be most interested in new crops as its priority would be to feed its often starving population. However this would not involve large volume trade as it would amount to importing seed samples. Food product obviously would not survive the long transit.

One New World product that may be of interest would be rubber, assuming someone think of a use for it.
 
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One New World product that may be of interest would be rubber, assuming someone think of a use for it.
One New World product that may be of interest would be uranium, assuming someone think of a use for it.

Anyway, I actually had a World History question, basically, "What if the Chinese had expanded globally?" My answer then was that it would hinder the Ming further in maintaining control over the country.
 
California's gold was not discovered until the 19th century. The Aztecs and Incas had plenty of gold. The purchasing power of gold in the Americas was much lower than in Eurasia. It's just a matter of trading with them.

But the Ming had no problem attacking weaker neighbors; why wouldn't they do so here?

Your comments on the Philippines did interest me though; ca you offer any books on it?
 
But the Ming had no problem attacking weaker neighbors; why wouldn't they do so here?
Three factors. One the difficulty of carrying out military operation far from home. Two potentially low cost of acquiring gold through trading steel tools. Three the Ming voyages were relatively peaceful despite the wars fought by Ming emperors close to home.

Spanish conquest was heavily motivated by religion. Certainly gold is another factor. But without the synergistic effect I think the Spanish would have been satisfied trading for a while longer.
Your comments on the Philippines did interest me though; ca you offer any books on it?
That came from discussions with a Filipino. Unsure of the veracity. None the less the fact remains there was trade yet there was no colonization.
 
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Three factors. One the difficulty of carrying out military operation far from home. Two potentially low cost of acquiring gold through trading steel tools. Three the Ming voyages were relatively peaceful despite the wars fought by Ming emperors close to home.

To be honest, to get a Ming state that reaches the Pacific Coast you're going to need vast and far reaching changes, among which might be a more assertive, if local, treasure fleet.
 
But the Ming had no problem attacking weaker neighbors; why wouldn't they do so here?
Its really far away. On the order of 8,000 miles or so. Plus theres not much point as far as I see. The barbarians across the Pacific are quite willing to give you lots and lots of gold for very simple things, why bother to send a military expedition? There expensive and often ineffective, and they might not even make it all the way there.
 
the Chinese naver had the desire to colonise other continents because they already ruled the whole world (or the only parts that mattered). they never had the impetus to colonize, that's why the empire grew so explosively under the Qing, the manchurians understood expansionism better than the Chinese.

in order for the ming to want an american colony it would take something big, really big, another country that was large enough and powerful enough to exert pressure on the Chinese borders.

more realistically, there might be some californian and oregonian tribes that set themselves up as tributaries and culturally assimilate to some degree, and then their territory is annexed when the Qing take over.
 
the Chinese naver had the desire to colonise other continents because they already ruled the whole world (or the only parts that mattered). they never had the impetus to colonize, that's why the empire grew so explosively under the Qing, the manchurians understood expansionism better than the Chinese.

Eh. On the other hand, the Tang dynasty ended up kicking ass and taking names in Central Asia, while epxanding the Empire even further south. The problem the Ming had was that their military sucked.
 
To be honest, to get a Ming state that reaches the Pacific Coast you're going to need vast and far reaching changes, among which might be a more assertive, if local, treasure fleet.
In my first post on the thread I said there was no way the state was going to set up colonies. Why bother? China had no desire to spread religion. Its population had recently plummeted from over 100 million to 60 million during Mongol rule. I doubt there would even be a state sponsored trade mission. It would have to be entirely private. If the Ming fleet had reached the Americas then commercial trade may follow, as it did in the South China Sea and continued its domination long after the state ran fleet was dismantled.

The Ming dynasty was warlike. But most wars involved trying to absorb Sinified border regions into the empire. There were also wars to check the Mongol threat. A more aggressive Ming would likely still follow this pattern. So wars over resources would be highly unlikely.
 
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Neil Craig

Banned
The Chinese Admiral Cheng Ho certainly did lead a fleet all round the Indian Ocean in the 1420s & came near to the Cape of Good ope. When he returned the party line had changed (the problem of having a centralised government) & not only was there no more voyages but it shortly became illegal to build 2 mast ships. hey established no colonies but did capture the King of Ceylion (also a giraffe). Since this was well before Vasco Da Gama sailed to India it is not difficult to imagine a China which continued such explorations & sailed into Lisbon before 1492. owever because of the central control I suspect they would not have had the competitive edge to conquer the world as thoroughly as european countries did.
 
But the Ming had no problem attacking weaker neighbors; why wouldn't they do so here?

Your comments on the Philippines did interest me though; ca you offer any books on it?
What is now the philippines is primarily comprised of 4 kingdoms before colonization much like china is during the civil war.
The Chinese Admiral Cheng Ho certainly did lead a fleet all round the Indian Ocean in the 1420s & came near to the Cape of Good ope. When he returned the party line had changed (the problem of having a centralised government) & not only was there no more voyages but it shortly became illegal to build 2 mast ships. hey established no colonies but did capture the King of Ceylion (also a giraffe). Since this was well before Vasco Da Gama sailed to India it is not difficult to imagine a China which continued such explorations & sailed into Lisbon before 1492. owever because of the central control I suspect they would not have had the competitive edge to conquer the world as thoroughly as european countries did.
yes it is not impossible.
 
Absolutely. The population under the Qing dynasty rose from 100 million to 400 million largely due to new world crops like corn, potato, sweet potato, tomato, eggplant, peanut, various squash and peppers. It transformed the Chinese diet and allowed food to be grown on land previously unusable. This in turn led to the down fall of the dynasty in part because its political institutions could not cope with a population of this size considering they were viewed as foreign occupiers. The youth bulge led to extreme violence like the Taiping Rebellion.

If Ming China established trade with the New World, it would be most interested in new crops as its priority would be to feed its often starving population. However this would not involve large volume trade as it would amount to importing seed samples. Food product obviously would not survive the long transit.

One New World product that may be of interest would be rubber, assuming someone think of a use for it.

Hmm. How much of the increase of the Chinese population was due to New World crops? For comparison, the population of Europe less than tripled in the three hundred years immediately following the discovery of the Americas. I also think the idea of a link between the increased population of China and the fall of the Qing is pretty laughable.

IIRC, the Chinese population was starving no more often than that of Europe. Why would the Ming dynastey be more interested in acquiring new crops than any European government?
 
Hmm. How much of the increase of the Chinese population was due to New World crops? For comparison, the population of Europe less than tripled in the three hundred years immediately following the discovery of the Americas. I also think the idea of a link between the increased population of China and the fall of the Qing is pretty laughable.

IIRC, the Chinese population was starving no more often than that of Europe. Why would the Ming dynastey be more interested in acquiring new crops than any European government?
Yup.I agree they want more crops.
 
I read a short story once, by Mary Rosenblum entitles 'sacrifice' where the Chinese trade with the Americas for gunpowder etc. which causes the Aztec emp. to survive etc. pretty inventive stuff. It was in the anthology 'Sideways in Crime'
 
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