專題演講
講題：南海間南北航行的創新

         Innovations in North-South Sailing across the South China Sea

講者：莽干 Pierre-Yves Manguin

         法國遠東學院名譽教授 Emeritus Professor, L'Ecole française d'Extrême-Orient (EFEO)

時間：2017年6月24日下午2時
地點：國立故宮博物院南部院區集賢廳

摘要：
Two major economic nodes in Asian history have lied at the Northern and Southern ends of the South China Sea for more than two millennia: China and the Straits area of Insular Southeast Asia. How did one sail along this major thoroughfare of East Asian traffic ? I will show that, until the second half of the 17th century, only a route closely following the coasts of Campa and Vietnam was in use. For centuries, the impossibility to assess the precise position of the Paracels and Macclesfield islands and banks and the dangers they present forced navigators of all nations to keep in sight of the coast until they had sailed away from their presumed position and extent. Some direct crossings appear to have taken place during the second half of the 17th century, however, but only when longitude reckoning was discovered at the end of the 18th century did navigators sail directly between the Singapore Strait and Guangdong.