As an envoy of the Celestial Empire, Zheng He presented many South Indian kings and chieftains with gifts such as porcelain, bronze and ironware, gold and silverware, and brocade saras, and also traded with the locals on an equal footing.

The silk that had been so popular with the kings of the small South Indian kingdom had long since disappeared, and it was impossible for silk to last for hundreds of years in the tropical climate here;

It is also difficult to find traces of the gold and silver objects that were given at the beginning, because Indians are particularly fond of gold and silver jewelry, and always love to make old gold and silver jewelry into new jewelry.

For these reasons, nearly six centuries have passed, and among the Ming artifacts left by Zheng He's fleet in South India, basically only copper, iron, and porcelain can be preserved.

But nothing is certain, and the third gift from the Varmar family was an organic, a beautiful ivory carving.

A semi-hollow ivory carving of about 30 centimeters in length, the color has been dark yellow, and there are many fine lines, on which there are 12 figures and 9 horses with a height of less than three centimeters each.

The carving is extremely delicate, and even the beards and manes of the characters are recognizable, which should tell the story of Guan Yu and Zhang Fei's conquest of the battlefield during the Three Kingdoms.

Looking at the style and sense of the times of this ivory carving, it is difficult to judge that it is very likely to come from the hands of the craftsmen of the Ming Dynasty, which is different from the ivory carving skills of Guangdong Province at that time.

Ivory carving, I have collected a lot, or China, and even the world's largest collection of ivory raw materials and handicrafts, this vision is still there.

In the Ming Dynasty, only the official envoys were able to give the palace ivory carving to Fanguo, and the Indians worshipped elephants, and ancient India had the tradition of carving mascots with ivory since ancient times, and the Chinese ivory carving products were taken for granted.

Zhang Nan looked at the ivory carving and said to others: "Among the gifts that Zheng He gave to the princes of South India, the ivory carvings were the most precious, and their popularity is said to have surpassed that of blue and white porcelain. ”

Then he said to the old Varma, who was attracted by his previous analysis: "Mr. Varma, this ivory carving was also found in the basement?"

"Yes, it's in our Hindu-style gold box, sealed tightly. The location is close to the outside of the basement, and it may have been put in more than 100 years ago. ”

"Rare!"

It is rare, this ivory carving should have been properly preserved as a precious ornament for the first few hundred years, and it was not put into the ground for a particularly long time, plus the protection of the gold box, otherwise it would be finished in many years under the ground here.

"It's very rare, these items obviously represent the traditional friendship between our family's ancestors and Huaxia," said the elder Valma with a smile.

Their family is the king of South India, and unlike those northern Yankees, "many Indians now only learn the history left to us by the British, but they don't know that these histories are actually recorded in ancient China."

In the 3rd and 3rd centuries B.C., for 600 years, when we were still speaking Tamil, Middle Eastern and Chinese merchants had been engaged in the spice trade in my homeland for a long time, and they have been intermittently ever since.

At that time, there was no war, and before China was peaceful and mutually beneficial trade.

In the 12th century, our generation was divided into several small kingdoms, and in the second half of the 14th century, the Ming Dynasty of China sent envoys to visit us many times.

From 1405 to 1433, Zheng He, a great Chinese navigator, led his fleet on seven voyages, and the first time he arrived at us. They also high-fived our ancestors, wrote contracts, traded on an equal footing, and used us as a fixed supply ground for fresh water and food, and a base for westward expansion.

It's amazing, isn't it, the powerful Ming Dynasty actually didn't have the idea of occupying our rich land as a colony, you must know that as long as Zheng He had this idea at that time, even if the kings of the entire South India combined, there was no chance of resistance in front of the powerful fleet of the Ming Dynasty.

In the past two years, I have read books about the voyage of Zheng He's fleet, and in 1433 A.D., Zheng He, a messenger of friendship, an upright merchant, and a great navigator, died on his last voyage in the kingdom of Guli..."

Zhang Nan was originally quite proud to hear it, but he didn't expect that Old Valma actually added the title of "honest businessman" to Zheng He, and almost didn't laugh out loud.

If Zheng He had a spirit, I don't know how he would feel about this evaluation.

Old Valmar continued: "The Chinese are kind and only trade on an equal footing, but unfortunately after Zheng He, the large-scale official exchanges between us and the Huaxia seem to have been cut off for a long time.

The East and the West are really different, and just 65 years after Zheng He's death, the Portuguese bandit da Gama from the West came and clashed with one of our ancestors.

Although we initially won the war, in 1502 we were defeated and plundered in a frenzy when da Gama's fleet of twenty warships invaded again.

In 1524 A.D., that da Gama also died with us, but we hated him, we hated the invader!

Our ancestors fought against the Portuguese for more than 100 years, and it was not until 1664 that they were able to overcome Portuguese rule and gain their freedom.

But then the English and the French came back, and as we all know, at the end of the 18th century we became a colony of the British.

Mr. Allen, or Mr. Zhang, we are true friends, aren't we? ”

Zhang Nan listened to Old Varma's words and said with a smile: "Yes, we are friends, we were, we are, and we will be in the future!"

The South Indians are a little different, at least the Varmars: for whatever reason, perhaps because it's too far from the Himalayas, they seem to care about the mess of Delhi and only care about their own interests.

India, a federal republic, with strong local powers, is not so united.

This will raise the practical interests to the traditional friendship, yes, very good, Zhang Nan still likes to have a few more good friends.

There were four gifts, and old Valmar pointed to the last one and said, "Until now, we don't know where this jar is, but we think it's very exquisite, and it should have been a treasure hundreds of years ago, so I don't know why it was like this." ”

By "where" he meant where the jar was put and what it was for, not where it came from—it was a blue and white porcelain dragon pattern jar.

Zhang Nan picked it up with both hands and looked at it, and there was a "Ming Wanli" paragraph at the bottom.

It is definitely a fine product in the folk kiln, and it may even be the official kiln fixed burning, but the style is slightly different from the memory of several Wanli official kilns.

Since Zheng He's voyage to the West, China has not completely closed the door to seafaring trade, and blue and white porcelain, as a lucrative commodity, cannot be completely banned from export, at least some smuggling ships still haunt the sea.

Dragon pattern jars, the Ming Dynasty for a long time folk can also be used, for example, Zhang Nan in his last life collected two Ming Dynasty no dragon pattern sugar jars.

Although the two pipes are exquisite, it is unlikely that they were produced by the official kiln.

The Ming Dynasty liked to canonize small countries, and even if this blue and white porcelain jar was not given directly to the small countries of South India during the Wanli period, it may have flowed in from Southeast Asia or was resold here by merchants from other countries.

It is this dragon pattern jar that has been transformed, just like Westerners liked to add "metal coats" to Chinese porcelain two or three hundred years ago as decoration.

The jar was covered with copper hoops around the bottom and mouth of the porcelain jar, and several thick copper skin welds and riveted between the two copper hoops, and a strange copper lid was added to the porcelain jar.

The copper lid is connected to the copper hoop with a copper buckle, and there is a movable copper hook on the lid.

It looks very strange, but Zhang Nan has seen similar items in Nong Bosheng's museum, and said to old Valma: "This is a ship container, 400 years ago, I was willing to use this jar to make a container on a ship, and the owner is definitely rich!"