This documentary looks back to a time when China ruled the waves, exploring the great sea voyages of the Ming dynasty and the treasure fleets that sailed across Asia, Africa and the Indian Ocean. It tells the story of China’s maritime power centuries before European ships came to dominate the seas, and of a civilisation that built some of the largest wooden vessels the world had ever seen.
The film covers the expeditions themselves — their scale, their purpose and the trade, diplomacy and exploration they carried out — and asks why this age of seafaring came to an end. After the great voyages, China turned inward, its fleets were dismantled, and the country that had once led the world in navigation gave up the seas to others. The documentary explores the political and cultural reasons behind that fateful turn.
For readers interested in socialism’s history and present, this history offers a longer view of China. The country whose rise dominates today’s headlines was once the world’s leading maritime power, and its later retreat from the sea shaped the centuries that followed. Understanding that earlier China helps explain the sense of history, and of unfinished greatness, that still runs through Chinese politics today.