[troutman]

In the Eastern category, I select ZHENG HE:



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zheng_He

Zheng He (traditional Chinese: 鄭和; simplified Chinese: 郑和; pinyin: Zhèng Hé; Wade-Giles: Cheng Ho; Birth name: 馬三寶 / 马三宝; pinyin: Mǎ Sānbǎo; Arabic/Persian name: حاجی محمود شمس Hajji Mahmud Shams) (1371–1433), was a HuiChinese mariner, explorer, diplomat and fleet admiral, who made the voyages collectively referred to as the travels of "Eunuch Sanbao to the Western Ocean" (Chinese: 三保太監下西洋) or "Zheng He to the Western Ocean", from 1405 to 1433.

There are claims that Persian stories of Sinbad the Sailor are based on the voyages of Zheng He

Between 1405 and 1433, the Ming government sponsored a series of seven naval expeditions. Emperor Yongle designed them to establish a Chinese presence, impose imperial control over trade, and impress foreign peoples in the Indian Ocean basin. He also might have wanted to extend the tributary system.

Zheng He was placed as the admiral in control of the huge fleet and armed forces that undertook these expeditions. Zheng He's first voyage consisted of a fleet of around 300 ships[9][10] (other sources say 200)[11] holding almost 28,000 crewmen.

Zheng He's fleets visited Arabia, East Africa, India, Indonesia and Thailand (at the time called Siam), dispensing and receiving goods along the way

There are speculations that some of Zheng's ships may have traveled beyond the Cape of Good Hope.

Amateur historian Gavin Menzies claims in his book 1421: The Year China Discovered the World that several parts of Zheng's fleet explored virtually the entire globe, discovering West Africa, North and South America, Greenland, Iceland, the Falklands, Antarctica, and Australia, passing the Arctic Ocean in the process. His thesis has been discounted "as nonsense"[18] by professional historians.