1434 on Playaway Author:Gavin Menzies Playaway is the easiest way to listen to a book on the go. An all-in-one format, the player and content are combined in one 2 ounce unit and it comes with everything you need to start listening immediately. No separate player needed, no CDs, no downloads just press play! — "Menzies contends that a large Chinese fleet, official ambassadors of the... more » Emperor, arrived in Tuscany in 1434 where they met with Pope Eugenius IV. A mass of information was given by the Chinese dilatation to the Pope and his entourage concerning world maps (which Menzies argues were later give to Columbus) astronomy, mathematics, art, printing, architecture, steel manufacture, civil engineering, military machines, surveying cartography, and genetics. This gift of knowledge sparked the inventiveness of the Renaissance -- Da Vinci's inventions, the Copernican revolution, Galileo, and much more.
Gavin Menzies was born in 1937 and lived in China for two years before the Second World War. He joined the Royal Navy in 1953 and served in submarines from 1959 to 1970. In the course of researching 1421, he visited 120 countries, over 900 museums and libraries, and every major sea port of the late Middle Ages. He is married with two daughters and lives in North London."« less