Fan Chengda (1126-1193) was a high-ranking Chinese government official in Guangxi, an experienced traveler, a keen observer, and a gifted writer. His observatio

The Ben cao gang mu, compiled in the second half of the sixteenth century by a team led by the physician Li Shizhen (1518–1593) on the basis of previously pub

Despite its 3,000 kilometre coastline, few people see Vietnam as a maritime country. Here Li Tana presents a powerful new argument about Vietnamese history: tha

China's Encounters on the South and Southwest. Reforging the Fiery Frontier Over Two Millennia discusses the mountainous territory between lowland China and Sou

The book investigates China’s relations to the outside world between ca. 100 BCE and 1800 CE. In contrast to most histories of the Silk Roads, the focus of th