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Koxinga's eldest son, Zheng Jing, -- the ruler of the short-lived Kingdom of Dongning (1661-1683) -- almost lost his head in his late teens. Daddy Zheng Chenggong (Koxinga) twice ordered his execution for fooling around with a wet nurse. But Zheng Jing survived and soon after became ruler-warlord upon Koxinga's sudden death. Koxinga (鄭成功) and his armies had defeated the Dutch in modern-day Tainan, but their goal wasn't Taiwan. They wanted to use Formosa as a base from which to retake China and restore the Ming Dynasty, which had been toppled by northern foreigners -- the Manchus -- who established the Qing Dynasty. When Koxinga's son Zheng Jing (鄭經) came to power, however, he and some of his generals set themselves a different goal -- conquering the Spanish Philippines!! (What??)
Cover: The banner of the Kingdom of Dongning (Via Wikimedia Commons)
Below: A 17th century painting of Zheng Jing (鄭經) October 25, 1642 – March 17, 1681, the son and heir of Ming loyalist warlord Koxinga.
Below: Zheng Jing changed the name of his kingdom from Dong Du (Eastern Capital) to Dong Ning (Eastern Pacification), a shift that showed a drifting away from his father's mission of restoring the Ming, but ultimately, Zheng Jing would ally with anti-Qing rebels in China... and be defeated.
Below: Model of Fort Zeelandia, the Dutch stronghold in modern-day Tainan. Zheng Jing's father, Koxinga, defeated the Dutch and expelled them from Formosa in 1662. (Pic via Tainan Museum of Zeelandia)
Book Recommendations:
1. Conflict and Commerce in Maritime East Asia by Xing Hang
2. Sea Rovers, Silver, and Samurai: Maritime East Asia in Global History, 1550–1700 (Perspectives on the Global Past) - by Tonio Andrade
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Check our very first episode, the story of a very white man who showed up in London in 1703... and claimed to be from Formosa. Or try a foodie episode from Season 3. Or, for those who want some harder-core history, hear the tale of the Lockheed U-2 pilot Wang Hsi-chueh 王錫爵, who became famous for defecting to the PRC by hijacking China Airlines Flight 334 on May 3, 1986.
