Tracing the geopolitical influences on the morphological and functional transformation in Guangdong merchant ships: Knowledge mining from the Ming and Qing maritime archives.

ABSTRACT: Although the institutional history of ancient Chinese maritime trade has been extensively documented, the functional evolution of maritime vessels and their underlying drivers remains underexplored. Recent studies have moved beyond political explanations to explore the interplay of economic and technological dynamics. Using KH Coder for text mining, this study applies word frequency analysis and co-occurrence network modeling to investigate the geopolitical factors shaping the morphological evolution of Guangdong merchant ships in the Ming and Qing dynasties. A visual-comparative analysis further assesses the functional attributes of three representative ship types. Findings reveal that economic and military imperatives were the primary determinants of ship design, with political and geogr

SUBMITTER: Ao J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12788687 | biostudies-literature | 2026

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature