In 2012, the National Palace Museum in Taiwan held an exhibition of historical maps in its collection and published a catalog of that exhibition entitled “Mapping the Imperial Realm, an Exhibition of Historical Maps” (河嶽海疆：院藏古輿圖特展).
Three of the maps displayed pertained to places in Southeast Asia. These maps were labelled in the exhibition as follows:
1. Map of the Situation of the Jiaozhi Central-Southern Peninsula (交趾中南半島情形圖)
2. Xianluo [Siam] Maritime Navigation Map (暹羅航海圖)
3. Map of an Investigation into the Sea Route Distances from Guangdong to Xianluo Citadel (查詢廣東至暹羅城海道程圖)
According to the catalog, the first map was presented during the Qianlong era (1735-1796). As for the second map, the catalog states that “It is an attached map from the Grand Council archives dated to the 36th year of Qianlong (1771), submitted to the Qing court; it is a chart of the water-route communications from Siam to China that was presented by the Siamese king Zheng Zhao.” (188)
Zheng Zhao is how the Chinese referred to Phraya Taksin, a man who from 1767-1782, ruled over a kingdom based at Thonburi following the Burmese conquest of Ayutthaya.
Finally, in the catalog, the third map is described as “an attached map to a memorial submitted on the 29th day of the 6th month of the 34th year of Qianlong (1769) by the Governor-General of Liangguang, Li Shiyao, in a document titled ‘Account of Inquiries into the Situation of the Xianluo kingdom’ (查詢暹羅國情形由).” (188)
These maps can be found in the National Palace Museum Digital Library of Qing Archives [清代檔案檢索系統-首頁] by looking up document numbers 014906, 014792, and 010263.
In examining the materials there, I have been unable to locate information that connects the second map to Phraya Taksin.
It is possible, as in that same year, 1771, he sent Burmese prisoners to China for interrogation (014971). Further, the map is “Siam-centric” as it has the “Kingdom of Siam” (Xianluo guo 暹羅國) at its center.
Unfortunately, the maps on the Digital Library of Qing Archives site, and in the exhibition catalog, are not high resolution.
In 2016, the maps were reproduced in volume 1 of the 2-volume work: Chen Jiarong 陳佳榮, et al., eds., Zhongguo lidai hailu zhenjing 中國歷代海路針經 [A Collection of Maritime Routes and Rutters of Imperial China]. Again, however, the images are not high resolution.
Finally, much of the information in that work, as well as the images, are available on this World10k site.
Because I like to spend lots of time doing mindless and repetitive tasks, I decided to create better resolution versions of these maps. I first enlarged the maps, but that then blurred the Chinese text, so I then input all the text again.
The first two maps contain some placenames that are written differently. Someone at some point put paper strips on these maps to indicate those variations.
As such, on the first map (Map of the Situation of the Jiaozhi Central-Southern Peninsula), there are paper strips that say “The new map has [variant writing]” (新圖作. . .), and on the second map (Xianluo Maritime Navigation Map), the paper strips say “The old map has [variant writing]” (舊圖作. . .).
In the catalog, it is mentioned that some of these pieces of paper have fallen off and I noticed that a couple are in the wrong place on the second map.
I have attached here pdf files of the maps as well as files of the names mentioned in the maps, following Chen et al.
On the maps, I have included the Chinese characters for the placenames as well as provided Pinyin transcriptions.
I have not indicated the modern placenames that these terms refer to because 1) for some, it is obvious, 2) for others, it is not certain what they indicate, 2) and for still others, they are placenames that are no longer used.
As such, it would take quite a bit of time to go through all the names and make determinations. Meanwhile, Chen et al. have already done that, and I include the information from that text. However, I don’t always agree with it, and I encourage you to be cautious as well.
Finally, I did my best, but my eyesight is pretty much shot at this point, so. . . 😊 Oh, and if these maps do exist in high resolution somewhere and I just spent a couple of days re-inventing the wheel. . . please don’t tell me. . .
1a) Map of the Situation of the Jiaozhi Central-Southern Peninsula (交趾中南半島情形圖)
1b) Placenames in the Map of the Situation of the Jiaozhi Central-Southern Peninsula
2a) Xianluo Maritime Navigation Map (暹羅航海圖)
2b) Placenames in the Xianluo Maritime Navigation Map
3a) Map of an Investigation into the Sea Route Distances from Guangdong to Xianluo Citadel (查詢廣東至暹羅水陸道里圖)
3b) Placenames in the Map of an Investigation into the Sea Route Distances from Guangdong to Xianluo Citadel