Naval Might in the Song Dynasty

China must now regard the Sea and River as her Great Wall and substitute warships for watchtowers.”

“Two “barbarian” enemies, the Ruzhen Jin and the Mongols, warred against the northern border of the empire. The Ruzhen Jin occupied northern China after 1125, weakening the Song, who retreated south, below the Yangtze, to a new capital at Hangzhou. With its northern border cut off, Song China turned even more to the sea, continuing to expand trade and building up naval forces to meet their enemies on the sea as well as on land.

The Song responded to the threat at their borders – and on the coasts – with an energetic campaign of warship construction, and the creation of China’s first permanent navy. By 1170, a traveller on the Yangtze described naval maneuvers by a fleet of some 700 vessels, “about 100 feet long, with castles, towers, flags flying and drums beating.” This fleet, drilling and training, was needed to keep both the Ruzhen Jin and the Mongols at bay.

The Song also relied on the introduction of new weapons such as gunpowder, catapults and incendiary devices to naval combat. In 1129, trebuchets throwing gunpowder bombs were adopted, between 1132 and 1189 the Song Navy introduced paddle wheeled warships, and by 1203, the navy introduced iron armour for warships. The Song were particularly adept in the use of Greek Fire, imported from the west. As early as the 10th century, Song ships used piston-engine flamethrowers to set enemy ships ablaze.