As early as 1955, a model pottery boat was unearthed from the tombs of the Eastern Han Dynasty in the eastern suburbs of Guangzhou, with an anchor at the head and a rudder at the tail. Liu Xi's scientific and technological work "Release the Ship by Interpreting the Name" in the Eastern Han Dynasty has discussed the rudder, its function and operating parts. China invented and used the stern rudder as early as the 2nd century AD, nearly 1000 years earlier than foreign countries.

Lu Xun, the leader of the peasant uprising army in Jin Dynasty, built an eight-slot ship in Yixi period (AD 405-4 18). This is considered to be a ship that divides the hull into eight watertight compartments through watertight bulkheads. The watertight bulkhead invented by China was widely used in the Tang Dynasty (AD 6 18-907) and was confirmed by many ancient ships in the Tang Dynasty.

Wheeled boats convert propellers of propulsion tools into wheeled propellers. If the paddle wheel is rotated continuously, the paddle will paddle continuously, which can not only propel continuously, but also avoid the virtual work caused by manual paddling. Because of the width of the ship, multiple pedals can be installed on the same rotating shaft, and many people can step on it at the same time, which can improve the propulsion efficiency and speed of the wheeled ship. Wheeled boats advance and retreat freely, which improves the maneuverability of warships, especially for warships. The ship invented by China first appeared in the Jin Dynasty in the 5th century. After suppressing Lu Xun, a peasant uprising army, Emperor Wu of Jin attacked the later Qin Dynasty in Chang 'an, its capital. "Zi Jian" records thirteen years (AD 4 17), General Jin "led the water army from the (Yellow) River to the Weihe River to reach Chang 'an, and ... the town returned to the Weihe River, and all the sailors were on the boat in Meng Chong. When the Qin people saw the ship, they were all surprised. "From then on, there was a ship in China's literature. Zu Chongzhi (AD 429-500), a scientist in the Southern Dynasties, not only made great achievements in the fields of mathematics and astronomy, but also built a thousand-mile ship with his own machine. " "Biography of Zu Chongzhi in the Southern Qi Dynasty" notes: "Making utensils is not because of geomantic omen, but because of machine, without effort. He also built a thousand-mile ship and tried it on the Xinting River, traveling more than 100 miles a day. "

In the Tang Dynasty, Cao Wang (733-792 AD) played a connecting role in the development of ships. "Old Tang Book" contains: Gao Li "The heart of long-term luck, cleverly thought of as a warship, danced on it for two rounds, the wind and waves were like sails, and the disease was like a sail pad, which was saved and lasting." In the Song Dynasty, ships (vehicles and boats) in China entered a great development era. In the Song Dynasty, vehicles and boats were incorporated into the establishment of the water army, which had a considerable scale. In the fourth year of Jianyan (A.D. 1 130), Zhong Xiang and Yang Yao rebelled against the Song Dynasty. With the help of the shipbuilder Gao Xuan, they built one ship after another. Yang Mo built a 24-car shipbuilding and named it "Hezhouzai". "In two months, I made 10 samples of many cars and boats in Shuizhai, which was magnificent." "If you stir the water with a wheel, it will fly like a fly and hit a pole next to it. The loyalist will touch it and break it." According to the Southern Song Dynasty poet Lu You's Notes on the Old Learning Temple, the Southern Song Dynasty loyalists also imitated the rebels and built wheeled warships: "The loyalist warships were also increased for thieves' boats and boats, which were 36 feet long, 4 feet and 1 foot high, 7 feet and 2 feet and 5 inches high, which was useless, but Yue Fei leveled the thieves with infantry. When Yan Yanliang entered the country, the transportation was quite successful. "What we are talking about here is that in the Southern Song Dynasty, the civilian who went to the Yangtze River to be a teacher replaced the commander-in-chief, and only used18,000 troops to fight against 400,000 nomads and defeated Yan Yanliang, the gold master, in the thirty-first year of Song Shaoxing (A.D.1).

A large number of documents prove that cars and boats were invented and used in China from the Jin Dynasty to the Southern and Northern Dynasties, and then from the Tang Dynasty to the Song Dynasty. In the Song Dynasty, the loyalists included the vehicles and boats in the navy's establishment. The peasant rebels also built wheeled warships on Dongting Lake, which made it difficult for the loyalists to parry and forced them to follow suit. Finally, the caravan won a great victory in the battle against the large-scale attack of the nomads from the Yangtze River. In Europe, the first test of cars and ships was carried out in Barcelona in A.D. 1543. When China has developed ships and established a navy on a large scale, it is about 400 years earlier than the first experiment in Europe.

Compass is one of the four great inventions in ancient China, which originated very early. Sina, which appeared in the 4th ~ 3rd century BC, was only used on land. In the Northern Song Dynasty, Ceng Gongliang wrote "Wu Jing Zong Yao" at 104 1, and the recorded guide fish was close to being used in cars and boats. Shen Kuo wrote Meng Qian's Pen Talk in 1085, and recorded four methods of installing magnetic needles: floating method, finger claw method, bowl lip method and hanging method. Shen Kuo recommended the thread hanging as the best, but the water float method was widely used in later generations. The appearance of guide fish and compass water float laid the foundation for the application of compass in seagoing ships. /kloc-At the beginning of the 20th century, China used a compass to navigate for the first time in the world. Zhou Ping Ke Tan, written in the first year of Xuanhe (A.D.119), and Xuanhe Tujing, written in the fourth year of Xuanhe (A.D. 1 122), made detailed and detailed reports on the application of floating needle. Sir Christopher Bacon, a British physicist who is often regarded as the father of modern science, delivered such an enthusiastic eulogy to China people at the beginning of the17th century: "Printing, gunpowder and compass, these three inventions changed the whole world and the state of things. The first invention is related to study, the second to war and the third to navigation. Changes in these three fields will lead to countless new discoveries in other fields. No matter what empire, religion, constellation and human influence will be as great as the invention of these things "[1].

China invented the stern rudder, watertight bulkhead, ship and compass, which effectively promoted shipbuilding and navigation activities in China and all over the world. At present, almost all transport ships and warships in the world use watertight bulkheads and stern rudders, and they also use compass needles. The ship promoted the development of steam engine ship, and the big paddle wheel that pushed the ship forward became the symbol of motor ship, thus the name "ship" appeared. Although the paddle wheel is no longer used today, the word "wheel" is still in use. Robert K.G. Temple, an American historian of science and technology, published "China: A Country of Invention and Discovery" in 1986, summarizing "China's 100 world firsts". In the preface of "The West Benefited from China", he wrote: "Without the introduction of technologies to improve navigation and navigation from China, such as stern rudder, compass and multi-masted ship, there would never be a voyage in Europe that led to a great geographical discovery, Columbus could not sail to America, and Europeans could not establish those colonial empires."

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