With the discovery of Portuguese and Spanish voyages extended to China in the 16th century, foreign economic activities in the Ming Dynasty were further developed, especially under the huge market needs in Europe and America, a large number of high-quality silk and cotton fabrics in the Jiangnan area continued to be sold overseas. Since the early Qing Dynasty, many cotton fabrics called "Nanking cloth" have emerged on the British East India Company's China trade list. However, it is well known that Nanjing was an important center of silk weaving in the Ming Dynasty, rather than a cotton producing area. The name is closely related to the role of Nanjing in the tribute trade system of Ming Dynasty and the administrative divisions of Ming and Qing dynasties. First of all, in the middle and late Ming Dynasty, Nanjing, as the secondary capital of the dynasty, still had important political and economic functions in the tribute system, and it was not only the only place to pay tribute to countries in the East and West Asia. Moreover, the convenient transportation between the Jiangnan textile producing area of Nanjing and the export port of Fujian and Guangdong also provided great convenience for the tribute and export trade in the late Ming Dynasty. In addition, the British businessmen in the Qing Dynasty named Jiangnan cotton goods as a region, and "Nanjing" was the old name of Jiangnan administrative area in the Ming Dynasty. In the 17th-18th century, when the update of Western map data lagged behind, Europeans' ideas were influenced by geographical mapping, and it was still called "NANKING" according to the Ming Dynasty geography, and the Susong area was a part of southern kingdom (Nanjing). The cotton cloth produced in its place is called "Nanking cloth".

Hui Ma. Study on the Name of "Nanking Cloth" and the Role of Nanjing in Jiangnan Textile Export Trade at the End of Ming Dynasty. Frontiers in Art Research (2023) Vol. 5, Issue 13: 98-107. https://doi.org/10.25236/FAR.2023.051318.

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