Book excerpt: The present volume is a collection of studies discussing trade and exchange relations across the East China Sea in the time period between c. 1400 and 1840. It introduces and analyses characteristics of trade and exchange, of economic and personal networks including knowledge transfer between East Asian countries, the importance of which has for a long time been underestimated or misinterpreted. The authors want to show that from the fifteenth to the early nineteenth century East Asia was far from being a group of more or less isolated states, but was characterised by multifarious contacts and connections.The countries or regions investigated include China, Japan, Korea, the Ryu-kyu- Islands and Tsushima. The contributions are subdivided according to topical themes and focus on sea and land routes, archaeology, trade and commodity exchange, knowledge transfer and exchange in the field of medicine (including physicians), and European images of parts of East Asia. Examining a great deal of sources ranging from diaries, letters, tomb inscriptions to commodity lists and government documents, this volume sheds more light into hitherto neglected aspects of maritime trade.