Conditions and risks of water transport in the late Ming Songjiang region as seen in cases collected in Mao Yilu's Yunjian yanlüe

This chapter presents information on water transport from the late Ming casebook Yunjian yanlüe 雲間讞略, composed by Mao Yilu 毛一鷺 (d. 1629), and other relevant works to evaluate the governmental institutions and the public security of the water transport network of the Songjiang region. This region includes the Huating 華亭, Shanghai, and Qingpu 青浦 Counties of Songjiang 松江 Prefecture and Jaiding 嘉定 County of adjacent Suzhou Prefecture, all in the highly commercialized cotton cloth production center of the late Wanli 萬曆 era (1573–1619).