@RecursiveRabbit I've heard about a Chinese explorer, Zheng He, making contact with sub-saharan African tribes hundreds of years before Europe's "scramble for Africa", but it was decidedly too early to establish permanent contact so their relationship with these tribes was mostly just gift exchanges. Not really something that fits into the epoch of princes; into history as we usually tell it
@kirin I've started to wonder if there were ever any explorers who weren't monstrous jerks.