Ming Shilu
The "Ming Shilu" [明實錄] provides a lot of the information relating to the treasure voyages, particularly the exchange of ambassadors. The work is divided into individual sections about the reigns of Ming emperors. Zheng lived through the reigns of five Ming emperors, but he directly served three emperors. He is mentioned in the of the Yongle reign, the of the Hongxi reign, and the of the Xuande reign. The combined the second and third voyages into one expedition. This was reproduced by the . The conflation of these two voyages into one voyage caused Zheng's Palembang journey from 1424 to 1425 to be wrongly construed as the sixth voyage to fulfill the count of seven voyages. However, the Liujiagang and Changle inscriptions make a clear distinction between the second and third voyage as they correctly date the second voyage from 1407 to 1409 and the third voyage from 1409 to 1411.