Ancient Silk Trade Routes: Selected Works From Symposium On Cross Cultural Exchanges And Their Legacies In Asia

Selected Works from Symposium on Cross Cultural Exchanges and Their Legacies in Asia

Dashu Qin, Jian Yuan

• Publisher: WSPC
• Year: 2015
• eBook ISBN: 9789814619110
• Topic: Biological Sciences
• Subtopic: Science General
• Index: Biological Sciences

As key nodes that connected ancient silk routes traversing China, Japan and India, trading hubs, towns and cities in Java and Sumatra and other places in Asia were key destination points for merchants, monks and other itinerants plying these routes.

Recent archaeological excavations in countries bordering the South China Sea and around the Indian Ocean unveiled remarkable similarities in artifacts recovered both on land and from the sea. The similarities underlined the many facets of regional exchanges and cross-cultural influences among people and places in these networks. Some of the findings indicate a distinct Chinese presence in the commercial, social and religious activities of these early Asian trading posts.

This book collects papers from the symposium on Ancient Silk Trade Routes — Cross Cultural Exchanges and Their Legacies in Asia. It explores several threads arising from this regional exchange of goods and ideas, in particular, the cross-cultural dimensions of the exchanges in the areas of textile trade, ceramic routes, trading hubs, arts and artifacts and Buddhism.

Contents:

• Foreword by Ho Min Fong
• Introduction by John Miksic
• Textile:
  • Lou–lan Textiles in the Stein Collection at the National Museum, New Delhi (Nirmala Sharma)
  • Tracing Ancient Networks: Linguistics, Hand-woven Clothes and Looms in Eastern Indonesia (Genevieve Duggan)
• Ceramics:
  • Archaeological Investigations of Chinese Ceramics Excavated from Kenya (Qin Dashu)
  • The China–Borneo Ceramics Trade Around the 13th Century: The Story of the Two Wrecks (Michael Flecker)
  • Mutural Exchange: Chinese and East African Trade in the Late First/Early Second Millenium BCE (Herman O Kiriama)
  • Aceh and the Maritime Silk Route: Aceh and Northern Sumatra, Key Locations on the Ancient Maritime Silk Route (E Edwards Mckinnon)
  • Ceramics along The Spice Trade Route in the Indonesian Archipelago in the 16th–19th Century (Naniek Harkantiningsih Wibisono)
• Arts and Artefacts:
  • The Silverwares from Shinan Wreck and Qingyuan Port (Qi Dongfang)
  • The Fairy Likes High Building: An Analogy Analysis Between the Newly-Excavated Pottery Building Decorated with ‘Xianglun’ in Xiangyang city and the Shrine of Buddha (Futu Ci) of China (Luo Shiping)
• Buddhism:
  • Comparing the Cross-Cultural Exchanges of Esoteric Buddhism through Overland and Maritime Silk Roads (Tanaka Kimiaki)
  • Ten Stages of Enlightenment (Dasabhumi) in the Journey of Sudhana in Indonesia and Chinese Art (Shashibala)
  • Exploring the Link between the Borobudur Temple and the Avatamsaka Sutra (Hsien Du)
  • Studies on the Chinese Classics on Java Buddhism (Xuan Fang)
• Postscript:
  • The Silk Road as Wealth, Hope and Despair

Readership: Academics, undergraduate and graduates students, professionals interested in ancient silk routes, archaeology, Buddhism, Borobudur, and ceramics trade.

Chapter 1

Large Western Floral Designs — A Study on Western Styled Silk Textiles in the Palace Museum, Beijing

Dr. Zhao Feng

China National Silk Museum, Hangzhou, China

Abstract

The exchange between the East and the West on the Silk Road is divided into several stages, each with its own characteristics, sometimes in the form of alliance marriages — attempts to pacify the minority rulers along the border by marrying daughters of the Han imperial family to them, while other times trade based. Since the Mongolian Yuan dynasty, missionaries played an important role in the cultural exchange of silk. These missionaries traveled far and wide to arrive in China, bearing the letters from the Pope and the sense of mission to spread the word of God. The scale of the missionaries was unprecedented between the Ming and Qing dynasty.

This paper draws on the Western fabric, velvet and the Western silk used by the Chinese royalties to describe the phenomenon and the importance of the missionaries in the course of the cultural exchange of silk.

Chapter 2

Lou-lan Textiles in the Stein Collection at the National Museum, New Delhi

Dr. Nirmala Sharma

International Academy of Indian Culture, New Delhi

Trying to track China’s ancient route to the West, scavenging with a few workers in the ruins of a large tract of houses, Sven Hedin found 3^rd century Chinese documents that repeated ly named the place as Lou-lan. He had discovered the ancient site known as Lou-lan. Hedin’s description of his expedition across the Taklamakan and his survival with only two local men and two camels left is a fearful one which Hedin sadly called his death march. Later Sir Aurel Stein and his caravan found Lou-lan exactly where Hedin’s map of 1900 plotted it. Several days of digging in the ruins produced more wood tablets bearing ancient Chinese writings and also Kharosthi tablets similar in language to those Stein had found at Niya. In these texts the name of the town was rendered as Kroraina, an indigenous form from which the Chinese counterpart Lou-lan has come as per the more restrictive rules of Chinese phonology.

Stein marched to the Lou-lan station a second time, approaching by a slightly different route. He found “rows of fallen dead trees” lining the banks of an ancient southern branch of the Kuruk-darya, the “Dry River”, which had once carried water to Lou-lan. Following this dry riverbed northward he made abundant finds of stone implements. As digging continued, he traced ruined forts and the cemeteries for about fifteen miles in this direction. At this point he came upon a small ruined fort, a hundred feet high and commanding a distant view over the desolate wastes around. The elevated position, together with the absolute aridity of the climate since ancient times, has assured a truly remarkable state of conservation of the bodies of human beings found in the graves outside what was evidently a look outpost occupied by indigenous Lou-lan people. Several bodies were wonderfully well conserved together with their burial deposits. They appeared so close to life in death.

In 1994 ancient mummies from Lou-lan were exhumed, among which the Cherchen man was an interesting find buried with his two wives and a child. The condition of these mummies and their belongings were in a very fresh state. This disclosed the fact that the people of Cherchen had dug their graves into geological salt beds, as crops would not grow on them. They may have selected such a place for burial to save the productive land. Like dry heat the salt would absorb the moisture out of the bodies and discourage microorganisms, an ideal cemetery for mummification. Salt also brightens certain dye colors and is used even today to intensify them during manufacture of yarn and cloth.

It was observed that the mummies were neither Chinese nor Mongoloid; they looked “Caucasian”. According to Chinese documents, the Han Chinese had begun to move into Central Asia only around 120 BC struggling to open trade with the West; hence there were no chances of finding Chinese mummies in Central Asia in the 2^nd millennium BC. The Mongoloids inhabited this area ever since the spread of Homo sapiens around the globe at the end of the Ice Age, forty thousand years ago. Central and Northern Asia has been the homeland of the Altaic linguistic family, which comprises three groups of Mongol, Turkic and Tungusic languages. A century before scholars have discovered in the same area variety of documents written in the now extinct language known as Tokharian. Tokharian is related to Indo European tongues spoken in most of Europe (including English, Latin, and Greek) and in the East (including Iranian and Sanskrit). These far flung Tokharian speakers penetrated into Central Asia from the West.

The mummies were not the only ones that were remarkably preserved, but along with them were preserved their objects: mats, baskets, tools, vessels, offerings of food and clothes on them and besides them. Ancient textiles came out along with the mummies in large quantities. The steady dryness of the desert preserved these perishable artifacts. The charming faces, the exquisite colors and designs of the clothes and fashions astonished the discoverers. Modern designers are struggling to get the weaves right and to assess the correct amount of twisting of the yarn to create different crinkled fabrics a perfection that we find at Lou-lan.

The Egyptian mummies have not been preserved in such a pristine condition. The Egyptians wore white drapes, which enhanced their jewelry. The people of the Tarim Basin dressed themselves in fabrics of vivid colors. These people were fashionable and stylish as can be observed by their clothes and accessories. The hats, shoes, bags, carpets, rugs, woolen pads are all made of fabrics, and are well designed with structured weaves, felts, appliqué, even embroidered or painted. Silk fabrics were expensive and hold great value and were often used as currency.

The Kharosthi documents from Eastern Central Asia were found at the sites south of Tarim Basin viz. Niya, Endere and Lou-lan. They were written from the third to the fourth century. Amongst these various documents, some have a mention of coins but other forms of money were used and barter also played an important role. These documents also mention textiles used as payment or part payment, particularly silk, tavastaga carpets, Kojava rugs and felt garments. Silk was a very common currency used in China from the Warring States period (475–221 BC) and by the mid third century BC. There was a standard unit of textile money, which has an equivalent value in coin.

The plate (Fig. 1) depicts bolts of silk used as a currency found in Kroraina in Lop desert, once an independent Kingdom and the neighbor of Khotan¹. Silk continued to be used in payments, although the standard measurements changed over the time.

Fig. 1: Bolts of Silk, 3^rd to 4^th century; Stein 2^nd expedition, L: 33 cm and W: 16 cm.

Fig. 2: Contract exchanging a slave girl for a debt of silk; 1991, Stein, 2^nd expedition: Dunhuang cave 17; British library.

A document (Fig. 2) found by Stein during his second expedition from Dunhuang cave 17 dated 20 December 1991 is a contract exchanging a slave girl for a debt of silk fabric.

Several documents in Kharosthi of the third to the fourth century from Niya, east of Khotan, mention carpets and rugs given in full or part payments for transaction as diverse as women, vineyards and camels.

Travelers needed to hire camels en route. If the camel died, it was a practice for the last keeper to compensate by another camel or a carpet.

The manafacture of silk in these areas was a flourishing industry. The mulberry trees found today in various places on the Silk Route have left a trace of the flourishing silk production and trade.¹ Aurel Stein brought a bolt of Lou-lan silk datable to the 2^nd to the 3^rd century, from his second expedition and it is now in the British museum.

Huge quantities of artifacts found by Aurel Stein were sent by rail and on the back of animals. He took black and white pictures of the mummies and textiles. He carried with him a few textiles, though he left the mummies there to be buried again by the sands.

Some are being discussed in the present work. These conditions cover the two Central Asian expeditions over the periods 1906–1908 and 1913–1916. These textiles from Lou-lan were removed with great care and then brought to museums. The credit of discovery of Eastern civilization and culture goes to Aurel Stein who uncovered shrines, paintings, and graves in the face of continual hardships, discomforts and multiple dangers. The finds of his extensive explorations include numerous antiquities, silk paintings, ancient textiles, painted pottery, coins, tapestries, murals, etc.

The Stein Collection in the National Museum consists of fabrics from the necropolis of Lou-lan. They are mounted and preserved with due care. They ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title
• Copyright
• Foreword
• Contents
• Introduction
• Part 1: Textiles
• Part 2: Ceramics
• Part 3: Arts and Artefacts
• Part 4: Buddhism
• Postscript The Silk Road as Wealth, Hope and Despair
• About the Editors
• Acknowledgements