A report on Hotan, Xinjiang, Tang dynasty and Silk Road

The empire during the reign of Wu Zetian, circa 700

Woven silk textile from Tomb No. 1 at Mawangdui, Changsha, Hunan province, China, dated to the Western Han Era, 2nd century BCE

Kanishka's Empire (2nd century AD) including Khotan

Dzungaria (Red) and the Tarim Basin or Altishahr (Blue)

Portrait painting of Emperor Gaozu (born Li Yuan, 566–635), the first Tang Emperor.

Chinese jade and steatite plaques, in the Scythian-style animal art of the steppes. 4th–3rd century BCE. British Museum.

Bronze coin of Kujula Kadphises found in Khotan.

Northern Xinjiang (Junggar Basin) (Yellow), Eastern Xinjiang- Turpan Depression (Turpan Prefecture and Hami Prefecture) (Red) and Altishahr/the Tarim Basin (Blue)

Empress Wu (Wu Zetian), the sole officially recognized empress regnant of China in more than two millennia. She first ruled through her husband and sons for almost three decades, then became emperor herself and ruled in her own right for another fifteen years.

Achaemenid Persian Empire at its greatest extent, showing the Royal Road.

Physical map showing the separation of Dzungaria and the Tarim Basin (Altishahr) by the Tien Shan Mountains

Soldier with a centaur in the Sampul tapestry, wool wall hanging, 3rd–2nd century BCE, Xinjiang Museum, Urumqi, Xinjiang, China.

Map of Han Dynasty in 2 CE. Light blue is the Tarim Basin protectorate.

The Leshan Giant Buddha, 71 m high; begun in 713, completed in 803

A ceramic horse head and neck (broken from the body), from the Chinese Eastern Han dynasty (1st–2nd century CE)

Map of Central Asia (1878) showing Khotan (near top right corner) and the Sanju Pass, Hindutash, and Ilchi passes through the Kunlun Mountains to Leh, Ladakh. The previous border of the British Indian Empire is shown in the two-toned purple and pink band.

Old Uyghur/Yugur art from the Bezeklik murals

Nanchan Temple (Wutai), built during the late 8th century

Bronze coin of Constantius II (337–361), found in Karghalik, Xinjiang, China

The Silk Road transmission of Buddhism: Mahayana Buddhism first entered the Chinese Empire (Han dynasty) during the Kushan Era. The overland and maritime "Silk Roads" were interlinked and complementary, forming what scholars have called the "great circle of Buddhism".

Amban Ch´ê Ta-jên's guests festing on a terrace in Nar-Bagh, 1912

A Sogdian man on a Bactrian camel. Sancai ceramic statuette, Tang dynasty

A late Tang mural commemorating the victory of General Zhang Yichao over the Tibetans in 848 AD, from Mogao cave 156

Central Asia during Roman times, with the first Silk Road

Mongol states from the 14th to the 17th centuries: the Northern Yuan dynasty, Four Oirat, Moghulistan and Kara Del

Emperor Xuanzong of Tang wearing the robes and hat of a scholar

A Westerner on a camel, Northern Wei dynasty (386–534)

Collecting jade in the White Jade River near Hotan in 2011

The Dzungar–Qing Wars, between the Qing Dynasty and the Dzungar Khanate

Tang tomb figure of an official dressed in Hanfu, with a tall hat, wide-sleeved belted outer garment, and rectangular "kerchief" in front. A white inner gown hangs over his square shoes. He holds a tablet to his chest, a report to his superiors.

Map showing Byzantium along with the other major silk road powers during China's Southern dynasties period of fragmentation.

Map of Hotan (labeled as HO-TIEN (HO-T'IEN) (KHOTAN)) and surrounding region from the International Map of the World (USATC, 1971)

The Battle of Oroi-Jalatu in 1756, between the Manchu and Oirat armies

Civil service exam candidates gather around the wall where results had been posted. Artwork by Qiu Ying.

Coin of Constans II (r. 641–648), who is named in Chinese sources as the first of several Byzantine emperors to send embassies to the Chinese Tang dynasty

Emperor Xuanzong of Tang giving audience to Zhang Guo, by Ren Renfa (1254–1327)

A Chinese sancai statue of a Sogdian man with a wineskin, Tang dynasty (618–907)

Light coloured or "Mutton fat" jade for sale at Hotan Jade Market

Scene from the 1828 Qing campaign against rebels in Altishahr

Emperor Taizong (r. 626–649) receives Gar Tongtsen Yülsung, ambassador of the Tibetan Empire, at his court; later copy of an original painted in 641 by Yan Liben (600–673)

The empires and city-states of the Horn of Africa, such as the Axumites were important trading partners in the ancient Silk Road.

The Chinese Tang dynasty during its greatest extension, controlling large parts of Central Asia.

After the Tang defeated the Gokturks, they reopened the Silk Road to the west.

19th-century Khotan Uyghurs in Yettishar

Chinese officer of the Guard of Honour. Tomb of Princess Chang-le (长乐公主墓), Zhao Mausoleum, Shaanxi province. Tang Zhenguan year 17, i.e. 644 CE

Marco Polo's caravan on the Silk Road, 1380

Entrance to the Khotan Jade Market Center

A 10th-century mural painting in the Mogao Caves at Dunhuang showing monastic architecture from Mount Wutai, Tang dynasty; Japanese architecture of this period was influenced by Tang Chinese architecture

Map of Eurasia and Africa showing trade networks, c. 870

Governor Sheng Shicai ruled from 1933 to 1944.

Tomb figure of mounted warrior similar to the one unearthed from the tomb of Crown Prince Li Chongrun

The Round city of Baghdad between 767 and 912 was the most important urban node along the Silk Road.

The Soviet-backed Second East Turkestan Republic encompassed Xinjiang's Ili, Tarbagatay and Altay districts.

Tomb guardian (wushi yong), early 8th century

A lion motif on Sogdian polychrome silk, 8th century, most likely from Bukhara

A bas relief of a soldier and the emperor's horse, Autumn Dew, with elaborate saddle and stirrups, designed by Yan Liben, from the tomb of Emperor Taizong c. 650

Yuan Dynasty era Celadon vase from Mogadishu.

Illustration of Byzantine embassy to Tang Taizong 643 CE

Map of Marco Polo's travels in 1271–1295

Tang dynasty Kai Yuan Tong Bao (開元通寳) coin, first minted in 621 in Chang'an, a model for the Japanese 8th-century Wadōkaichin

Port cities on the maritime silk route featured on the voyages of Zheng He.

Local jade displayed in the Hotan Cultural Museum lobby.

Plan of the Silk Road with its maritime branch

Map of the region including Khotan (Ilchi) (1893)

Black Irtysh river in Burqin County is a famous spot for sightseeing.

Tomb figure of a horse with a carefully sculpted saddle, decorated with leather straps and ornamental fastenings featuring eight-petalled flowers and apricot leaves.

Map including Hotan (Ho-t'ien, Khotan) (DMA, 1983)

A contract from the Tang dynasty that records the purchase of a 15-year-old slave for six bolts of plain silk and five Chinese coins. Found in the Astana Cemetery in Turfan.

Ambassador from Khotan (于闐國 Yutian) to the Tang dynasty, in Wanghuitu (王會圖) circa 650 CE.

Tomb Figure of a Sogdian merchant, 7th-century

A mural depicting a corner tower, most likely one of Chang'an, from the tomb of Prince Yide (d. 701) at the Qianling Mausoleum, dated 706

Nur Bekri, Chairman of the Xinjiang Government between 2007 and 2015

The Nestorian Stele, created in 781, describes the introduction of Nestorian Christianity to China

The distribution map of Xinjiang's GDP per person (2011)

The bronze Jingyun Bell cast 711, height 247 cm high, weight 6,500 kg, now in the Xi'an Bell Tower

Fragment of a wall painting depicting Buddha from a stupa in Miran along the Silk Road (200AD - 400AD)

Ürümqi is a major industrial center within Xinjiang.

A Tang dynasty era copy of the preface to the Lantingji Xu poems composed at the Orchid Pavilion Gathering, originally attributed to Wang Xizhi (303–361 AD) of the Jin dynasty

A blue-eyed Central Asian monk teaching an East-Asian monk, Bezeklik, Turfan, eastern Tarim Basin, China, 9th century; the monk on the right is possibly Tocharian, although more likely Sogdian.

A poem by Li Bai (701–762 AD), the only surviving example of Li Bai's calligraphy, housed in the Palace Museum in Beijing.

Bilingual edict (Greek and Aramaic) by Indian Buddhist King Ashoka, 3rd century BCE; see Edicts of Ashoka, from Kandahar. This edict advocates the adoption of "godliness" using the Greek term Eusebeia for Dharma. Kabul Museum.

Calligraphy of Emperor Taizong on a Tang stele

A statue depicting Buddha giving a sermon, from Sarnath, 3000 km southwest of Urumqi, Xinjiang, 8th century

A Tang dynasty sculpture of a Bodhisattva

Iconographical evolution of the Wind God. Left: Greek Wind God from Hadda, 2nd century. Middle: Wind God from Kizil, Tarim Basin, 7th century. Right: Japanese Wind God Fujin, 17th century.

An 8th-century silk wall scroll from Dunhuang, showing the paradise of Amitabha

This flag (Kök Bayraq) has become a symbol of the East Turkestan independence movement.

A timber hall built in 857, located at the Buddhist Foguang Temple of Mount Wutai, Shanxi

"Heroic Gesture of Bodhisattvathe Bodhisattva", example of 6th-7th-century terracotta Greco-Buddhist art (local populations were Buddhist) from Tumxuk, Xinjiang

A Tang sancai-glazed carved relief showing horseback riders playing polo

Sogdian donors to the Buddha, 8th century fresco (with detail), Bezeklik, Eastern Tarim Basin

A late Tang or early Five Dynasties era silk painting on a banner depicting Guanyin and a female attendant in silk robes, from the Dunhuang caves, now in the British Museum

Two-Storeyed Caravanserai, Baku, Azerbaijan

Palace ladies in a garden from a mural of Prince Li Xian's tomb in the Qianling Mausoleum, where Wu Zetian was also buried in 706

Bridge in Ani, capital of medieval Armenia

People engaging in snow sports by a statue of bodhisattva Guanyin in Wujiaqu

Tang era gilt-gold bowl with lotus and animal motifs

A Tang sancai-glazed lobed dish with incised decorations, 8th century

Medieval fortress of Amul, Turkmenabat, Turkmenistan

Tomb figure of a lady attendant, 7th- to 8th-century; during the Tang era, female hosts prepared feasts, tea parties, and played drinking games with their guests.

Temple of the Great Buddha in Midong, Ürümqi

A rounded "offering plate" with design in "three colors" (sancai) glaze, 8th-century

Sogdian man on a Bactrian camel, sancai ceramic glaze, Chinese Tang dynasty (618–907)

Taoist Temple of Fortune and Longevity at the Heavenly Lake of Tianshan in Fukang, Changji Hui Autonomous Prefecture

The ruins of a Han dynasty (206 BCE – 220 CE) Chinese watchtower made of rammed earth at Dunhuang, Gansu province

A square bronze mirror with a phoenix motif of gold and silver inlaid with lacquer, 8th-century

A late Zhou or early Han Chinese bronze mirror inlaid with glass, perhaps incorporated Greco-Roman artistic patterns

Id Kah mosque in Kashgar, largest mosque in China

The Diamond Sutra, printed in 868, is the world's first widely printed book to include a specific date of printing.

A Chinese Western Han dynasty (202 BCE – 9 CE) bronze rhinoceros with gold and silver inlay

Erkin Tuniyaz, the incumbent Chairman of the Xinjiang Government

The Dunhuang map, a star map showing the North Polar region. c. 700. The whole set of star maps contains over 1,300 stars.

Han dynasty Granary west of Dunhuang on the Silk Road.

"Great Tang" (Dà Táng) in seal characters.

Green Roman glass cup unearthed from an Eastern Han dynasty (25–220 CE) tomb, Guangxi, southern China

A Tang Dynasty sancai statuette of Sogdian musicians riding on a Bactrian camel, 723 AD, Xi'an.

Hotan (also known as Gosthana, Gaustana, Godana, Godaniya, Khotan, Hetian, Hotien) is a major oasis town in southwestern Xinjiang, an autonomous region in Western China.

- Hotan

An important station on the southern branch of the historic Silk Road, Hotan has always depended on two strong rivers—the Karakash River and the White Jade River to provide the water needed to survive on the southwestern edge of the vast Taklamakan Desert.

- Hotan

The most well-known route of the historic Silk Road ran through the territory from the east to its northwestern border.

- Xinjiang

From its numerous subjects, the dynasty raised professional and conscripted armies of hundreds of thousands of troops to contend with nomadic powers for control of Inner Asia and the lucrative trade-routes along the Silk Road.

- Tang dynasty

The Western Regions during the Tang era were known as Qixi (磧西).

- Xinjiang

The main historical sources are to be found in the Chinese histories (particularly detailed during the Han and early Tang dynasties) when China was interested in control of the Western Regions, the accounts of several Chinese pilgrim monks, a few Buddhist histories of Hotan that have survived in Classical Tibetan and a large number of documents in the Iranian Saka language and other languages discovered, for the most part, early this century at various sites in the Tarim Basin and from the hidden library at the Mogao Caves near Dunhuang.

- Hotan

The southern stretches of the Silk Road, from Khotan (Xinjiang) to Eastern China, were first used for jade and not silk, as long as 5000 BCE, and is still in use for this purpose.

- Silk Road

From right to left, the countries are Lu (魯國) which is a reference to the Eastern Wei, Rouran (芮芮國), Persia (波斯國), Baekje (百濟國), Kumedh (胡密丹), Baiti (白題國), Mohe people (靺國), Central India (中天竺), Sri Lanka (獅子國), Northern India (北天竺), Tashkurgan (謁盤陀), Wuxing City of the Chouchi (武興國), Kucha (龜茲國), Japan (倭國), Goguryeo (高麗國), Khotan (于闐國), Silla (新羅國), Dangchang (宕昌國), Langkasuka (狼牙修), Dengzhi (鄧至國), Yarkand (周古柯), Kabadiyan (阿跋檀), Barbarians of Jianping (建平蠻), Nudan (女蜑國).

- Tang dynasty

The longtime jade supply from the Tarim Basin is well-documented archaeologically: "It is well known that ancient Chinese rulers had a strong attachment to jade. All of the jade items excavated from the tomb of Fuhao of the Shang dynasty, more than 750 pieces, were from Khotan in modern Xinjiang. As early as the mid-first millennium BC, the Yuezhi engaged in the jade trade, of which the major consumers were the rulers of agricultural China."

- Xinjiang

Both the Old Book of Tang and New Book of Tang, covering the history of the Chinese Tang dynasty (618–907), record that a new state called Fu-lin (拂菻; i.e. Byzantine Empire) was virtually identical to the previous Daqin (大秦; i.e. Roman Empire).

- Silk Road

In fact, it was during this rebellion that the Tang withdrew its western garrisons stationed in what is now Gansu and Qinghai, which the Tibetans then occupied along with the territory of what is now Xinjiang.

- Tang dynasty

3 related topics with Alpha

Kashgar

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Kashgar in the Kushan Empire under Kanishka the Great

Camels traversing the old silk road in 1992

Kalmyk Archer, Kashgar Army in the 1870s

Night interview with Yakub Beg, King of Kashgaria, 1868

Colonel Mannerheim at the Russian Consulate in Kashgar, 1906

Sign marking previous Russian Consulate in Kashgar

Map of Kashgar (labeled as SU-FU (KASHGAR)) and surrounding region from the International Map of the World (1966)

Map including Kashgar (labeled as Kashi K'a-shih (Kashgar)) (DMA, 1983)

Cafe built on site of old British Consulate-General. Kashgar. 2011

Uyghur family with two calves for sale at Kashgar market.

Map of the region including Kashgar (1893)

Mao statue in the city square of Kashgar.

Kashgar (قەشقەر) or Kashi is an oasis city in the Tarim Basin region of Southern Xinjiang.

With a population of over 500,000, Kashgar has served as a trading post and strategically important city on the Silk Road between China, the Middle East and Europe for over 2,000 years, making it one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in the World.

Another early mention of Kashgar is during the Former Han (also known as the Western Han dynasty), when in 76 BCE the Chinese conquered the Xiongnu, Yutian (Khotan), Sulei (Kashgar) and a group of states in the Tarim Basin almost up to the foot of the Tian Shan range.

The founding of the Tang dynasty in 618 saw the beginning of a prolonged struggle between China and the Western Turks for control of the Tarim Basin.

Uyghurs

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The Uyghurs ( or ), alternatively spelled Uighurs, Uygurs or Uigurs, are a Turkic ethnic group originating from and culturally affiliated with the general region of Central and East Asia.

Uyghur man in traditional clothing, playing a tambur, a traditional Uyghur instrument.

A possible Tocharian or Sogdian monk (left) with an East Asian Buddhist monk (right). A fresco from the Bezeklik Thousand Buddha Caves, dated to the 9th or 10th century (Kara-Khoja Kingdom).

Uyghur princes from Cave 9 of the Bezeklik Thousand Buddha Caves, Xinjiang, China, 8th–9th century AD, wall painting

Uyghur Khaganate in geopolitical context c. 820 AD

Map showing the distribution of ethnicities in Xinjiang according to census figures from 2000, the prefectures with Uyghur majorities are in blue.

Protesters Amsterdam with the Flag of East Turkestan

Leaf from an Uyghur-Manichaean version of the ‘‘Arzhang’’.

Wall painting at Bezeklik caves in Flaming Mountains, Turpan Depression.

Doppa Maker, traditional Uyghur hats, Kashgar

A Uyghur man having his head shaved in a bazaar. Shaving of head is now seen mostly among the older generation.

Uyghur girl in clothing made of fabric with design distinctive to the Uyghurs

Uyghur women on their way to work, Kashgar. 2011

The Uyghurs are recognized as native to the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region in Northwest China.

. It is transcribed into Tang annals as / (Mandarin: Huíhé, but probably *[ɣuɒiɣət] in Middle Chinese).

These groups of peoples often identify themselves by their originating oasis instead of an ethnicity; for example those from Kashgar may refer to themselves as Kashgarliq or Kashgari, while those from Hotan identity themselves as "Hotani".

During the late-19th and early-20th centuries, scientific and archaeological expeditions to the region of Xinjiang's Silk Road discovered numerous cave temples, monastery ruins, and wall paintings, as well as miniatures, books, and documents.

Tarim Basin

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Endorheic basin in Northwest China occupying an area of about 888,000 km2 and one of the largest basins in Northwest China.

Physical map showing the separation of Dzungaria and the Tarim Basin (Taklamakan) by the Tien Shan Mountains

Tarim basin ancient boats; they were used for burials

Tarim mummies, found in westernmost Xinjiang, within the Tarim Basin.

Fragmentary painting on silk of a woman playing the go boardgame, from the Astana Cemetery, Gaochang, c. 744 AD, during the late period of Tang Chinese rule (just before the An Lushan Rebellion)

Map of Taizong's campaigns against the Tarim Basin oasis states, allies of the Western Turks.

A document from Khotan written in Khotanese Saka, part of the Eastern Iranian branch of the Indo-European languages, listing the animals of the Chinese zodiac in the cycle of predictions for people born in that year; ink on paper, early 9th century

Uyghur princes from the Bezeklik Thousand Buddha Caves near Turpan, Kingdom of Qocho, 8th-9th centuries

An Islamic cemetery outside the Afaq Khoja Mausoleum in Kashgar

Northern Xinjiang (Dzungar Basin) (yellow), Eastern Xinjiang - Turpan Depression (Turpan Prefecture and Hami Prefecture) (red), and the Tarim Basin (blue)

Fresco, with Hellenistic influences, from a stupa shrine, Miran

Painting of a Christian woman, Khocho (Gaochang), early period of Chinese Tang rule, 602–654 AD

Located in China's Xinjiang region, it is sometimes used synonymously to refer to the southern half of the province, or Nanjiang, as opposed to the northern half of the province known as Dzungaria or Beijiang.

The southern Tarim route ran from Kashgar over Yarkant, Karghalik, Pishan, Khotan, Keriya, Niya, Qarqan, Qarkilik, Miran and Dunhuang to Anxi.

During the Tang Dynasty, a series of military expeditions were conducted against the oasis states of the Tarim Basin, then vassals of the Western Turkic Khaganate.

Recent research with help of GIS database have provided a fine-grained analysis of the ancient oasis of Niya on the Silk Road.