htmlFa Xian, who has been in his sixties for 60 years, is walking on the Silk Road | Documentary "The Record of the Buddha's Kingdom: Fa Xian's Traveling West"
He did not take the land route again, but instead took the sea route.
In 411 AD, with the help of local merchants, Faxian boarded the merchant ship returning to the east, passing through Shiziguo (now Sri Lanka) and Java Island , with the destination of Guangzhou along the South China Sea .
Surprisingly, under the wind and waves, the ship gradually deviated, and it was three months later than expected to dock. It had already bypassed Guangzhou and almost fell into a food shortage crisis. After getting ashore, Faxian asked the local hunters and found out that the ship had arrived at Qingzhou Changguang County (now Jimo, Shandong) .
This is the first time a Chinese monk went to India to learn scriptures and seek Dharma. Faxian became the first traveler to travel around China and India in history. What’s more rare is that Faxian’s back and forth journey passed through the land Silk Road and the Maritime Silk Road respectively, confirming the long history of the “Belt and Road”.
When I returned to my hometown, Faxian was already a 78-year-old man.
Sri Lanka Beach | Tuchuang Creative©
Silk Road
The first German geographer named "Silk Road" Li Xihofen , took Zhang Qian's mission to the Western Regions as the starting point for the Silk Road opening. He set the opening of the Silk Road in 114 BC.
This year, Zhang Qian died, not long after he returned to China for the second time on his mission to Western Regions .
After Zhang Qian opened the Western Regions, the land Silk Road formed two relatively fixed routes, namely the Middle Road and the South Road (after , the north road leading from Hexi to Hami gradually matured) .
In Han Dynasty , generally speaking, the Silk Road starts from the capital Chang'an, passes through the Guanzhong Plain, enters the Hexi Corridor, and reaches Dunhuang, one of the four Hexi counties. From Dunhuang to Yumen Pass, you will cross the Bailongdui Desert, which is recorded in ancient books, pass through ancient Lop Nur, and arrive at the famous Loulan Ancient Kingdom in the Western Regions.
According to later records, Lop Nur was the most difficult section of the Western Regions. There are often "evil ghosts" in the sand river, and the hot wind is raging. Pedestrians will die as long as they encounter it. There are no birds in the sky and no beasts on the ground. If you want to find a way out, you can only use the dead bones along the way as a signpost. Some scholars speculate that the "ghost words" heard by Faxian may be the sound of wind and sand in the desert. After
arrived in Loulan, the Silk Road is divided into two routes:
all the way to the southwest, which is the southern road, reaching the southern edge of Tarim Basin , and traveling west along the north side of Kunlun Mountain. The northwest route of
is called the middle road. It follows the northern edge of the Tarim Basin and moves along the southern foot of the Tianshan Mountains.
Zhang Qian and countless merchants, envoys, soldiers and monks walking on these roads are all pioneers of the Silk Road.
Zhang Qian's early deeds are not recorded in history books. He only knows that as a Langguan (a court attendant) , he responded to the conscript of Emperor Wu of Han in 139 BC and went to the Western Regions to find the Great Yuezhi who moved west to attack the Huns.
When Zhang Qian went on his mission, the Hexi Corridor and the Tarim Basin were under the control of the Huns. As soon as Zhang Qian and his group left Longxi, they encountered the Huns' army and were detained by the Huns. The Huns put Zhang Qian under house arrest and found him a Hu wife.
But Zhang Qian has never forgotten his mission. No matter how the Huns PUA, he did not hand over the talisman that represents the identity of messengers in the Han Dynasty. In this way, he was detained in the territory of the Huns for 13 years, and finally found an opportunity to escape, continue to travel westward, and look for the Great Yuezhi.
When Zhang Qian went through a lot of hardships and finally found the immigrant of the Great Yuezhi on the banks of the Amu River, the latter had already let go of his hatred for the Huns and was unwilling to form a military alliance with the Han Dynasty.
History is full of accidents.
Zhang Qian made his first mission to the Western Regions and did not complete his mission, but this trip made unexpected gains.
After Zhang Qian returned to China, he not only reported to Emperor Wu of Han about the situation of 36 Western Regions in the Tianshan area, but also made the Han Dynasty understand the customs and customs of Central Asian countries such as Dayuan , Kangju, Dayuezhi, and Daxia, to the Pamir Plateau (known as "Pangling" in ancient times). When he was in Daxia, he also learned from the local people that there was an ancient country called 正文 (now India) in the southwest of the Han Empire.
When visiting Daxia, west of Pamir, Zhang Qian discovered the specialty Qiong bamboo stick and Shu cloth produced in , Shu in the Great Han Dynasty (now Sichuan).
Zhang Qian asked the local residents, how did you get these products?
people in Daxia told him that these were all transported from the southern body poison.
Therefore, Zhang Qian speculated that there was a road in the southwest of the Han Dynasty, leading from Shu to Shidu Kingdom and then to Daxia.
After Emperor Wu of Han heard about this, he sent someone to look for a way to India from the southwest. This exploration included the southwestern Yi in the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau under the rule of the Han Dynasty, and also discovered the "Yarang Road" leading from the Yunnan-Guizhou Plateau to India.
This is the eastern line of "South Silk Road" .
Historically, the Silk Road was not just the direction from the Hexi Corridor to the Western Regions, but also several other routes.
High latitude areas Grassland Silk Road is a channel for migration of nomadic peoples and was formed as early as 1000 BC.
This road starts from the middle of the Yellow River, goes north to the Mongolian grassland, crosses the Altai Mountains, enters the Kazakh grassland, and leads to the Black Coast. The famous Aryans migration eastward and the Xiongnu moving westward all occurred on the grassland Silk Road.
"Jade Road" , which was earlier than the Grassland Silk Road, is also one of the predecessors of the Silk Road.
This route extends westward from the ancient Central Plains to the Kunlun Mountains. The tomb of Fu Hao, the concubine of Shang King Wu Ding (13th century BC) was discovered in Yinxu, Anyang. Many of them were produced in Hetian, Xinjiang, namely "Jade of Kunshan", which provides evidence for the existence of the jade road.
When Zhang Qian went on a mission to the Western Regions, he also discovered that Khotan's country "many jade" on the southern edge of the Tarim Basin.
Although the first mission failed to convince the Dayuezhi to form an alliance with the Han Dynasty, after Zhang Qian returned to the Han Dynasty, based on his understanding of the Western Regions, he suggested to Emperor Wu of Han to alliance with the nomadic people Wusun in the Yili River Valley area on the northern foot of the Tianshan Mountains.
So, in 116 BC, Emperor Wu of Han sent Zhang Qian to lead a mission of 300 people to the Western Regions for the second time, heading to Wusun in the Yili River basin.
never thought that Wusun people was also very cowardly and did not agree to the alliance request of the Han Dynasty. They just sent envoys to return to the court with Zhang Qian and thanked Emperor Wu of Han.
After Zhang Qian arrived in Wusun, he sent deputy envoys to visit Dayuan, Kangju, Dayuezhi, Daxia, Anxi, and Sindu countries respectively. When Zhang Qian went on his first mission, he knew that the Central Asian countries had "no paint or silk in their land". Therefore, when he went to the Western Regions for the second mission, he asked the court to prepare a large number of precious silk as gifts to the countries along the way.
In this regard, the "Han Shu" records that the gifts brought by Zhang Qian's delegation "There are tens of thousands of cattle and sheep, and the funds are thousands of thousands of silk. Most of them hold the deputy envoys of the rituals, and the way can be sent to the countryside."
This is the first batch of recorded Chinese silk that passed through the west of the Silk Road. After seeing Zhang Qian's subordinates in the distant country, he sincerely felt the strength of the Han Dynasty and realized that the Han Dynasty was not short of money.
Han Dynasty historian Sima Qian In "Records of the Grand Historian", he used a more vivid word to describe Zhang Qian's historical event in "Records of the Grand Historian" - "dig the empty" Western Regions .
Statue of Zhang Qian in Yangguan Scenic Area, Dunhuang, Gansu | Tuchuang Creative©
East-West Road
Before the journey to the west of the Han Dynasty was blocked by the Huns, the Greeks in the West had already begun to explore the East.
In the 4th century BC, the students of Aristotle, Macedonian, Kings Alexander After unifying the entire territory of Greek , they marched eastward to sweep West and Central Asia, and pushed the influence of Greek civilization to the Fergana Basin between the Tianshan Mountains and the Gizar-Alaya Mountains.
Alexander's army once crossed the Amu River and captured the core area of Central Asia - today's Uzbekistan Samarkand .
As the saying goes, God is jealous of talent. This conqueror who "always turn his eyes to the distance" died shortly after the Eastern Expedition. His army failed to continue exploring eastward and passed by China, which was in the Warring States period at that time. After that, Alexander's empire fell apart and Greek civilization gradually withdrew from Central Asia.
During the reign of Emperor Wu of Han, Central Asia, where Zhang Qian arrived, was in the "Hellenistic Age" after the Alexander era.
With the arrival of the Han Dynasty envoy, the Han Dynasty replaced the long-defunct Alexander Empire and transported the culture and wealth of Chinese civilization to Central Asia.
The two empires of the East and the West compete for discourse power and influence in Central Asia. Such a history will continue to be staged in the future East-West relations.
Uzbekistan's ancient city of Samarkand | Photo Network ©
With the opening of the Silk Road, Europeans began to leave traces about China in the literature. They called the ancient country in the East "Seris" , which means the country of silk.
When the Roman nobles watched the Colosseum performance in their precious silk from the East, Ancient Roman Poet Virgil used his poem to describe the imaginary oriental fantasy: "The Seris collected very slender wool from the leaves of their trees."
The Romans at that time did not know that silk was produced from silkworms that feed on mulberry, so they fantasized a fairy tale of "sweets from trees".
The Han Empire also longed to understand the farther West.
More than 200 years after Zhang Qian opened up the Western Regions, Eastern Han messengers Ganying accepted the appointment of the Western Regions' guardian Ban Chao, walked west along the southern foot of the Tianshan Mountains, crossed the Pamir Plateau, entered the Mesopotamian Basin, and came all the way to the seaside of the Persian Gulf.
It is generally believed that Gan Ying's trip to the west was to find the way to "Da Qin" (i.e. the Roman Empire) .
But just as he was about to cross the sea, the resting sailor on the boat stopped him.
The resting man said that the road to Daqin is extremely far away. If you encounter a headwind, it often takes two or three years to reach it. Therefore, those who enter the sea must prepare at least three years of food, and there are longing monsters in the sea, which can make people miss their hometown, become sad and crazy, and fall into the sea and die.
Some scholars believe that the story of the Sabre man scaring Gan Ying is the prototype of the Siren legend in Greek mythology.
年年 , also known as Parthian Empire , this Western Asian power, which was almost the same as the Qin and Han dynasties, was located between the Roman Empire and the Han Empire, and had a long monopoly on the huge profits of the Silk Road. For their own interests, they were unwilling to directly contact Rome and the Han two producers and consumers.
History records that after the Sailor of Anxi, Gan Ying "I stopped hearing it" .
From Chang'an to Rome, the Silk Road stretches for tens of thousands of miles, but by the vast sea, the Eastern Han envoys were only one step away from the Roman Empire.
Hormuz Island's Persian Gulf Coast | Tuchuang Creative©
Exchange Road
The opening of the Silk Road has brought about the first major exchange of Chinese and Western goods in world history.
After Zhang Qian went on a mission to the Western Regions, not only did China's silk circulate westward in large quantities, but fruits such as peaches, apricots, pears and pears native to China were also brought to West Asia and India by merchants.
The romantic Emperor Wu of Han was curious about foreign things on the Silk Road, especially the good horses produced in Dayuan (in the Fergana Basin today), and he praised it as "Tianma". It is said that when Dayuan horses run, they will shed blood-like sweat, so they are also called "sweat-blood BMW" .
Emperor Wu of Han attacked the Huns in the north for many years and needed good horses as an important military resource. After hearing Zhang Qian's statement that good horses were produced in Dayuan, he sent envoys to (Osh, Osh) of the Dayuan Kingdom to trade in , in exchange for local sweat-blooded BMWs.
However, the people of Dayuan are unwilling to offer horses, and they always replace them with inferior horses from other places. Even when Emperor Wu of Han ordered people to carry a golden horse to trade with the Dayuan people, the King of Dayuan still refused. The Han envoy smashed the golden horse he brought in in person and humiliated the King of Dayuan.
Dayuan people are really no zuo no die. It would be fine if they can't bear to leave the good horse, but then they were even more confused and even ambushed on the way back of the Han envoy and intercepted him.
After hearing that the Han envoy was killed, Emperor Wu of Han was furious and sent his favorite concubine, Mrs. Li, to lead his army to the west to Dayuan. Li Guangli’s title “ General 2 ” originated from this war to seize the good horse.
But Emperor Wu of Han, Li Guangli, was obviously not as good as his previous brother-in-law named Wei Qing in war. Due to the lack of supplies on the Silk Road, when he led his army to Dayuan, there were only a few thousand troops left by tens of thousands of troops, and he was beaten by the people of Dayuan.
Li Guangli had to retreat to Dunhuang, when only one tenth of his troops were left. Li Guangli was afraid that Emperor Wu of Han was angry, so scared that he stayed in Dunhuang, and did not dare to send troops or return to the court.
The second year, Emperor Wu of Han summoned another 60,000 soldiers to ask Li Guangli to redeem his merits and send troops from Dunhuang to conquer Dayuan.
This time, Li Guangli learned his lesson and forced the supply from a small country on the Silk Road to the capital of Dayuan. Although the Han army lost more than half of the Han army during the long-distance march, the Dayuan army was also scattered all over the place and there was no time to defend. Li Guangli led his army to surround Dayuan City for more than 40 days, digging out the water source in the city, and forcing Dayuan to surrender.
After that, Dayuan agreed to pay tribute to the Han Dynasty every year in exchange for a large number of rewards from the Han Dynasty. After paying heavy casualties, Emperor Wu of Han finally got his bloody BMW as he wished.
Map of the Western Regions of the Han Dynasty in "Records of Buddha" | Internet
The forage specially used by the Dayuan people to feed horses "alphafa" also spread to the east along with the Silk Road.
Alfalfa is the most widely distributed and most cultivated grass in the world. When Zhang Qian went on a mission to the Western Regions, he saw large areas of planted alfalfa in the countries along the way and brought back the alfalfa seeds. At the latest to the Northern Wei Dynasty, alfalfa was promoted to the middle and lower reaches of the Yellow River, and was called an important feed for raising cattle and horses.
At the same time, some products named "Hu" were also introduced to the Central Plains from west to east. Such as walnut , which is widely distributed in Central Asia, persian jujube , which is produced in persian , pomegranate , which is derived from angli, etc.
During the 16 Kingdoms of the Eastern Jin Dynasty, the ruler of the Northern Later Zhao Shihu loved these Western fruits transported from the Silk Road.
Historical records show that Shi Hu used 160,000 male and female migrant workers to transport soil with ten thousand vehicles to build a Hualin Garden in Yecheng, and brought Zhangshui into the garden to plant plants in the Western Regions. There are "The Queen Mother of the West, leaves in winter and summer, flowers grow in September, ripen in December, three sons and one foot" and the An Mumbai tree "the son is as big as a cherry".
The cruel Shi Hu became a Western Region crop promoter because he is a Jie tribe and does not like the word "Hu". While planting these plants, he ordered people to remove the text related to Hu in his name, which makes it easier for the people of the Central Plains to accept these new crops. Since then, An Pomegranate has cultivated excellent varieties in Hebei, which once became an important pomegranate production area.
In the chaotic times, the Central Plains is fragmented, and new beliefs are spreading on the Silk Road.
Qing Xinjiang grapes | Tuchong Creative©
Road to Faith
Buddhism was introduced into the Central Plains through the Silk Road during the Eastern Han Dynasty and developed to Wish, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties , and became the "national religion" respected by many regimes.
With the destruction of the unified dynasty, the empire lost its supreme authority, and the theory of "harmony between man and nature" established by Confucianism is on the verge of bankruptcy. From kings to people, new beliefs are needed to support the repressed mental state. Buddhism from the Western Regions can just soothe the displaced minds in troubled times.
During this period, many eminent monks emerged on the Silk Road.
In addition to the above mentioned Faxian who travels around the land Silk Road and the Maritime Silk Road, there are also the Sabre Anshigao , Kumarajiva from the Indian nobles, etc.
Kumarajiva practiced in Kucha in the Western Regions since childhood (between Kuche and Shaya counties in Xinjiang Province), and his reputation spread far to Chang'an.
Former Qin Fu Jian After hearing this, he believed that Kumarajiva was a great man sent by God to assist him, and sent generals Lu Guang and others to send troops to the Western Regions. Before the army set off, Fu Jian specifically instructed Lu Guang: "I heard that there was a high monk named Kumarajiva in the Western Regions, who was the treasure of the country's fortune. After you conquer Kucha, you should invite him immediately."
After Lu Guang set out along the Silk Road, Fu Jian was defeated in the Battle of Feishui with the Eastern Jin Dynasty in 383 AD. The defeat of Feishui not only shattered Fu Jian's desire to unify the north and south, but also caused the Former Qin to collapse. Kumarajiva was unable to go to Chang'an to preach the scriptures to Fu Jian. He stayed in Liangzhou for more than ten years. It was not until Yao Xing of the Later Qin Dynasty was in power that he was welcomed to Chang'an and received the courtesy of the national teacher.
When Kumarajiva entered Chang'an, Faxian was traveling westward through the Silk Road.
The Former Qin Expeditionary Force brought back to the Han area from the Western Regions, such rare treasures such as Kucha music and wine, were also spread and shined in the Sui and Tang Dynasties.
Xinjiang Kizil Thousand Buddha Cave and Kumarajiva Statue | Tuchong Creative©
In the early years of the Tang Dynasty, a young monk with the Dharma name Xuanzang embarked on the road of pursuing faith along the Silk Road.
first year of Zhenguan (627) , Emperor Taizong of Tang, Li Shimin, who came to power with the Xuanwu Gate, was in a state of great concern to consolidate the regime, and the invasion of the Turks made him even worse. This year, the Central Plains suffered frost and famine. Therefore, Emperor Taizong of Tang ordered the victims to "go out with the Fengfeng four times" and allowed them to migrate to various places and find their own way out.
Xuanzang hid among the crowd and walked westward. He did not want to escape from famine, but to go to India to study Buddhism and retrieve the true scriptures. However, in the early years of Zhenguan, in order to avoid collusion between the people on the border with the Turks, the imperial court imposed strict restrictions on leaving the country.
After Xuanzang arrived in Hexi, he failed to apply for "passing the office" (passing certificate) , so he decided to smuggle out of customs through illegal channels.
At that time, the ancient city of Loulan had been abandoned. It led to the Western Regions from Yumen Pass in Guazhou in the Tang Dynasty. It could pass northwest through the Gobi Desert called "Moheyan Diamond" to the northwest, reach Yiwu (Hami) , and go west along the Tianshan Mountains. This road is the North Silk Road.
After Xuanzang smuggled through Yumen Pass, he encountered the first dangerous situation in his journey in Moheyanchi. There are only five beacon towers in this Gobi Desert, and there is spring water under each beacon tower and , which is the only supply on this road. However, Xuanzang unfortunately got lost and accidentally dropped a leather bag containing water.
He was in despair, endured his hunger and thirst and walked for five days and five nights, almost died, before he found the source of water and was able to survive.
Xuanzang later recalled this experience and said: "This kind of danger cannot be prepared for hundreds of thousands."
Fortunately, after Xuanzang arrived in Gaochang, Turpan, he received funding from Gaochang King Qu Wentai. Qu Wentai was a Buddhist. Later, he disobeyed the Tang Dynasty many times and was attacked by Emperor Taizong of Tang. He was frightened and died, and his country was destroyed.
It was with the help of Qu Wentai that Xuanzang was able to continue his journey. The enthusiastic King Gaochang not only sent four little novice monks and 25 servants to escort Xuanzang to the west, but also wrote to 24 countries west of Gaochang on the Silk Road, asking them to assist Xuanzang, including the Khan of the Western Turks.
Xuanzang and his party continued to travel westward and encountered an avalanche while crossing the Tianshan Mountains (Xuanzang called it "Tyrannosaurus") , with heavy casualties. When he arrived at Lake Isek in Kyrgyzstan's current , there were only a few Xuanzang's companions left.
After a long journey of more than 50,000 miles, Xuanzang finally arrived in India. In India, Xuanzang traveled all over the north, central and southern India, and stayed at Nalanda Temple, the center of Indian Buddhism for the longest time, studying here for many years.
Indian Jieri King repeatedly tried to keep Xuanzang, but Xuanzang did not forget his original intention. After he finished his studies, he refused King Jieri's kindness and stood up and returned east.
Xuanzang did not go to the sea like Faxian, but continued to follow the Silk Road on the land, return to Dunhuang along the Silk Road, and enter Yumen Pass.
19th year of Zhenguan (645) , when Xuanzang returned to Chang'an, Emperor Taizong of Tang did not pursue his guilt of privately going to India, but summoned him personally and held a grand welcome ceremony for him. After that, Xuanzang wrote his experiences on the Silk Road into "A Record of the Western Regions of the Great Tang Dynasty".
The rulers of the Tang Dynasty were very tolerant of religion. Although they claimed to be descendants of Laozi (Li Er) and respected Taoism, they still treated Buddhism preferentially most of the time. In addition, Zoroastrianism, Manichaeism, Nestorianism (Christian Nestorius) was also introduced to China through the Silk Road east.
Huichang Destruction Movement (840-846) , not only Buddhist monks were affected, but also 3,000 Nestorians and Zoroastrians were also forced to return to secular life. Some believers who escaped punishment by chance fled to Guangzhou in the south to continue their missionary missions until they met a man named Huang Chao many years later.
Xi'an Big Wild Goose Pagoda and Xuanzang statue | Photo Network ©
The road of war
After the encounter between the great man and Rome came to an abrupt end, they each went toward death.
395, the Roman Empire split into the Eastern Roman Empire and the Western Roman Empire. This year was the 20th year of Taiyuan in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, and China was also deeply trapped in the quagmire of troubled times.
The Western Roman Empire existed less than three centuries and was destroyed by the " barbarians " Germans, and its heritage was inherited by the divided continental countries. The Eastern Roman Empire existed for a longer time until 1453, with the fall of Constantinople as a symbol of its destruction, but before that, the territory of the Eastern Roman Empire had been shrinking.
The Arabs in the east were strong for a while and conquered everywhere was one of the reasons why Eastern Rome was difficult to regain its might.
As mentioned earlier, since the Silk Road was opened, there will always be two major powers in the East and the West to compete for hegemony in Central Asia. In the Tang Dynasty, the Western country that was coexisted with the Tang Empire was the Islamized Arab Empire (Dashi) , which rose strongly after the 7th century with an astonishing expansion rate.
When Emperor Gaozong of Tang (649-683) was reigned, the Persian Sassanid Dynasty was defeated by the Great Food, the last Persian king was killed, and his son Beilus ran to Tochar in the northern part of Afghanistan to continue to resist the Great Cannibals, and sent a distress signal to the East Datang twice.
Due to the distance, the Tang Dynasty was really helpless in Persia's affairs, but it still announced that it would set up a Persian Governor's Office in the Persian Jiling City (now Zabole, Iran) , appointing Belus as the governor, and under the jurisdiction of the Anxi Protectorate. This is a common ban system used by the Tang Dynasty, that is, to establish Tang Dynasty official positions in foreign areas that are not under jurisdiction, and continue to be governed by local people, indicating that the influence of the Tang Dynasty has spread here.
However, the Tang army was beyond the reach of the war between Persia and the Great Food. Soon after, the only remaining territory of Beluth was also captured by the cannibals. The last Persian prince fled east along the Silk Road, entered the Tang Dynasty, accepted the official position of the Tang Dynasty, and finally died of illness in Chang'an.
After that, the Tang Dynasty did not lose the upper hand in the battle with Dashi. The Tang army was defeated by Dashi only in one military conflict. As the saying goes, "Good things don't go out, bad things go through thousands of miles." This famous defeat was won by Dashi in many historical books.
During the Tianbao period of Emperor Xuanzong of Tang Dynasty, the famous Tang Dynasty general Gao Xianzhi led his army to cross natural obstacles such as Kunlun Mountains and Pamir Plateau and enter Central Asia. However, because Gao Xianzhi mistakenly killed the king of of Shiguo (in Uzbekistan today), it aroused public anger, causing the Shiguo to rebel and requested the Dashi to send troops to attack the Tang Dynasty.
Tenth Year of Tianbao (751) , in the Battle of Talas , the famous Tang Dynasty general Gao Xianzhi led tens of thousands of troops into 700 miles, and fought with the Dashi coalition forces for several days in Talas (in Kazakhstan today).
Because the Ge Luolu tribe in the Tang army turned against each other, Gao Xianzhi's army was in chaos and was eventually defeated by the Dashi Army. This was a crushing defeat in the prosperous Tang Dynasty when operating the Western Regions. Later historians believed that Gao Xianzhi "70,000 people were gone" and returned home in a defeat.
In fact, the Battle of Talas did not seriously damage the Tang Dynasty's vitality. Just two years later, Gao Xianzhi's good comrade-in-arms Feng Changqing was promoted to the governor of Anxi, and continued to attack westward, with the troops aimed directly at Dabolu, "defeat it, and return after surrendering." The Tang army still retained strong military strength in Central Asia.
It was not until after the Anshi Rebellion that the Tang Dynasty's national strength declined and had no time to look west, so it left Central Asia to the Arab Empire.
Another achievement left in cultural history by the Battle of Talas comes from a literati named Duhuan.
Du Huan was born into the famous Jingzhao Du family. He went on a war with the Tang army during the Battle of Talas, but was unfortunately captured by the cannibals. The Arabs saw that this guy was a talented person, so they took him from Samarkand to Mulu (also known as Molu, which is now Mare in Turkmenistan) .
Samarkand section in "Silk Road Landscape Map Scroll" in the Forbidden City in Beijing | Internet
In Mulu, Du Huan lived for 5 years. According to his recollection, the irrigation here is developed, the land is fertile, the oasis is "connected with villages and intersecting trees", and the town is "high and thick, and the city is flat".
Later, Dashi built a capital in Baghdad (in present-day Iraq) , transferred back to the army stationed in Mulu, and Du Huan and other groups of prisoners of war came to the Mesopotamian River Basin with the army. Here, Du Huan discovered that Han people had long passed the Silk Road to the Arab world, including painters in the capital and textile workers in Hedong.
Du Huan later recorded their names in his works. They were just ordinary people who survived in the cracks between two empires. Historical scholars believe that China's inventions such as papermaking, gunpowder, , were spread from the Silk Road to the West.
After coming to West Asia, Du Huan's movements were relatively free. He traveled through three different religious areas and became the first Chinese to visit Jerusalem and leave records. Then he crossed the desert westward and entered the Moroccan area in North Africa.
Baoying's early years (762) , Du Huan, who had been in a foreign land for many years, returned to Guangzhou by sea by merchant ship, and later wrote this long Silk Road trip into the book " Jingxing Ji ". The book
has now been lost, and only a few contents have been compiled into "Tongdian" by Du Huan's fellow tribe.
, Du Huan, who was unlucky, became the only Chinese who had clearly recorded visiting Africa and left behind his works. This record was not broken until the era of unprecedented prosperity of maritime trade in the Song and Yuan dynasties.
Morocco Street View | Photo Network ©
Ocean Road
Arab traveler Ma Sudi mentioned in his book the situation of Central Asian trade from China after the mid-to-late Tang Dynasty. After the Anshi Rebellion, because Tubo and Uighur tribes occupied the Silk Road, blocking the East-West transportation, Samarkand merchants in Central Asia wanted to go to the Tang Dynasty to do business, they needed to go west to Basra, Iraq, and then sell some goods in Arabia, then go to India, and go to China by sea, and go around a big circle in the known Asian world at that time.
The destination of these Central Asian businessmen is Guangzhou .
As early as the Western Han Dynasty, when the King of Nanyue ruled Lingnan, its capital Panyu (now Guangzhou) had traded with East China Sea and even Central and West Asian countries through the South China Sea. In the tomb of the King of Nanyue unearthed in Guangzhou, Persian silver boxes, dragonfly eye glass, lamp-holding beard figurines and other cultural relics with exotic characteristics appeared.
By the Tang Dynasty, Guangzhou was an important port on the Maritime Silk Road. When traffic on the Silk Road on the land was cut off, Western merchants continued to transport goods to Guangzhou through the Maritime Silk Road.
At the end of the Tang Dynasty, Chang'an, the starting point of the land Silk Road, and Guangzhou, the important city of the Maritime Silk Road, suffered a devastating blow almost at the same time.
According to Arab historical records, after the rebel army headed south into Guangzhou, in order to plunder military capital, they massacred Arab merchants living here. At the same time, those who were killed include believers who believe in Nescent and Manichaeism.
After resting in Guangzhou, Huang Chao led his army northward and advanced towards Guanzhong, and fought to Chang'an, the capital of the Tang Dynasty. The reign of Emperor Xizong of Tang sent troops to quell the rebellion, and fled to Shu in shame. Although the Huang Chao's uprising army was later destroyed by various Tang troops, the Tang Empire was about to die.
Guangzhou was burned by Huang Chao's war and quickly regained its vitality. During the Song and Yuan dynasties, China's shipbuilding technology was ahead of the world, and port cities such as Guangzhou, Quanzhou and Ningbo continued to continue the prosperity of the Wanli Maritime Silk Road. Silk, ceramics, spices and other goods are circulated between the East and the West.
13th century, Marco Polo travel route | Jinxiu Humanistic Geography
Until today, after several rises and falls, Guangzhou still has vigorous vitality.
However, at the eastern end of the land Silk Road, Chang'an, the imperial capital of the Han and Tang Dynasties, never restored the glory of the former Silk Road.
British historian Hopkins commented in "Globalization in World History": "Before the great voyage of Da Gama and Magellan, on the Eurasian continent and the vast Indian Ocean, the major ancient central civilizations had formed a symbiotic circle through land and sea routes. This kind of economic, trade, cultural and political exchange is a kind of classical version of globalization ."
On the Silk Road, the monsoon of the times swept by, taking away the caravan's camel bells, and the past that shocked the ages.
References:
[Han] Sima Qian: "Records of the Grand Historian", Zhonghua Book Company, 1982
[Han] Ban Gu: "Han Shu", Zhonghua Book Company, 1962
[Jin] Fa Xian, Zhang Xun's annotation: "Annotation of Fa Xian Chuan", Zhonghua Book Company, 2008
[Southern Dynasty Song Dynasty] Fan Ye: "Book of the Later Han", Zhonghua Book Company, 2000
[Tang Dynasty] Fang Xuanling: "Book of Jin", Zhonghua Book Company, 1996
[Tang Dynasty] Xuanzang and Bian Ji, Ji Xianlin's annotation: "Annotation of the Western Regions of the Tang Dynasty", Zhonghua Book Company, 2000
Xiang Da: "Chang'an and Western Regions Civilization in the Tang Dynasty", Hebei People's Publishing House, 2007
Lin Meicun: "Fifteen Lectures on Archaeology of the Silk Road", Peking University Press, 2006
(English) Peter Franken: "Silk Road" : A brand new world history, Zhejiang University Press, 2016
Editor-in-chief of Li Wei: "Crossing the Silk Road: The Way to Discover the World", CITIC Publishing House, 2017
Guo Jianlong: "The Great History of the Silk Road: When Ancient China Meets the World", Tiandi Publishing House, 2021
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