The Silk Road was coined in 1877 by Ferdinand von Richthofen, a German geologist who visited China seven times. The concept has touched off a wide range of studies since then. Many scholars prefer to call the Silk Road as Silk Routes as there are many routes in history thorough which silk trade from China to the west was carried out. The Silk Road does not refer to a single trade route. This was a channel of exchanges connecting China in the east and Europe in the west. The specific routes, appearance and disappearance of these routes, commodities carried through these routes, functions and influences of these commodities are subjects worth further studying and exploring. The ancient Silk Road is a history we must understand while exploring the Road and Belt.

Multiple Silk Trade Routes

The Silk Road described by Ferdinand von Richthofen mainly refers to an overland route between Asia and Europe, a route that went through deserts, the Gobi, and oases. Such a trade route diverged and converged before it went into central Asia and then Iran before it reached the Mediterranean Sea.

The French sinologist Édouard Émmannuel Chavannes (1865-1918) claimed in 1903 that there existed a maritime silk road between China and Europe. The Silk Road, in his opinion, was composed of a maritime route and an overland route. In 1968, a Japanese scholar also explored the Maritime Silk Road in a book. In China, Chen Yan was the earliest scholar who concerned himself with the study of the Maritime Silk Road in 1980. Chen then published a series of articles further exploring the shipping routes that connected China and countries in other parts of Asia and Europe. Some scholars have suggested the existence of Grassland Silk Road. But this route expects more studies and researches.

The most influential study about multiples silk trade routes was conducted by the UNESCO from 1988 to 1998. The ten-year project saw five field studies. In 1990, scholars explored the route from Xi’an to Kashgar in Xinjiang. From 1990 to 1991, experts looked into a maritime silk road from Venice to Nagasaki. In 1991, experts probed the grassland silk route that reached the central Asia. In 1992, experts examined the silk route operated by the nomads through Mongolia. In 1995, experts probed the silk trade route opened by Buddhist disciples that connected China and Nepal.

Multiple Silk Routes in China

There were four silk routes across China. The major route started from Chang’an and Luoyang and went westward through a long corridor west of the Yellow River into Xinjiang. This road thrived during the Han Dynasty (206BC-220AD) and the Tang Dynasty (618-907). The second route went through the north of China. It is known as the Grassland Silk Road. The third route zigzagged through Sichuan, Yunnan and Tibet in the southwest of China. The fourth route was the Maritime Silk Road that went south and west from the coastal provinces of eastern China.

The Earliest Silk Road

The silk routes responded to the development of civilizations across the world. Studies indicate that silk routes formed and extended through three different periods. The first silk route formed in the bronze era and the early iron era and went westward through the grasslands. The route that went through deserts and oases thrived in the Warring States, the Han and the Tang dynasties. The Maritime Silk Road thrived in the Song, the Yuan and the Ming dynasties. Silk was carried on to the west through grasslands by nomads.

The Silk Road Blocked in the Tang

Over two thousand years ago, two things happened in the west and the east that seriously impacted the Silk Road through the deserts. In the west, the rise of the Rome Empire and the eastward expedition of Alexander the Great changed the map of the world. In the east, Zhang Qian (?-114BC), a diplomat of the Western Han (206BC-8AD), opened up a trade route to the west. A route that went through deserts and connected one oasis with the next took form as Zhang Qian trekked westward. The road was utilized by people such as diplomats, traders and monks in the states along the road. The road was kept open by military forces of the states and the Tang. However, as the Tang forces were defeated in 751 by an Arab army in battle at Talas River near Samarkand, the overland Silk Road was blocked.

Any Silk in Sunken Ships found in Southeast Asia?

In the middle of the Tang, the Chinese government gave up the control of the Silk Road and the western region of China fell apart. Meanwhile, the economic center shifted to the south, and ports in southeastern China thrived. The Maritime Silk Road started in 661 when a government office was set up in Guangzhou to administer international trade affairs. From the sunken ships found in the Southeast countries in modern times, a lot of porcelain products from China were salvaged. At the bottom of South Sea No. 1, a Chinese cargo ship of the Southern Song Dynasty that sank on its outbound journey, scientists studied the sediments on the bottom of the ship and found traces of silk. The evidence indicates that the ship carried some silk products in its cargo holds. In the Sui and the Tang Dynasty, ships that sailed out to overseas destinations carried silk as a major product. It was in the Song (960-1279) and the Yuan (1279-1368) dynasties that porcelain replaced silk as the major commodity.

Silk Found in Sweden

Silk was the major commodity on the Silk Road zigzagging through deserts and oases. Archaeologists have found silk remains from tombs both in Xinjiang and Pazyryk cemetery. The silk was manufactured in the Warring States period of China. The silk remains found in Gansu and Xinjiang go back to the Han and the Tang dynasties. Chinese silk made in the Tang has been found in Norway and Sweden. Though no silk has been directly found to indicate silk was shipped from China to overseas destination, there is indirect evidence. Buddha sculptures of the 9th century in Southeast Asia feature fabric patterns that look apparently like those made in the Tang Dynasty. Some Buddha sculptures of the 12th and 13th centuries in Indonesia present fabric patterns made in the Song Dynasty.

Cotton Fabrics Shipped to China

Cotton-woven fabrics originated in the South-Asian Subcontinent. In China’s Han (206BC-220AD) and the Western Jin periods (265-316), cotton fabrics were carried to China through the overland Silk Road from the northern India. Excavated from the tombs in Xinjiang that date back to the Han and the Western Jin are some cotton fabrics. In the Tang Dynasty, cotton as a crop was cultivated in Xinjiang. In the Song Dynasty, cotton fabrics were shipped in large quantities to China through the Maritime Silk Road. Books written in the Song and the Yuan mention cotton fabrics imported from the “Western Sea”, a then common epithet for the fabrics made in the South Asian Subcontinent.

Silk as Currency

On the silk routes, silk was more than a commodity that changed hands. In some cases, it was a hard currency in trade. In some bid deals, silk was used as currency to buy livestock and slaves. According to ancient documents, a horse could be bought for 15 bolts of silk in Dunhuang and Turpan. In the Tang Dynasty, three kinds of currencies were used: Persian silver coins, copper coins of the Tang, and silk.

Ethnic Fusion through Silk Trade

Business people came with caravans to China in early years. Among them were Sogdians in the region of Maracanda (modern Samarkand). Along the silk roads were many settlements of Sogdians. These settlements were in present-day Suyab, Kashgar, Hetian, Dunhuang, Chang’an, Taiyuan, and Datong. They married outside their tribes and converted to some other religions. Arabs who came to China through the Maritime Silk Road also set up large settlements in China. Especially, Guangzhou and Quanzhou were two large cities where international communities were large toward the end of the Tang. Quanzhou in Fujian was a port city where Arabs formed a large community. These foreigners spread their religions in China.

Sericulture Traveled Four Centuries to Reach Europe

The Silk Road was a road that also promoted cultural exchanges and communication. What went through the silk routes included geology, astronomy, mathematics, physics, chemistry, agriculture, medicine, transport skills, music, dance, murals, silk, gold and silver gadgets, porcelain, and painting.

Sericulture and silk craftsmanship appeared in Xinjiang in the 2nd to 3rd centuries. From Xinjiang, it continued to move westward and prospered in central Asia in the 4th to 5th centuries. It spread to Minor Asia in the early 6th century. According to history, during the rule of Justinian the Great, a Persian talked about the genesis of silkworm in Byzantine. This is the earliest mention of silkworm in European literature.