Silk Road

Traveling the Roads

The Silk Road was regularly traveled in both directions. From China, the Silk Road begins at Chang'an, although trade was also conducted with Japan. The Silk Road passes west through China [Page 1179]along the Gansu corridor to Dunhuang. From Dunhuang, travelers either used the northern route around the Taklamakan Desert through Kucha and the foothills of the Tian Shan Mountains or the southern route to Khotan. From Khotan, travelers could go south across the Kun Lun and Himalayan mountain ranges to India or rejoin the northern route at Kashgar. From Kashgar, paths led south across the Pamir Mountains to Kashmir, but the main route led west to Samarqand. Beyond Samarqand, one route turned north at Bukhara, passing Khiva on the way to the Caspian Sea. Alternatively, the Silk Road continued west across Persia to the Mediterranean. Other trade routes extended through Arabia, North Africa, and Europe. Merchants generally did not travel the full length of the Silk Road. They instead acted as intermediaries who carried goods along a portion of the route and acquired different goods to trade on the return trip. Most products were exchanged between neighboring regions rather than being carried to the end points of the Silk Road.

Trade and Commodities

As the name implies, silk was an important commodity often carried by trade caravans from southern China to the Near East, Arabia, or Rome. The silk trade accounted for a substantial portion of state revenue, so the Chinese ordered all aspects of silk production to be kept secret: Anyone attempting to smuggle silkworm eggs or mulberry leaves out of China would be put to death. Sassanian Persian merchants, often middlemen for the silk trade, also understood the value of the secret and sometimes propagated disinformation about the origin of silk and the methods of its production. Despite attempts at secrecy, a fifth-century Chinese princess successfully smuggled silkworm eggs to Khotan by hiding them in her hair. In the sixth century, two Nestorian monks hid silkworm eggs in hollowed staves and carried them to the Byzantine court in Constantinople. Trading silk to the West was a lucrative business, but silk was not the only commodity traded on the Silk Road. Horses, gold, precious gems, jade, fabrics, and produce were carried by caravans between Silk Road towns. Unavoidably, travelers also spread cultures and ideas, with a noteworthy example being advances in medical science.

History along the Silk Road

People, commodities, ideas, religions, music, and art moved along the Silk Road since the fourth century BCE, when the Macedonian empire of Alexander the Great expanded east from Greece as far as Kashmir. Aspects of Hellenistic Greek culture influenced developments in Central Asian art, architecture, language, religion, and coinage.

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