The Silk Roads - Highways of Culture and Commerce

Towards the middle of the 20th century, scholarly research revealed that the fabled Silk Roads, far from being mere trade routes, were cultural highways that played a pivotal role in linking east and west, intermittently bringing together nomads and city dwellers, pastoral peoples and farmers, merchants and monks, and soldiers and pilgrims. The notion of movement is therefore central to an understanding of the relations between peoples; it is also the factor of which specialists have, for various reasons, not taken sufficient account. It is in this context that the Silk Roads Project, initiated by UNESCO, assumes its significance. It has proved very fruitful and led to a large variety of projects of which this volume presents a selection. Although the papers collected here are wide-ranging, they reveal the emergence of the concept of a common heritage and plural identity. The studies carried out under the Project have shown that identity, seen from a long-term perspective, cannot be viewed as a ghetto or an enclosure, but as the result of a whole process of synthesis and encounter between peoples and cultures. (from the Introduction)

List of contents

Foreword

Doudou Diène

Contributors

List of Abbreviations

Introduction: Approaches Old and New to the Silk Roads

Vadime Elisseeff

Chapter 1. Perspectives on Buddhism in Dunhuang during the Tang and Five Dynasties Period

Henrik H. Sørensen

Chapter 2. The Expansion of Buddhism into Southeast Asia (Mainly before A.D. 1000)

J.G. de Casparis

Chapter 3. The Travels of Marco Polo in the Land of Buddhism

Ananda Abeydeera

Chapter 4. Indus-Gulf Relations: A Reassessment in the Light of New Evidence

Nilofer Shaikh

Chapter 5. The Southern Silk Road: Archaeological Evidence of Early Trade between India and Southeast Asia

Ian C. Glover

Chapter 6. An Inscription in Memory of Sayyid Bin Abu Ali: A Study of Relations between China and Oman from the

Eleventh to the Fifteenth Century

Liu Yingsheng

Chapter 7. The Mongol Empire in the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries: East-West Relations

Bira Shagdar

Chapter 8. A Brunei Sultan of the Early Fourteenth Century: A Study of an Arabic Gravestone

Chen Da-sheng

Chapter 9. Caravanserais along the Grand Trunk Road in Pakistan: A Central Asian Legacy

Saifur Rahman Dar

Chapter 10. Maritime Trade from the Fourteenth to the Seventeenth Century: Evidence from the Underwater Archaeological Sites in the Gulf of Siam

Sayan Prishanchit

Chapter 11. The Ban on the Export of Certain Articles from the Levant to the Mediterranean Ports during the Fifteenth and Sixteenth Centuries

Zeki Arikan

Chapter 12. The Impact of the Macao-Manila Silk Trade from the Beginnings to 1640

Rui D’Ávila Lourido

Chapter 13. Inner Asian Muslim Merchants at the Closure of the Silk Routes in the Seventeenth Century

Isenbike Togan

Chapter 14. The Exchange of Musical Influences between Korea and Central Asia in Ancient Times

Song Bang-Song

Chapter 15. The Trade Routes and the Diffusion of Artistic Traditions in South and Southeast Asia

Nandana Chutiwongs

Chapter 16. The Development of China’s Navigation Technology and of the Maritime Silk Route

Sun Guangqi

Chapter 17. Mongol Nomadic Pastoralism: A Tradition between Nature and History

Jacques Legrand

Chapter 18. The Spiritual Identity of the Silk Roads: A Historical Overview of Buddhism and Islam

Amir H. Zekrgoo

Appendix: International Seminars and Colloquiums Held during the UNESCO Silk Roads Expeditions

About the author

Vadime Elisseeff (1918-2002) was Chairman of the UNESCO International Consultative Committee of the Silk Roads during the ten years of its existence. He is a specialist in the archaeology and history of the Far East and has held a number of important posts in national and international academic or cultural institutions such as that of General Inspector of the Museums of France and Director of Research in Archaeology of the Far East at the Ecole pratique des hautes études en sciences sociales, Paris, and was a member of the French Commission for Archaeological Excavations from 1955 to 1968.

Summary

Towards the middle of the 20th century, scholarly research revealed that the fabled Silk Roads, far from being mere trade routes, were cultural highways that played a pivotal role in linking east and west, intermittently bringing together nomads and city dwellers, pastoral peoples and farmers, merchants and monks, and soldiers and pilgrims. The notion of movement is therefore central to an understanding of the relations between peoples; it is also the factor of which specialists have, for various reasons, not taken sufficient account. It is in this context that the Silk Roads Project, initiated by UNESCO, assumes its significance. It has proved very fruitful and led to a large variety of projects of which this volume presents a selection. Although the papers collected here are wide-ranging, they reveal the emergence of the concept of a common heritage and plural identity. The studies carried out under the Project have shown that identity, seen from a long-term perspective, cannot be viewed as a ghetto or an enclosure, but as the result of a whole process of synthesis and encounter between peoples and cultures. (from the Introduction)

Product details

• Authors: Vadim Elisseeff, Vadime Elisseeff
• Assisted by: Vadime Elisseeff (Editor)
• Publisher: Ingram Publishers Services
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 01.07.2000
• EAN: 9781571812216
• ISBN: 978-1-57181-221-6
• No. of pages: 352
• Dimensions: 145 mm x 222 mm x 22 mm
• Weight: 574 g
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > History > Regional and national histories; Non-fiction book > History > Miscellaneous; Social sciences, law, business > Business > General, dictionaries; History (General)